storage

64 Articles

The WebStick Is A Small, Cheap NAS

September 9, 2023 by 23 Comments

The ESP8266 was one of the first chips that provided wireless functionality at a cost low enough to be widely popular for small microcontroller projects. This project uses one to provide rapid, small, and inexpensive network-attached storage (NAS) capabilities wherever you happen to go.

With an ESP12F board at the heart to provide network connectivity, the small device also hosts a micro SD card slot and a USB-A port to provide power and programming capabilities for the device. It’s Arduino-compatible, and creator [tobychui] has provided the firmware source code necessary to bring it up on your network and start serving up files. Originally intended for people to host web services without experience setting up all of the tools needed for it, there’s services for storing and streaming music and video over the network as well.

While it includes a lot more functionality than is typically included on a NAS, [tobychui] notes that with a library, something like WebDAV could be added to provide more traditional NAS capabilities. As it stands, though, having networked storage with web hosting capabilities on a PCB with a total cost of around $5 is not something to shy away from. If you’re looking for something a little more powerful for your home network, take a look at this ARM-based NAS instead.

Get A Fresh Build Plate At The Push Of A Button

September 6, 2023 by 18 Comments

For best results, a build sheet for a 3D printer’s print bed should be handled and stored by the edges only. To help make that easier, [Whity] created the Expandable Steel Sheet Holder system that can store sheets efficiently without touching their main surfaces, and has a clever mechanism for ejecting them at the push of a button.

Pushing the button (red, bottom left) pivots the section at the top right, ejecting the plate forward for easy retrieval.

The design is 3D printable and made to be screwed to the bottom of a shelf, which is great for space saving. It can also be extended to accommodate as many sheets as one wishes, and there’s a clever method for doing that.

Once the first unit is fastened to a shelf, adding additional units later is as simple as screwing them to the previous one with a few M3 bolts, thanks to captive nuts in the previously-mounted unit. It’s a thoughtful feature that makes it easy to expand after the fact. Since build sheets come in a variety of different textures and surfaces for different purposes, one’s collection does tends to grow.

Interested, but want it to fit some other manufacturer’s sheets? The design looks easy to modify, but before you do that, check out the many remixes and you’re likely to find what you’re looking for. After all, flexible magnetic build sheets are useful in both resin and filament-based 3D printing.

DIY All-Flash NAS Vs. Commercial Hardware

July 20, 2023 by 36 Comments

[Jeff Geerling] has tried building his own network-attached storage before, but found that the Raspberry Pi just wasn’t able to keep pace with his demands. He’s back with a new all-flash NAS build, and put his new design to the test against proper store-bought gear.

His build is based around the ROCK 5 Model B, which is able to truck data around far faster than most other single-board computers. Internally, it can top 1 GB/sec without too much hassle. He decided to build a NAS rig using the board, putting it up against the turn-key ASUSTOR AS-T10G3.

Using OpenMediaVault to run the ROCK 5 as a NAS, [Jeff] was able to get decent performance out of the setup. With a 3-drive RAID 5 configuration, he recorded write and read speeds of 100 MB/sec and 200 MB/sec respectively, over a 2.5 Gbps network connection. There were also some spikes and curious performance wobbles. While speed was better than [Jeff]’s previous Raspberry Pi experiments, it wasn’t capable of double or triple the performance like he’d hoped. In comparison, the ASUSTOR solution was capable of much greater speeds. It topped out at 600 MB/sec write speeds, and 1.2 GB/sec on reads.

If you’re looking to build a high-performance DIY NAS, the ROCK 5 may be a better solution than most Raspberry Pi boards. However, if you want speed over all else, existing commercial NAS solutions really have the edge. Video after the break.

Continue reading “DIY All-Flash NAS Vs. Commercial Hardware” →

ADATA SSD Gets Liquid Cooling, But Not Everyone’s Convinced

June 3, 2023 by 19 Comments

Solid-state drives (SSDs) were a step change in performance when it came to computer storage. They offered incredibly fast seek times by virtue of dispensing with solid rust for silicon instead. Now, some companies have started pushing the limits to the extent that their drives supposedly need liquid cooling, as reported by The Register.

The device in question is the ADATA Project NeonStorm, which pairs a PCIe 5.0 SSD with RGB LEDs, a liquid cooling reservoir and radiator, and a cooling fan. The company is light on details, but it’s clearly excited about its storage products becoming the latest piece of high-end gamer jewelry.

Notably though, not everyone’s jumping on the bandwagon. Speaking to The Register, Jon Tanguy from Crucial indicated that while the company has noted modern SSDs running hotter, it doesn’t yet see a need for active cooling. In their case, heatsinks have proven enough. He notes that NAND flash used in SSDs actually operates best at 60 to 70 C. However, going beyond 80 C risks damage and most drives will shutdown or throttle access at this point.

Realistically, you probably don’t need to liquid cool your SSDs, even if you’ve got the latest and greatest models. However, if you want the most tricked out gaming machine on Twitch, there’s plenty of products out there that will happily separate you from your money.

A dark grey couch with a white pegboard on a drawer slide protruding from its arm. The pegboard has a magazine holder, pen holder, and several other miscellaneous bins holding odds and ends on it.

Sofa Armrest Is A Nifty Storage Spot

February 26, 2023 by 7 Comments

If you’re like us, you’re always in need of a little more space to store things. [Javier Guerrero] realized his sofa wasn’t living up to its full storage potential and designed this sofa armrest storage.

[Guerrero]’s sofa arms were hiding 80 liters of space, so he really wanted to do something with it. After disassembling them, he found his original plan of just cutting them up wouldn’t work due to the minimal structure inside. Not to be discouraged, he drew up some plans and built replicas from 15 mm plywood.

For one armrest, he made a single giant box that opens from the top where he can store a couple of folding chairs. On the other side, he made a shorter top-opening bin for charging phones and storing the remote. Underneath that is a large pull out drawer with a pegboard for organizational bliss.

The arms were upholstered using the fabric from the original arms plus a little extra from another slip cover. Separate arm modules and easily obtainable matching fabric aren’t a given for every couch, but we expect that almost any sofa with arms could benefit from this hack given a little ingenuity.

If you’re looking for more storage hacks, checkout this Modular Storage from Old Filament Spools, the Last Component Storage System You’d Ever Need, or the ever popular Gridfinity.

Weird Energy Storage Solutions Could Help The Grid Go Renewable

November 29, 2022 by 122 Comments

We’re all familiar with batteries. Whether we’re talking about disposable AAs in the TV remote, or giant facilities full of rechargeable cells to store power for the grid, they’re a part of our daily lives and well understood.

However, new technologies for storing energy are on the horizon for grid storage purposes, and they’re very different from the regular batteries we’re used to. These technologies are key to making the most out of renewable energy sources like solar and wind power that aren’t available all the time. Let’s take a look at some of these ideas, and how they radically change what we think of as a “battery.”

Continue reading “Weird Energy Storage Solutions Could Help The Grid Go Renewable” →

Organizational Inspiration From The Discount Tool Company

October 15, 2022 by 12 Comments

When in need of any tool to get a job done quickly, or only for a small number of times, it’s great to have a local “discount tool” company locally for some working, yet often low-quality solution to whatever problem might arise. While there are some gems, most of these tools won’t last through heavy, sustained use like their more expensive counterparts will. On the other hand, there are other things to be had at these discount shops, such as inspiration for tackling a storage problem.

This particular storage system comes from Harbor Freight, and uses a set linked crosshairs, the center of which is hollowed out. A set of movable compartments sits on top with feet that can interlock inside the crosshairs. This allows much more efficient use of space within the toolboxes, but [Alan] wanted it to be useful for more that that. He designed and implemented the Storage Case Base Template (SCBT) which allows for a container of any size to be fitted with a similar crosshair network.

With this non-proprietary system implemented and printed, the original goal of reducing the clutter in [Alan]’s workspace was accomplished. The 3D printing files can be modified easily for any space, and are available both on Thingiverse and Printables. For some other ways of packing a lot into a small space, we featured this tiny workshop a while back that’s packed with storage hacks.