mystik

I saw mention in another forum of someone running from a USB or VM. Forgive my ignorance on this. I know that UnRAID is an OS. I know that it is not an application that you can write to a USB drive, put into a Windows system, and run it. I am positive that any mention of using with a USB means that you boot from that USB drive and then run the OS that way. There is just one part I would like clarification on... Is it that you just "setup" the drives while booted into the OS, and then they can be accessed from a Windows system? If I am correct, that is not exactly the case even if the OS is used only for setup (without a special driver)...because unRAID uses ZFS, BUT, is that even how it works anyway, or does that server have to be running all the time (what I suspect)? What I am getting at is... I have a desktop PC and an HTPC (both Windows)...and an external drive enclosure (not a NAS) connected to the desktop PC. I have the enclosure's files shared through the desktop PC, and I can access them on the HTPC via wired network. Can I use unRAID with this setup without buying additional hardware? I think the answer is "no", but I wanted to be sure. Perhaps something has changed on that front with newer versions. Thank you.

Sorry to necro an old post, but since it is very related, seems like the best place. I am looking for something. I don't have experience with Linux. So, knowing the commands for doing various updates may be an issue. I installed Mint and then Kodi, and that all worked ok, but when I rebooted, the Rii i8+ did not connect. So, no keyboard/mouse. It was enough to put me off of that route. So, now I am thinking OpenElec/LibreElec or KodiBuntu. It seems like KodiBuntu may have been discontinued, though. I have a very beefy HTPC. It's the latest Intel NUC, 16 GB RAM, SSD (don't ask why it's so beefy...I know it's not quite needed for this purpose). So, resources is not really an issue. I'm just tired of dealing with Windows for the HTPC. Mainly because I want to solve a playback issue I have with an addon, and I think switching over to a Linux base would do it (it fixes on Windows if I close and re-open Kodi). What would you recommend considering this? Ideally, I would like to get something that will update on its own. Is there something like that?

I am brand new to UnRAID. I have been using RAID systems for many years, but have finally hit the last straw for those setups. I had an 8-bay RAID5 system, and a second drive failed during rebuild. Obviously, if I had it to do over, I would have gone RAID6, but moving forward... One thing that I want to do now with the new setup is use mixed size drives. The reason is I had all 3 TB drives in my last RAID system, but now I have an 8TB drive I had been using, trying to recover everything as much as possible before getting back setup. I would like to use this drive in my configuration, ideally with being able to keep the content already on the drive now. I have seen products like FlexRAID that can do all of this, but wasn't sure if it was the best solution. Plus, they do not seem speedy to reply to support. So, still looking. But, here's the reason for this post: When my last RAID system failed, it decided to die out too. Unfortunately, I didn't have $1000 to replace it. So, I bought a base 8-bay drive enclosure. I have a Windows desktop that I am connecting it to. I also have an HTPC, but it does not have an eSATA port, which is how I will be connecting the drive enclosure. So... Can I use UnRAID with this setup? That is, can it be used on top of a Windows system, or must it be its own OS only? Thanks much in advance. I appreciate any and all feedback.