Sync unRAID Servers Over the Internet

[Spyderturbo007]

I recently build a new box so I still have my old server minus the drives, sitting in a closet.  I set my parents up with a HTPC, but it only has a 1TB drive and every time they want something I have to load it on an external drive and physically take it to their house.  I was wondering what would be involved in adding drives to my old server and syncing everything over the Internet.

 

It would be a one way sync from my box to theirs, only because they won't be adding anything to the server.

 

I looked at rsync, but I'm completely confused.  Can anyone shed some light on what the best plan would be, or if it is even possible?  Keep in mind, I know just enough to preclear a drive and even then I get confused. 

 

EDIT->  I just noticed I posted this in the v6 section.  Can a moderator move it to the v5 section?

[bkastner]

I can't comment directly on your question, but thought I would offer up my suggestion to a similar situation.

 

I have Plex running on my UnRAID server and just set my parents up with a Plex client. I had them running XBMC with an external drive, but got tired of having to refresh the data. With Plex they can see/access everything that I have on my UnRAID server without me having to do anything. If you are going to take this approach I would suggest either a Windows or Android as there can be a wide variation in the clients, and ones like Roku outright suck. The nice thing about this solution is you can pick up a good Android client for $100.

 

Again, not an answer to your specific question, but the easiest/most cost effective solution I found. The only caveat is they are now using bandwidth for everything they watch (as it's streaming from your server). This hasn't been a problem yet for me, but they have an option of paying an extra $10/month for unlimited downloads, which we may do if it comes to it. It's still a pretty cheap solution.

[gundamguy]

Becuase I am a little confused are you trying to sync an unRAID server with another unRAID server at your parents house, or are you thinking of syncing data on your unRAID server with a device running another OS at your parents house.

 

Rsync is likely the best approach for you to do this, but depending on internet speeds and how much data you want to transfer could take awhile for the first sync.

[Spyderturbo007]

Becuase I am a little confused are you trying to sync an unRAID server with another unRAID server at your parents house, or are you thinking of syncing data on your unRAID server with a device running another OS at your parents house.

 

Rsync is likely the best approach for you to do this, but depending on internet speeds and how much data you want to transfer could take awhile for the first sync.

 

I would have one unRAID server at my house and another unRAID server at my parents house.  I would like mine to sync it's data with theirs on a regular basis.  I was planning on doing the initial sync at my house and then moving it offsite to their house.  I'm just not sure how to do it.

[trurl]

I think some are using Crashplan this way. Saves you the trouble of setting up VPNs and doing command line stuff to schedule command line stuff.

 

I haven't tried it but you might search the forum.

[gundamguy]

Becuase I am a little confused are you trying to sync an unRAID server with another unRAID server at your parents house, or are you thinking of syncing data on your unRAID server with a device running another OS at your parents house.

 

Rsync is likely the best approach for you to do this, but depending on internet speeds and how much data you want to transfer could take awhile for the first sync.

 

I would have one unRAID server at my house and another unRAID server at my parents house.  I would like mine to sync it's data with theirs on a regular basis.  I was planning on doing the initial sync at my house and then moving it offsite to their house.  I'm just not sure how to do it.

 

Well if you’re planning on doing manual syncs instead of automatic syncs it's a bit easier.

 

What you want to do is something like the following.

 

rsync -avz --progress /source user@remoteaddres:/dest

This will create a ssh connection.  --progress -v -z are not strictly required but you might want them, you might also want other arguments depending on what you want rsync to do.

 

I also imagine that this requires you to forward ports to your unRAID box, which is not generally recommend without taking security precautions that I'm not sure I can explain (I don't do this myself... not yet anyway)