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How to Make External USB Storage Available on Network

guruerror

Version: SFVH (SFOS 17.0.3 MR-3)

Is it possible to attach external storage via USB and make it available to the LAN?

I've demoted my Linksys WRT1900AC to a bridge to gain the added security of having an XG firewall.  The only feature I appear to be 'losing' is the ability to attach my USB RAID storage and make it available to internal network users.

I've done some due diligence in searching the forum (and Google) for ways to make this available under the XG OS, but it would appear that this is not a feature that is currently available.  Can someone please confirm?  ...or let me know if I've missed an option somewhere.

As mentioned above, I'm running SFVH (SFOS 17.0.3 MR-3) on a Dell desktop...so I have available USB ports.

Thanks in advance.



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  • +1

    Hi,

    that is not a feature of any real network security device, it is a security risk. You will need to have a switch or something similar within your network that can put usb devices on your internal network.

    I would further suggest you buy a cheap modem and put your linksys on your network as the USB access and WIFI AP.

    Ian

  • 0 in reply to rfcat_vk

    Thanks for the quick reply.  That was my line of thinking also, but thought I'd throw the question out there.

    The problem with the WRT1900AC is that when you put it in Bridge mode you lose the 'Attached Storage' capability; and my core switch is an Adtran 1534p and I don't think it has external storage capability, for similar reasons.

    It's really a small concern considering the added security I'm gaining from the XG.  I'll simply figure out another solution for my network storage.

    Thanks again for the quick reply.

  • +1 in reply to guruerror

    Hi,

    use the linksys on your network, don't put it in bridge mode, just don't connect anything to the wan interface and make sure all devices point at the XG for their gateway and DNS.

    Ian

  • 0

    Have a real file server (or nas) makes more sense i think. You can get it cheap with raspberry pi and your exist usb storage. Or you can buy a smb nas like synology/qnap/readynas

  • 0 in reply to daiqingxu

    Hi,

    yes, all very good, but to get a good performance on those NAS devices you need to spend about $1000 on just the chassis. I have a NAS which was so so slow it wil not even format the disks when I tried to upgrade it as the disk array for my fileserver (MS2012 SMB). Ended using using USB 3.1 disks. The NAS cost about $400 without disks and its throughput with many functions disabled was abysmal.

    You already have the equipment, stay with it.

    Ian

    Update:- I reviewed the raspberry PIx things and they all seem to come with a 100mb/s interface, not good for file sharing or multi-user environment.

  • 0 in reply to rfcat_vk

    If you buy a smb nas and expect to run as a san, then you definitely will run in problems.

    Device like DS218j(170$) can sature 1GBE on large file transfer and will outperform WRT1900AC easily, and provide a easy ui to work with at same time.

    Added: pi is cheap and can provide reasonable speed if what you need is just share some small doc/mp3 files between devices.

  • 0 in reply to rfcat_vk

    And to your situation.

    SAN only make sense when you run HA EMC/3par or similar.

    What you need is DAS, like usb drive or SAS Enclosure

  • 0 in reply to daiqingxu

    Sorry, it was a NAS (same as the DS218+) and the reviews all said the same thing. It was much more powerful than a PI, has dual 1gb NICs and would never go above 105mb/s on single user file transfer. I have reviewed a number of devices from different manufacturers all around the same price and have similar performance figures. My setup was as per recommendations.

     

    Ian

  • 0 in reply to rfcat_vk

    Didn't that expected performance? To go beyond 1Gbps either you need SMB multichannel (which is a feature only avaliable in windows server since 2012 which cost a lot of $) and proper network gear and multi link from end to end. Or you need a 10Gbps network.

  • 0 in reply to daiqingxu

    I think you miss read the performance 105mb/s, not 105 MB/s. The device is fitted with dual NICs but cannot feed them due to CPU limitations.

    Anyway the DS218+ appears to run rings around my qnap device.

    Ian