Firefly an Maxtor Shared Storage II or Buffalo LS Homes. ?

@midi wrote:

I want to buy a NAS system to stream my WAV, FLAC and ALAC musicfiles with my Soundbridge M1001.

Two NAS devices are interesting for me:

1. the new Maxtor Shared Storage II (MSS II)
2. the Buffalo Linkstation Homeserver

I prefer the MMS II, because it´s faster and quiet.

I didn’t look exhaustively, but it doesn’t appear that the MSS II has hacked/optware firmware yet. The MSS+ does, but not he MSS II.

I may be wrong. If it doesn’t, then it will be difficult to get it working on the mss ii.

The linkstation appears to be a regular HG, which is a ppc device. It will (should?) run either openlink or freelink. For freelink, there are packages on the nightlies page, and it’s easy to get working assuming you know debian already. :-/

Othereise, openlink would be easier, but I don’t have a package prebuilt. I see them floating around the linkstation forums, though, so I think it’s available.

So generally, my thoughts would be that the linkstation would be more easily hackable, and if you already have linux experience and/or don’t mind hacking around on the thing, I’d go for linkstation running freelink.

If you didn’t want to mess with it, and just wanted something that would work, I might go with linkstation on openlink.

If you really, *really* wanted to hack, you could attack the mss II. Rebuild the firmware from the GPL package with backdoor, build a cross toolchain and see if you could get something compiled for the mss II.

🙂

After reading a lot of threads in different forums i´m not sure if it is possible to install and run FF on this devices without a lot of problems. I´m not a computer expert…

That’s how it read to me, too. I’d guess that would change, but right now the devices are pretty spendy, which makes people hesitate to take the risk of developing new firmware for them. They would be expensive bricks.

If it should be possible, which FF or mt-daap version is the right one ?

Thanks !

Almost all nas devices come with mt-daapd 0.2.4 built in firmware. The MSS II does, I’m not sure if the linkstation does. In either case, you reallyw ant to be running nightlies on it though, which means you’ll need to have a device that is hackable in the sense that people have already figured out a way to run custom software on them.

Which (again) makes the linkstations look more appealing.

None of them will be simple though — there’s a fair learning curve even just with regard to installing something someone else already compiled and set up for you.

If you are willing to hack on it, though, I think you’ll be happy with the results.

From a “lots of documentation” standpoint, the nslu2 isn’t a bad way to go either. With OS on flash disk and an external hdd, it’s a quiet and configurable platform.

— Ron

@midi wrote:

First – thank you very much !

But it seems to be very difficult with the MSS II. I think i keep my hands off the MSS II.

I´m looking for a Buffalo Linkstation oder nslu2 solution.

Sadly, there are no pre-installed Firefly devices like the Freecom FSG or better the INTRADISK with Twonky on the market. So you have to put a lot of time and energy to get the systems running. And a risk is still there.

True. But there have been *lots* of people through these forums that we’ve gotten set up on nslu2+mt-daapd nightlies. Lots. It might take a weekend, but you’ll get there.

Anyway, good luck. It’s a fun trip.

— Ron