On 19 December 2017 at 18:23, steve-ALUG@hst.me.uk wrote:
I do like me a Pi :-)
So I'd need a USB to SATA connector for each drive and a beefy PSU?
I'd use external drives which come with USB and their own power supplies (if the smaller 2.5" external drives will suffice then you likely would be able to power them through the Pi, in which case a beefy PSU would be needed).
It would possibly let you down on the speed of network/disk access though, depending on your requirements, but if so there are some less well known Pi-like boards (same form factor, better hardware) that do give USB3, Gigabit LAN, more RAM, etc.
Any suggestions on where to look?
I've "ordered" one of these: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/renegade-arm-computer-with-usb-3-on-andro...
It being crowd funding there's no guarantee I'll ever get it, never mind that it'll be any good, but on balance I decided to take a punt on it. The funding period hasn't quite finished yet so that's a option.
Otherwise Googling for "Pi alternative USB3 gigabit" throws up a few threads discussing alternatives (fr me it also shows a few products which turn out not to be USB3 or gigabit...)
Of-course you could also just do it all with a standard Pi and see whether the performance is sufficient for your needs before going further, maybe with a view to upgrading to Pi4 if/when such a thing exists.