USB port functionality

[chm8v]

I'd like to use my Almond+ for a network attached hard drive, but have some questions. On my current setup(different router), it's clunky at best and limited in functionality.  With the Almond+, can I attach a USB hub and then attach multiple hard drives?  Or better yet, can I use something like this multi drive enclosure?
If this does work, how does it show up in Samba?  Each drive as separate mount points?

thanks
-Chris

[eldaria]

Although I have not tested it, it should not be any issue using a hub, just make sure the Hub is USB 3 compliant if you plan on using USB 3 drives otherwise your hub will be a bottleneck.

Each drive you connect to it's own USB port should get it's own mount point and therefore also show up individually.

For an enclosure with multiple drives the question get's more tricky as it depends on the enclosure, some have integrated Raid controllers and do not present the drives directly unless you specifically configure it as such. Instead they can present for example a mirrored pair of drives as one.

[LGNilsson]

We haven't done much with Samba yet, so I wouldn't recommend using it until we've fixed it properly.
That said, a multi-drive enclosure works, but I've not tried to connect one to the Almond+ in anything but RAID mode.
I can give it a try and see if it works well. Hubs work too.
We have two USB 3.0 ports which is still unique as far as I know, so you could attach two drives this way around as well.

[mparadis]

What if one used a usb 3.0 hub connected one of the ports. Would the individual drives show up?

[LGNilsson]

Yes, that would work.

[mparadis]

Thanks Lars! Just wanted to make sure that I was understanding that correctly. I know you've been catching a lot of flak from some users on here and while the almond+ isn't there yet, I still believe in the end it will be and I understand these issues take time to resolve.

[LGNilsson]

Just tested with the enclosure I have here, set it up to use the drives as two individual drives and that works too, as they show up as two separate drives once the enclosure is connected to the Almond+.
What I don't know is how well it would work with an enclosure for say 7-8 drives and I'd really suggest running RAID on something like that anyhow.
I also tested to write to both drives at the same time via FTP and that works just fine as well. The performance will of course drop a bit, but again, we still have a fair bit of work to do on the storage side of things so this will hopefully improve.

One thing about USB hubs though, you need to use powered hubs, bus powered hubs won't work.

[jeffmcneill]

I too would like to use the USB for NAS. Idea of when that support will be available in an update? I'll put it in my calendar and check back then. Thanks for the excellent device and support!

[LGNilsson]

It is sort of working already, it's just not that usable if you're using anything else than Windows, due to some stupid bug with the drive capacity showing up incorrect.
I don't have an ETA I'm afraid, but it'll be in the firmware release notes once it's done.

[jeffmcneill]

Hi, thanks for the response. I've got OSX/Linux so will have to wait. I'll put a reminder to check at end of January. I'm sure you guys will be busy until at least then on other stuff.