FreeNAS has always been a popular options I’ve heard of from people wanting to build NAS devices. FreeNAS is based on BSD and is an incredibly small and lightweight operating system. The download is only about 100MB.
Ease of Use
I have to admit I was pretty impressed with the ease of use and set up initially. The testing was conducted on a virtual machine, which worked great. When trying to install it onto my hardware, I encountered issues with network card drivers. I was only able to obtain a loopback connection, since the RealTek GbE family apparently does not have any drivers built in to FreeBSD. I started searching for drivers, and found a bunch of answers about just grabbing the source from X, compiling it on another BSD machine, and then loading it into your install image. One forum member was kind enough to include the compiled drivers and instructions that still seemed to require me to have another BSD system and a good understanding. I’m not against learning, but for this implementation I simply want something that I can use today, not in a few months from now.
Everything is managed through the web interface. When the machine boots up, it presents a screen with the machines IP address and a few basic options, including the option to go to a terminal. E-mail notification is also available.
Ultimately, the reason I rule this option out for my use isn’t even due to the network drivers, because that’s a relatively small issue. That just prevents me from working hard enough to give the rest of you performance results! The limitation for me is that there is no straightforward way to run Plex Media Server or common online backup solutions. Without the need or desire for these, I would probably strongly consider this option.
Verdict
Ease of Use: 4/5 (If it supports your hardware)
Drive loss limit: 1 (2 or 3 is also an option)
Performance: N/A
Expansion / Upgrade options: Online Expansion and Drive Replace.
Efficiency: N-1 (2 or 3 drive parity is also an option).
Cost: Free
Viable: Yes, for NAS specific functionality.