[PogoPlug] cbalde04:
Problem:

I wanted a NAS server (with data redundancy) at my house without having to run a whole PC. I bought a Pogoplug Series 4 (<$20 on amazon.com), set it up, and moved everything. In the process, I found that the pogoplug (with its default firmware) did not play well with moving my pictures from my phone to the device, and I lost about a year's worth of memories. I looked to the raspberry pi. simple enough, but needed an additional USB hub (under powered and not enough USB ports), and the video output was unnecessary (as I would setting it up as a headless server). So, while playing with the pi, I looked back to my dusty Pogoplug.

Solution:

Hack the pogoplug to operate just as I would have with the raspberry pi. You can install the OS on an SD card now (thanks to the Devs for that), it has two USB 3.0 ports (which is not necessary since this particular model only has an 800Mhz processor), an additional port on top with a hard drive dock (which I wont use often), and you will only see one power cord, and the cords going to the drives, taking up about a "Rubik's Cube" worth of space (OK, a little more, but not much).

Pros: 3 powered USB ports (2 x USB3.0, 1 x USB2.0), small form factor, OS on SD card, Low power consumption

Cons: 800 Mhz Arm processor (though, the rPi is only 700 Mhz), which is the transfer speed bottleneck. Fast enough for me though, and most home use scenarios. Also, no video output, but thats actually a for my scenario. SSH only.

Materials:

1: Pogoplug Series 4 - Don't pay more than $20

2: 2 x External Hard Drives - I bought two new 1TB USB 3.0 portable drives to replace my two old 1TB clunky ones.

3: SD card - I recommend 8GB or larger. I personally used a 16GB microSD w/ adapter because it's just what I had laying around from an old cell phone.

4) Optional - Wireless LAN Adapter - I recomend the EDIMAX EW7811Un because it fits under the cover when used on the top USB2.0 port, it uses the RTL8188CUS chipset, and it's ridiculously cheap. You'll have to load the realtek firmware to get it to work on pogoplug (apt-get update && install firmware-realtek).

Instructions:

1

: The following instructions were copied from the following site (Hack the Pogoplug (v4/debian)). I figured it would help to have the info all in one place. This is an excellent tutorial for hacking the Pogoplug Series 4. Very easy to follow.

2

: Optional - Install wireless adapter and connect via WiFi (I did this so I wasn't tethered to a router)

3

: Setup Rsync via SSH - Since you will be running as the root user, you will omit the "sudo " from your commands. Be sure that when you enter "apt-get install rsync", you replace it with "apt-get install rsync cron" if you do not, then "crontab -e" will not work.

4

: Optional - Install DLNA client to stream to game console, chromecast, etc (I used miniDLNA, seems to work pretty good.)

Final Product:

Thoughts:

1: I tried following this link to install lsyncd for using with the Pogoplug. It worked, but I didnt want to accidently delete a file and have it delete instantly from the backup. So I just stick with RSYNC.

2: Now that I see the Pogoplug Pro has two 800 Mhz processors, I may research this same type of setup on that device. But I do like having the OS on an SD card. I would have to use a USB flash drive if I switched. I had already committed to the Pogoplug Series 4.

3: I understand that the costs incurred total over $20 when you factor in the SD card, External Hard Drives, and optional wireless adapter. This is simply a comparison to the "$35 Raspberry Pi NAS" reference. It is assumed that you likely already have hard drives that you currently save your info to, and likely some sort of SD card laying around. Also keep in mind, the Pogoplug already has a case for the circuit board.

Update 2014-11-12 - Do not use wicd-curses:

After some time with this Pogoplug, I ran into and issue where the Pogoplug freezes through simple tasks. It seems to be that I have reached the limit of the RAM memory. I tried adding SWAP, but the system doesn't seem to utilize it when activated. I believe it may be linked to my wireless application (wicd-curses). I uninstalled wicd-curses, using a LAN connection, and everything seems to work fine. My swap is even behaving properly. Now I just need to figure out how to get wifi to work properly with my configuration.

Credits and Thanks go out to:

Qui Hong, How-To Geek, and Ben Perove.