Whats a good home networking setup for my needs?
We have 2 laptops and a desktop (P4 1.8, 512 MB) with a DSL internet and a wireless router. Internet works fine. Even some days when they all agree, I can share files between PCs! Now my needs have changed. I’ve bought a 6 MP camera, which adds a GB of photos to my laptop’s 30 GB hard disk every 2 weeks, so it will choke in 4 weeks! I need to setup the desktop as a file server. What network setup best suits my needs? 1. I have 3 hard drives in the desktop: A. 30GB with OS installed on it. B. 40GB with some old stuff and, C. 120GB matrox baby. 2. A relible file server. My experience with windows file sharing hasn’t been convincing since making a connection between the PCs sometimes works but other times just doesn’t. 3. I need to make it a very reliable server. A software RAID with my existing hard drives is ideal. 4. Minimal energy consumption. I’d like the desktop to sleep in standby mode & wake up automatically when required to. 5. It should be cheap! I’d Rather not buy new stuff. Ad
