Home Server Build: DIY NAS from an Old Laptop
I built a home server using an unused 2014 laptop.
Hardware: CPU i5-4210U, RAM 8GB, SSD 256GB + external HDD 2TB.
OS: Ubuntu Server 22.04 LTS installed.
Services:
- Samba file sharing (family photo backup)
- Jellyfin media server (movies/TV)
- Syncthing for automatic smartphone photo sync
- Pi-hole for ad-blocking DNS
There was more trial and error than I expected, but once everything was set up, I felt proud. The electricity cost is only about 100 won per day, so it's not a burden.
If anyone has a beginner-friendly guide, please share it.
7 answers
Agreed, I'm also using it in a similar way.
It's really nice if the electricity bill is 100 won.
I also did something similar with a 2013 laptop, but when connecting an external hard drive, the USB port was unstable and caused trouble. If possible, connecting via internal SATA was more stable.
Does Jellyfin hardware transcoding work well? The i5-4210U should support QuickSync.
Well, is 100 won per day actually measured? Even for a laptop with HDD+SSD+idle, it would be about 15W. Running it 24 hours a day would come out to about 10kWh per month, so it would be more expensive than 100 won. It would probably be around 1,000 won.
Oh, I have a similar setup. Pi-hole works better than expected. For a beginner's guide, just search 'making a laptop NAS' on YouTube and you'll find good tutorials.
I tried it on an old netbook, but gave up due to poor performance. An i5 should be fine. One tip: I recommend a lightweight OS like DietPi instead of Ubuntu. It's easy for beginners to adapt to CLI and comes with many basic packages.