I purchased an old HP workstation to use as a NAS and router at my home. This post is a short note of my process of setting it up. Hardware Choice For a NAS, you usually have these hardware choices: Ready-to-use NAS (e.g. Synology) Pros: ready to use out of the box. Cons: Expensive, to the extent of "free hardware for software purchase". Harder to customize, when comparing the stock operating system with various Linux distributions. Second-hand servers Pros: Cheap. Most servers are thrown away by datacenters once their warranty ends, and are obtained at minimum cost, refurbished and then resold. Stable. These servers are built to last, and are used in a datacenter with controlled temperature, humidity and no dust. Cons： Noise. In order to lower the fan speed,...