Trying to run NAS server on a dell from 2001.... and failing miserably.

[Masonrk]

So I have an old Dell Dimensions 4400(Pentium 4, 256MB of ram) and I can get FreeNas to boot from the disc drive. The system recognizes the disk drive and I burnt FreeNas to a disk with PowerIso. I got the 32-bit version to be safe and I don't know what to do! I am stumped from the start! Please help!

Thank you,

Regards, Mason.

 

[popatim]

Enter the bios and set the boot order to optical (CD/DVD drive) first and USB second. Save and exit.
Install a flashdrive, boot from the freenas disk, Select Boot Freenas. then install to usb.
remove disk and reboot which should boot from the usb drive.

Once freenas has booted there will be an IP address at the bottom of the freenas screen under the various console options. Write that down and go to your pc and type that address into a web browser.

Once into the freenas web interface click the alert light in the top right corner to proceed with setting up freenas. first it will have you setup an admin password. Next a user account. And finally your disks.

Since you have so little memory you will need to use the UFS file system along with CIFS for sharing.

There are hundreds of guides oo this on the net already so I'll let them take over and leave you with a plan to either get mor ram or invest in a cheap motehrbd that supports more ram. The better files system to use is ZFS and that really likes 1gb ram per TB of drive space.