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Asustor AS5402T

Asustor AS5402T Features Quad-Core 10 nm Intel Celeron N5105 CPU 4x M.2 slots for NVMe SSDs 4 GB of DDR4-2933 RAM Dual 2.5-Gigabit Ethernet ports 3x USB 3.2 Gen 2 at 10 Gbps HDMI 2.0b Aesthetically pleasing M.2 SSD heat dissipation thermal vents Enjoy, download, upload and stream content with 4K transcoding Supports Wake on LAN and Wake on WAN Read More Asus You can configure the Asus ROG Strix G15 to have 64GB RAM, 17-inch screen, and GeForce RTX 2070 Super… but the asking $2999 price was too much. Going in for sub-$1000 for the Electro Punk edition ...

I’ve been looking to upgrade my NAS (Network Attached Storage), as the current one I own is running out of space. To be honest, my previous NAS is not really a true NAS, as it has a non-removeable hard drive and is just very limited to what it can do.

So I’ve been looking for the perfect NAS, and after many hours of looking, I’ve decided to get the latest Asustor AS5402T (a company related to Asus). The 5402T is a two-bay NAS, plus four m.2… which sounds amazing, except I can’t seem to unscrew the tiny, tiny screws that is holding the case. I’ll have to find a good screwdriver … or maybe use a power tool to remove the screws at a later time.

The main two-bays for standard spinning hard drives were easy to remove. It was designed to be tool-less, so all you need to do is put the drive in the tray and pop in the sides to hold it in place… and that’s pretty much it. It was very easy to load a hard drive. Right now, I can only afford one 16TB Toshiba Hard Drive, but that’s plenty of room for me right now. Eventually, I will probably buy another 16TB, so essentially, I will have 32TB of local network storage.

Why do I need so much storage, you might ask? As you know, I’m actually a big Bluray collector and I personally just want to back up movies that I buy. Once I rip the Bluray, I will store it on my NAS and now it’s ready to be view on my iPad or Xbox. This is great, saves time in finding the disc for the Xbox or the ability to view my media on my iPhone or iPad.

I’m also backing up photos and software, or whatever needs to be archived.

Currently this is my backup solution for important documents:

1. A copy on my computer’s external hard drive
2. A copy on my local NAS
3. A copy on OneDrive

Now that I have the Asustor up and running, I’ve been copying movie files too it … it’s going to take a while since I have so much files. So far, it’s pretty good. Speed is limited to WiFi speed, which looks like about 35MB/S. That’s pretty fast for WiFi, so I can’t complain… but I wish it was faster.

As this is a “real” NAS, they do offer the ability to host websites (https access), so if I really wanted to, I can host thegeorgeperez.com on my own NAS… but at the moment, I’m quite happy using iBrave to host my website and email services.

I tried Embry and tried Plex (again), and immediately uninstalled them both. Those services costs money, I think it’s $115 each, so, no thanks. I tried out the Jellyfin, which works just fine and doesn’t require paying a fee to access my movies on my iPad… so right now I can only recommend Jellyfin. It looks pretty good too, displaying actors and actresses when you pull up a movie file. That looks quite nice. It also keeps track of what you played, so that might be helpful you’re not sure what episode you’re on in a television series.

I played some files and it loads up pretty quickly, and playback was smooth. I couldn’t figure out how to turn off the subtitles… but I’m sure it’s in the settings somewhere. Otherwise, I didn’t have any issues with using Jellyfin.

My all-time favorite is Kodi (formerly XBMC), but for whatever reasons, it’s not available as an app on Asustor’s control panel. Its motto is “Kodi runs on just about anything”… but apparently not on Asustor.

Yours,

Weekend Gamer

Read more Weekend Gamer.

Jellyfin

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SunFounder 10.1 display for the Raspberry Pi 4

SunFounder 10.1 display for the Raspberry Pi 4 Specifications 10.1 inch IPS HDMI LCD screen monitor with resolution of 1280×800 pixels Wide IPS angles, and fast response speed a Input interfaces: HDMI and VGA Camera holder option 3 pieces of transparent acrylic plates to protect your Raspberry Pi. Read More Raspberry Pi I’ve been playing around with my Raspberry Pi 4 (4 GB Model), a lot lately. I’ve had the single-board computer since November 2019, even though the RP4 wasn’t supposed to launch until 2020. As a result of it being released early (it came out in June 2019) …

Ever since the makers of Retropie made it work on the new Raspberry Pi 4 in January 2020, I have been paying more attention to this exciting development. The story behind why it took so long for the popular gaming frontend to work on the new Pi is because the Pi 4 finally entered in to the 64-bit architecture. Previous models of the Pi were all 32-bit-based.

There’s still a lot of bugs and kinks that the developers had to work out, but all this will eventually go away as more people get their hands on the new Pi 4.

I have to say that having experienced it with the original Pi and Pi 2 (and some limited time with the Pi 3), that the Pi 4 really is a massive improvement over those previous single board computers.

Although the Pi 4’s 1.5 GHz 64-bit quad core ARM Cortex-A72 is much faster than the previous models, it does have a habit of overheating when under stressed… but that is expected with faster chips. So, despite the low entry price of $35 for the basic model, the real cost of the device may actually float around $100 (you have to buy a fan, keyboard, power supply, etc.) Fortunately, you might have many of these components sitting around the house.

Anyway, all my weekends are basically in spent building “Vu’s Ultimate RetroPie Gaming Station”! My idea is an all-in-one video player, retro gaming, and basic computer station. So far, my 128GB MicroSD card will run RetroPi, Kodi (for watching movies and television show), and Raspbian (GNU Linux). This is really nice, considering that in the past, if you wanted to switch applications, you had to swap out your SD cards.

The other thing is that I bought a small 10.1 inch display, dedicated for my Raspberry Pi 4. It is using HDMI (not display ribbon), so that it’s a little flexible if I decide to use it on a bigger display. The Pi 4 is attached to the back of the Sunfounder display, using its built-in mounting screws, designed for the Pi. The display also comes with a three-layer acrylic to protect the Pi.

If you are interested, here are affiliated links to all the items I bought:

Sunfounder 10.1 Inch HDMI IPS LCD Monitor

Raspberry Pi 4 (4GB Ram)

128GB SD Card

vu ([email protected]) ♥ weheartmusic.com ♥ facebook.com ♥ twitter.com/weheartmusic

The Mi Box

Mi Box Specification Output resolution Up to 4K 60fps Processor Quad-core Cortex-A53 2.0GHz GPU Mali 450 750MHz RAM 2GB DDR3 Storage 8GB of on-board storage Connectivity Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, Dual-band Wi-Fi 2.4GHz/5GHz Bluetooth 4.0/3.0 Video VP9 Profile-2 up to 4K x 2K @ 60fps H.265 HEVC MP-10 at L5.1, up to 4K x 2K at 60fps H.264 AVC HPat L5.1, up to 4K x 2K at 30fps H.264 MVC, up to 1080P at 60fps Supports HDR10/HLG HDR processing (software upgrade required) Sound DTS 2.0+ Digital Out, Dolby Digital Plus Up to 7.1 pass through Ports HDMI: HDMI 2.0a x 1 port (HDCP 2.2) USB: USB 2.0 x 1 port AV: SPDIF Out / 3.5mm audio output x 1 port Power: 1 port Software Android TV 6.0 Dimensions and weight 101 x 101 x 19.5mm 176.5g Color Black Read More Roku So, I previously poo-poo the Roku because it did not support YouTube. You know, the most popular video service in the world and Roku just didn't work with it? It's sad and lame, in my opinion. ....

I recently upgraded my television to a Samsung 4k (UHD). It's only 40-inch, but it's big enough for me (especially for the sale price). My current first-gen PS4 isn't powerful enough for 4k (or wasn't really design to output at that resolution), and, at of this writing, only the Xbox One S and the new PS4 Pro offers 4k support. Unfortunately, I'm not going to re-buy a PS4 and I'm patiently waiting for the Xbox One Scorpio... so I can't just buy the current Xbox (although I really want to get it it now).

The 4k problem is actually the lack of content. Streaming 4k is not a great option, because my internet cannot handle streaming it. Downloading it takes forever... and not to mention the sheer takes up too much valuable disc space on my harddrive. 4k discs are being sold, but are limited to certain popular titles and at an extra cost. Discs are priced at usually at $30, which is $10+ more than Bluray discs. Plus, unless you got an Xbox One S, 4k disc players is an added $150 or more extra cost.

Basically, it's a chicken and egg problem, but eventually 4k is the future. For collectors, the steelbooks and special packaging are only available on Bluray, so they're not migrating any time soon.

So why would you want a 4k TV? Let me break it down to you: the image quality is much better than a standard 1080 screen. It's not just my imagination, because the pixels look smoother/sharper because the image is upscale on the same display size. The smaller the dots, the better it looks... but only if you have really good 20/20 vision (or look closely at the display).

The other cool thing about my Samsung set is that it comes with apps, so if you're watching TV, you can click on the extra icon to see the latest weather or play minesweeper, etc. Although you can install apps directly on the TV, the Samsung App store is severely limited.

My only 4k streaming box options right now are: Roku 4, Chromecast Ultra, Nvidia Shield, or the Mi Box. Having own the Roku 2, I was not impressed with its inability to turn off or that it does not support multiple audio or even something simple as subtitle support.

As for the Chromecast, you basically need an Android Phone (which I currently don't own), and the Nvidia Shield is just too expensive ($200 for the base model and the remote is an extra $50, and the stand is $30)..... so that left me with my only choice: The Mi Box. If you aren't familiar with the Mi Box, it's a $69 Android TV box sold by Chinese company Xiaomi.

When you get the Mi Box, I suggest getting the Kodi app (formerly known as XBMC) so you can stream your local DNLA or add streaming video playlists. Kodi is really just the best app, I've used it on various platform. It will play everything, and it does multiple audio and multiple subtitles. It's really the only video player you need.

Some things I do not like about the Mi Box:

Power cord is not very long and seemingly exclusive to Mi Box (meaning you can’t just swap it out for another longer cable).

Limited to only Android TV selections (this is a Google limitation)

Voice search is not very good (again, this is a Google limitation)

Chromecast did not really work for me on some applications I tried.

No Apple Mirror (this is an Apple restriction/DRM issue)

One USB, no SD card reader

Some things I love about the Mi Box:

Has all the Apps I like: Haystack, Pluto TV, Kodi, etc.

Game option with the Mi Controller (may buy one if I find it in stores)

Cheap! $69

Small and compact design.

vu ([email protected]) ♥ weheartmusic.com ♥ facebook.com ♥ twitter.com/weheartmusic