Linksys Storage Link for USB 2.0 Disk Drives NSLU2

Network Storage Link for USB 2.0 Disk Drives

1 Beware...
I have had my NSLU2 for three months. It stopped working after 2.5 months. Sent it back for warrenty repair, Quality Assurance found nothing wrong with it, they shipped it back to me. It still did not work. Hours on the phone with Linksys Tech support to get new RMA to ship unit back. It's a great unit when it works, but BEWARE! Once you format the disk on your external hard drive to use the NSLU2, there is no going back to simply plugging in your external hard drive to your computer...so I have had no acces to my external hard drive for several weeks now...if I could go back in time, I would not have purchased this unit...

2 Does what is says it does
Pretty simple to use and set up. Make sure to use an Maxtor external USB 2.0 hard drive.

You can use this device as a web server, even though it is not ment to be used that way.

The device is a little on the slow side, but agian, the unit does what it is supposed to do. For those who complain about speed, please re-read this paragraph.

This device is great for backing up and file shring across a net work.

3 For MacOS X users...
The install disc does not work on Macs, but you can still configure the NAS using Safari (or any web browser). Point safari to http://192.168.1.77 (or whatever the IP assigned to your NAS is) the username/password is admin/admin. Change your password, format the disk then you're ready to go.

You can not transfer files whose name contain certain characters that MacOS X allows but linux does not (for example, "/"). This is a big problem. But, you can work around it by creating a disk image on the NAS then transferring your files to the mounted disk image. This way you can transfer your existing files without having to find and rename the files that use the offending characters.

Overall, a very nice product.

4 Quick and Easy Network Attached Storage
I was shocked to see this device average only 3 stars. I've since read all the reviews; people who rated the device lower than 4 starts almost universally based their assessment on the fact that the NSLU2 will not read pre-formatted hard drives with data on them. Boo hoo. That's a pittance compared to the value provided by this device.

This device allows you to easily setup a file server for your network. It's Web interface is typical of LinkSys products -- good, not great. However, beyond simply allowing everybody read/write access to everything shared, the device allows you to define users, create multiple directories to share, and specify which uses can read and write to each directory.

This is NAS made easy. The NSLU2 is worth every penny!

5 This is not a consumer product for the home market
There is a small but growing community of people world-wide who are using this device as a very low-cost, low-power Linux box. If you are buying this for that purpose, it's a great product. I love it for what it is.

I would not recommend this to anyone who is not a Linux hacker enthusiast or a professional network administrator. Mine did not work at all until I plugged in a new USB 2.0 flash drive (it didn't even appear on my network with just a USB 1.1 external hard drive attached to it). The documentation, such as it is (mostly on the CD that comes with the device), frequently defaults to such helpful suggestions as "if this doesn't work, see your network administrator."

In my experience, it is a lot easier to buy a second hard drive and install it in your PC than to setup one of these on your home network.

6 Great price/performance with flexible functionality.
I was looking for an inexpensive NAS box to store videos, music and photos on to share between my three computers and eventually a networked media player. The NSLU2 fit the bill. I attached a Seagate 160GB drive in a USB housing to it and fired it up. I was moving files to it in a matter of minutes.

I found out quickly that the NSLU2 has some limitations. The file transfer rate accross the network and to/from the USB disk would max out at about 4-5Mbytes/sec. This is too slow to use as a working NAS connection(on-line storage), however, for static file (near-line) storage (backups, archives, and finished media) it has sufficient speed and capability to deal with them.

All three of my computers can access the file system without any trouble. Even better, since the box runs an form of Embedded Linux, the firmware is customizable. There is a group dedicated to this and has already produced firmware that can easily have packages added to it to enhance the functionality of the little NSLU2 box. For instance, you can add a webserver package, or a UPnP Media Server, or and FTP server and many many more things.

My NSLU2 is serving up DVD Video, MP3 Audio, and JPEG photos to a wireless media player in my entertainment center.

Pros: Inexpensive, customizable, simple concept with easy setup.

Cons: File transfer speed.

I love it and will likely purchase another one when I need more storage capacity.

7 This product works as advertised, for the most part
I bought this product, because me and my roommate share a lot of files between each other. Photos and whatnot. I wanted to be able to share DVDs that a put on my hard drive and the storage Link allows that to happen. Plug it into my network plug a USB hard drive into the storage Link shows up on the network on any computer in the House.

Now, as noted in a previous review the storage Link does format your external hard drive with its own type of file system, which doesn't allow you to plug-in your own external hard drive without losing the data. So just be forewarned that you will need to take that into consideration.

Just a thought to on transfer times. I'm on a 100 MB network, and it takes about 15 minutes for me to put a 4 GB DVD onto this drive. I was hoping it would be a little quicker, but oh well. It's not FireWire.

With that all said, this does exactly what is supposed to do for me. Allows me to back up any files I want off my main computer and allows any computer on my network to of access to my DVDs. So, I like it.

Peace out

8 Possibly killed my drive
Gotta say I was really interested in this device. Too bad I didn't know that it had to reformat my Western Digital drive before it would work.

I plugged it in, THEN found out that it needed to reformat the drive. I never got far enough to actually tell the Linksys software to do that. However...

Now, my drive no longer works. It used to work very nicely. But I can't use the USB connection anymore, and I only got the firewire connection to work ONCE. So I think that it some how toasted a perfectly working drive. Now I get to spend hours on the support lines with WD. I hope that THEY have tech support that actually speaks English.

BTW, I returned this item.

9 Innovative and useful but could use improvements
I've been using this item for about a month. I think it actually deserves somewhere between 3 and 4 stars... considering the cost of the item, I give it 4. My comments: (1) Uses Linux file system. Not compatible with NTFS format. In Windows environment, can not go between direct USB connection and NSLU2 device without reformatting drive (with exception of the next point). (2) Despite what the docs say, many smaller Fat32 hard drives work just fine for me in the Disk2 port. I've gone up to 8 gig here. Does not have to be Flash memory. (3) Device will not boot reliablly for me when it is configured for DHCP. Often it gives up and resets its IP address to factory default. This can be a real pain (see item 4). I have found that using a fixed IP address for it seems to work fine. (4) Caveat: Initially, device can only be accessed from a 192.168.1.xxx IP subnet. For example, if your router/dhcp server uses 192.168.0.xxx (as mine does), you'll need to manually set a fixed IP address for one of your PC's just so you can _reach_ the NSLU2 to set it up. Then you can set it to the fixed IP address of your choice. (5) The device, or perhaps I should say the overall strategy moreso than the device itself, is relatively slow when compared to direct USB 2.0 connection to a computer. I tested the same 60g USB 2.0 drive first as an NTFS drive on my PC's USB 2.0 port, then with the drive connected to the NSLU2. Using an idle 100 mb ethernet LAN, I reformatted the drive as required and copied about 10 gigs to it. Copy times seems to be 5-10x slower this way for large amounts of data. Much slower than direct USB2 connection in my experience. Copying a few gigs of data can take an hour instead of only the few minutes via direct USB2.

10 Has Issues - can't use for multi-Media Storage/Streaming
I'm happy with the NSLU2 other than the following issues which Linksys is not resolving.

-- Unsuitable for Media Streaming. Every hour or so, the NSLU2 hangs for a minute. Definitely annoying while creating documents, etc - but completely unusable for streaming MP3s, JPEGs, MPEG Video, ripping audio CDs, etc. I have to periodically copy all of my media to my PCs local HD for streaming out to my media players.

-- Only Supports SMB. Linux+Solaris clients must use SMB, ala Samba instead of standard NTFS. This prevents UNIX file system features such as symbolic links from being used. NTFS access was deliberately disabled from the embedded Linux running NSLU2.

11 This product will not work with the Linksys Media Adapter
Linksys sells a Network Storage Link (NSLU2) to add large shared drives to your network. A practical use for this in a home network would be to store large music librairies, allowing access to any song in seconds from any PC in the house.
To connect your media library to your stereo or TV, Linksys offers a Media Adapter, model No. WMA11B. Sounds like a great combination.

However, the Linksys Media Adapter's (WMA11B) software will not recognize any drive except a local drive. Even a mapped network drive is not acceptd by the WMA's Media Folder Manager software. You simply cannot use these 2 products together.

Counting these 2 pieces of hardware, plus the 300GB Maxtor drive, I have $600 invested in a non-solution. Look for a better way. Linksys support folks simply say that the 2 products are not designed to work togther. I do not understand how a company like Linksys can overlook this. Is it asking too much for 2 of their own network devices to work together?

If you intend to store project files and miscellaneous data, this is a good solution.

12 Good product, but do you need it
The product worked well, though configuration took some work. If you want to see how much this device can do, be sure to check out the exhaustive articles on Tom's Hardware's Networking page.

I decided to return this product and instead built a cheap computer to house a bunch of internal hard drives. Unlike external hard drives, the computer is upgradeable and can network on its own. I also used a Shuttle case, so I didn't sacrifice much portability.

13 Everything you need to know about the NSLU2
I've used the NSLU2 for about six months. If you buy this product, there are a couple of things you need to know.

First, when it works, it works well, and it is very useful to have a large drive accessible by all of the computers on your local network.

Second, it doesn't work well with every USB Drive. I have personally tested the Seagate 160GB drive, the Maxtor One Touch drive, and the Maxtor One Touch II drive.

With the Seagate 160GB drive, it will recognize the drive only once. If you ever reboot the NSLU2, it will not recognize the drive the second time and all of your data will be lost.

With the Maxtor One Touch drive, it will recognize the drive fine, but on large data transfers, the speed will slow to a crawl and eventually you'll get an error that says something to the effect of the network path not being found. Its very irritating.

With the Maxtor "One Touch II" drive (which I just bought), it seems to work great.

The moral of this story is that you should test your drive very thoroughly before you use this for storage of anything you don't mind losing. Set the drive up and reboot it several times to make sure that it continues to recognize the drive. Then, perform several copies of large amounts of data from and to the drive (copying all your mp3's and digital photographs over and over again will work) and make sure that it doesn't give you an error message. If all that works, you probably have a drive that works well.

Third, the device does format the drive with a proprietary linux based format, so you won't be able to disconnect the drive from the NSLU2 and hook it up to your computer to access your files.

Fourth, make sure you have the latest firmware, or the internal clock on the device may lose time.

Fifth, if you're interested in hacking the device, look for several articles at www.tomsnetworking.com that talk about how to hack into the device and add new functions. Just search for NSLU2 at that web-page.

Sixth, the device does not have a defrag function. If you have the money, a better choice is the Linksys EFG120, which does have an internal defrag function as well.

14 Extremely unreliable! very difficult accessing files!
Extremely unreliable! Very difficult accessing files! Not worth the trouble!

15 Misleading
They advertise that Maxtor works well with this device. They don't say that you must reformat disk destroying its ability to be used directly on Windows. Further you can't use Maxtor one-touch software.
A good idea but a silly implementation.

16 Don't expect this to be easy
I bought this product after purchasing the Maxtor One-touch because I was enticed by the prospect of being able to schedule simple, scheduled backups of the 3 computers that I have on my home network. Forget it! The simplicity of the Maxtor product goes down the drain when you buy the Linksys NSU. I am much more technically inclined then the vast majority of business or home computer users, and I've been on and off HOLD for over an hour with Linksys tech support. They can't even figure out why I can't connect to the Maxtor from my laptop. I'm ready to ship the product back and try to reformat the Maxtor to work with just one PC, as it was originally designed with it's easy-to-use backup software. If you decide to buy this, make sure you are much more techically savy than Linksys' tech support people because they won't help you at all. VERY DISAPPOINTING AFTER LOTS OF WASTED TIME!

17 Got it working with a Seagate External drive
Just got my NSLU2. To get it working with a Seagate external drive, one needs to RESTART the NSLU2 from the web console. The drive should be turned on first, then the NSLU2 (it still didn't recognize the drive), then do the RESTART, and there is my 160MB Seagate drive!

This probably will work with a lot of brand x enclosures that don't seem to be working with the default instructions.

Apparently you can't update the firmware without a harddrive connected (at least I couldn't).

I also own a Ximeta Netdisk 80MB drive so I hope to be able to edit this soon with a comparison.

18 Tiny package, with a big punch!

The pictures do not do this piece of work justice. Eyeballing it, the dimensions are roughly 6" x 4" x 3/4" - but don't let the size fool you.

Setup was a breeze. Plug it into your LAN, plug a USB storage device into it, run the setup program, choose DHCP and that is it - you now have LAN-based storage.

The miniature device has a built-in webserver which you can use for all administration once it's been initially configured for your LAN (with its fixed IP address or DHCP setting).

My package just arrived today - I haven't even gotten around to running backups on the LAN - but, even if performance is not stupendous, it is an excellent low-cost network storage solution.

Linksys/Cisco did an amazing job with this product.

19 Slow, slow slow zzzzzzzzzz
As others have reported, this gizmo is easy to set up and configure out of the box. However, I am seeing throughput speeds on the order of 150 Kbps (average). That is not a misprint, I typed a "K" in front of the speed. It takes absurdly long to open a single digital photo and/or copy a single mp3. It could take days to fill the device with data -- not that I've had the patience to let it run that long.

Other than the NSLU2, my network hums along reliably and at high speed. Very disappointing...so far I have spent more than ten hours installing, debugging, testing and trolling internet sites looking for a solution. I don't have limitless time to debug the NSLU2, especially since I originally bought it as a covenience to SAVE me time. I'll probably noodle around a little bit more and if/when I make no headway then sell it online for whatever I can get.

Not recommended, even for hobbyists. If you must buy it, ensure that you have a good return policy to fall back on.

20 Beware of Windows Networking
After reading the reviews here complaining of slow data transfer,
I was worried that the NSLU2 would be a loser. However, I really
needed a backup solution for my 5 PC home network, so and I went
ahead and bought a NSLU2 and a 250 GB Maxtor drive anyway.

The NSLU2 works quite well; with 4 out of 5 PCs it works great,
however, Windows networking is abominably slow on one of my
PCs. Data transfers are in the same range or even slower that
some of the other reviewers have mentioned. Running Knoppix (a
version of Linux that runs from a CD-ROM) on that
PC gives good network performance, it's just Windows (both
XP Home and XP Pro) that exhibit the problem; The other PCs
work quite well.

The same slow PC, a recent HP/AMD box with 1.25 GB of memory,
connecting with full-duplex 100 BaseT, also has performance
problems transferring files to other machines on the LAN, not
just the NSLU2. It's not noticable with small files, but
with 10GB to 20GB backup files, it's a real killer.

I've tweaking the network settings on the slow box, but nothing
I tried helps.

21 Wonderful, inexpensive project box!
The Linksys NSLU2 is an inexpensive Network Attached Storage server. Essentially, it's a tiny box with an Ethernet port and two high-speed USB connectors. You connect it to your LAN, attach one or two external USB drives to it, format the drives and configure the shared storage using the built-in web server.

If this was all the NSLU2 was capable of, it would already be a wonderful little tool. I strongly disagree with another reviewer who recommended a Xinet NDAS drive as a replacement: the big benefit of the NSLU2 (or rather the drawback of the Xinet) is that you don't have to load any unreliable third party software on your computer to access it: it uses the ubiquitous SMB protocol supported by Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Turtle Beach Audiotron, etc... a proper file server protocol capable of handling concurrent access from multiple clients.

But that's only the beginning, because the NSLU2 happens to be running Linux, which makes it an ideal target for all sorts of projects. If you go to tomsnetworking.com's "how-to" section, you will find a series of articles written by Jim Buzbee giving step-by-step, clear instructions on how to hack the NSLU2 to unleash its full potential. I turned mine into an iTunes music jukebox; you can also run other server protocols for any number of tasks.

In conclusion, this is a great, reliable, inexpensive and easy to configure NAS box.
It's a great value even if you only use it as intended; and it's also a wonderful little always-on server project box for the wannabe hacker, with lots of info and help out there. Very highly recommended to all.

If you're interested in the NSLU2's hacking potential you should also investigate the Buffalo Kuro box. It's twice the price of the Linksys device, but its manufacturer fully supports development on it.

22 another linksys product in work
like one of the other reviewers i purchased a seagate drive and guess what after a few hours with tech support, who really did not understand the product, figured out that it only really supports the maxtor drives. the drive works well with two of my computers but will lock up one of my xp pro machines whenever i try to download to the drive. forget even trying to work that one with linksys tech support. i give the product three stars because the price is right and it does work with two of my machines very well. just remember to buy the maxtor drive to go with it and not any other product (i tried USB IDE adaptor as well without success.) Like some of the other reviewers figure an upgrade to the OS will eventually become available from some one other than linksys.
as a side note i really like linksys because of the inovative products they produce. you just have to be prepared to go it alone sometimes if you want a leading edge product.

23 Nice Little Device
I have been using the NSLU2 for about a week now and am really pleased. I have a linksys54g wireless router and I wasn't able to setup over the wireless connection at first but I hardwired to router and setup was a breeze. I was affraid that connectivity would suffer once I unhooked and went wireless but I've been pleasanltly suprised. I surf the web while listening to music served up by hardrive connected to the NSLU2. I am however fairly close to router in my appartment. I'm assuming performance would suffer over a an 802.11b setup.

The only reason I'm giving it 4 stars instead of 5 is that you cannot unplug the external hardrive and plug it into a windows system. This little device has a lot of potential checkout hacks on www.tomshareware.com

24 DANGER! NOT WINDOWS COMPATIABLE
There is no documentation of this until you receive the device. The device requires a USB hard drive which is clearly stated. What it does not state is in order to use this hard drive it must be reformated for Lenix and will no longer work if plugged directly into a Windows machine or if there is exisiting data on the hard drive, it must be removed, reformatted and returned!

Very disappointing.

25 Forget about it for VPN; works okay otherwise
This product worked fine on a local LAN. Not as sluggish as some reviewers would suggest -- it is not direct attached storage, so you have to expect performance differences.

However, when I tried to use it on VPN connected segments, it didn't work. I made 5 separate calls to Linksys technical support, and they jerked me around for the first 4 calls. Finally, the 5th techie, a senior one, admitted that they had never really gotten the device to work over a VPN tunnel. So much for the other 4, who made it seem that I was doing something wrong. DISHONEST! SHABBY! If you can find any indication on Linksys' web site that this doesn't work on VPN, congratulations. I lost 2 weeks and numerous hours on the phone due to this deception.

If you're staying local, it's okay. With VPN = no way!

26 Fantastic tiny device
It's hard to believe such a small device operates as a file server. Setup was a breeze! I simply opened a web browser and set up my devices. It's been working great ever since.

27 Almost perfect
I've tried the buffalo linkstation. Although most of the reviews I read said that it had more options and a better thought out interface, lacked a ton of features. The buffalo system only had folder level security. I called tech support stating that I couldn't set permission for one user to write to a file and another to only read. Buffalo said that wasn't possible.

Here we are now. I've had the linksys for a week now. Permissions are so easy and you can achieve the impossible of the buffalo system mentioned above. I've also turned a computer for work into a windows 2003 server...what a pain in the *ss. The linksys unit is amazing. I've got a over 10 users at work who never back up important data. The linksys unit logs on to thier computer and backs up a shared folder, even if it's password protected, and backs it up to a secure shared folder only accessed by them.

Here's the 'Almost Perfect' part. I tried using it to share our Act! database but it was too slow. I've seen from tomsnetworking.com that it's possibly only comparible to a 500 mhz pc. I'm not too worried about it though since I can share that on a spare pc. Hopefully Linksys will correct the speeds down the road with a firmware update as well. It seems there is a problem with the box even communicating with a usb 2.0 drive in the first place.

Get it and don't wast your time with the buffalo system.

28 Great Idea - Never Worked.
Knowing the NSLU2 would reformat my drive didn't bother me but really never got the chance to find out how great this device could have been. For the second time in two weeks, a Linksys device did not work correctly out of the box. The orginal setup software 1.5 failed to recognize the Storage Link Device althought the device could be connected through the IP address. I was attempting to use the NSLU2 as a network backup drive attached to a new Maxtor 120 One Touch. Even though this was a new device - the packaging appeared to be be in unopened status, the device had been passworded, the usual "admin" would not work. After spending an hour on the phone, nothing worked, the representative did not seem that overall knowledgeable of this product. Much of the time was spent resetting the device for 20 seconds, no less the ten resets later I gave up on this universal fix. A very similiar circumstance happened two weeks ago when the Linksys wireless range extender failed to show a network link on the status lights even though there was a strong signal increase once I got the device working. Would not have affected performance but if the light is supposed to turn blue, shouldn't it? Is legendary "Liksys Service & Quality" a thing of the past?

29 Good idea, bad implementation
I got this up-and-running in no time, however, it runs at an abominable pace. I calculated a transfer rate of 46k/sec, which is WORSE than a 56k modem for crying out loud.

This is a good idea for a product and a lousy way to manifest it.

30 Horrible Product
I bought this product thinking "An All In One Sharing Capible Drive" NOT the case!! How do they expect to sell any of these with a propriatary file system?!?! the access on the drive is SLOW. Thier Tech Support is worthless (took me 30 minutes to talk to an ACTUAL PERSON) and they still couldnt resolve the issue i was having after a hour long phone conversation. I know have a very heavy papper wieght. THANKS LINKSYS!

31 About the filesystem
As some others have mentioned, the filesystem is ext3, one of the filesystems used by Linux. If you want to access the drive from a PC you have two choices:

(...)

Knoppix is a live CD Linux - just boot it. It does nothing to your harddrive but will autoconfigure your network and all your hardware. You can read ext3 and NTFS (read only) filesystems with this and copy any data from the Storage Link drive to a FAT partition or a Windows network share, not to mention run dozens of desktop programs.

Actually, anyone into computers should get a copy just to try it out. You will be impressed.

32 Great Product, some minor gripes
The NSLU2 does what it is supposed to. I had no problem with standard Western Digital IDE drives in generic USB 2.0 enclosure boxes plugged into the NSLU2. Security settings are very easy to use if you have experience with that sort of thing, but probably more difficult for those without such experience. Backup can be easily set to automatically happen every night if you have two drives (highly recommended). If your primary disk fails, you just swap in the second disk.

Some have commented on the transfer rate being slower than direct USB 2.0, but they're comparing apples to oranges. If you want to plug a USB drive into one PC, you don't want this product. Just plug the drive directly into the PC, duh! However, if you want to share data across a network of multiple PCs, without having to worry about which PC is turned on or has the disk plugged into it at any given time...the NSLU2 is a good solution. It is comparable in performance to setting aside a "server PC" that just serves files over the network...only it costs less, uses less energy, backs itself up easily, and is totally silent.

Now, some minor gripes that are relevant:
- The backup drive is not accessible at all unless you turn off backups. Read-only access to the backup drive would be very helpful for easily retrieving files that were accidentally deleted since the last backup, or just reassuring yourself that the backup files are actually there.
- The box keeps poor time, drifting over an hour in less than a week. Linksys says if you set the box to recycle periodically it will pick up the correct time...but that is a kluge.
- Use of the non-Windows (ext3) filesystem on the drives is a bit of a downer, since it would be nice to unplug a drive from the NSLU2 and plug it into a laptop when travelling. There are supposedly programs that will allow Windows to read ext3 disks, but I haven't tried them.

None of these gripes would keep me from buying the box again, and all should be fixible by Linksys with a firmware upgrade (though I don't expect the filesystem ever will be).

For the uber-geeks, check out the TomsHardware article "Hacking the NSLU2" for how to log in and directly access the Linux server running on this box, giving you the ability to tweak it to your satisfaction. Very cool!

33 Work in Progress, but has potential
This is definitely a product released before it has matured. The software is flaky and unpredictable and when the setup is successful I cannot maintain stable connections with the drive.

First, I had trouble setting up this device from a wireless connection. Only when I used a PC that is wired to the router & NSLU2 that I was able to do certain things like renaming the server.
Second, the built in software is very buggy and at many times does nothing when you press the save or create button. At other times I would lose connection with the device altogether and had to physically restart it- which takes an awful long time to boot up (1-2 minutes). Not a single operation I tried worked the first time I attempted it, so it was a very frustrating experince.

Now that I have things set up and running, I can't maintain a connection long enough to transfer large files. The connection keeps dropping off.

The silver lining, however, is that this is an inexpensive device and it runs Linux, which means someone eventually will hack it and create a better software. For now, this is definitely an 'early adopter' product with all the kinks and grieve you'd expect from a prototype or a beta version.

34 It's great!
I have been waiting for an affordable networked storage solution for some time. We have 3 PC's lots of music and photo files as well as critical Quicken files that need to be backed up regularly and accessed from multiple PC's. Trouble is that we never do it. I had the Storage Link installed in a few minutes, and after taking advantage of the Maxtor/Linksys bundle I found that the Dantz Retrospect software that comes with the Maxtor drive is the perfect backup utility to round out the solution since it can be used with the networked drive. It takes a while to do the first full backup, but once it is complete and the incrementals are scheduled, we never have to think about backing up again. And when we need more storage we'll just add another drive.

35 Mixed bag
I wanted a file server that I could leave up and running 24/7 on my home network. First, I tried the Ximeta 160GB NetDisk, but it wouldn't work on one of my machines (a month later, I'm still working with tech support to try and figure out the problem. Their tech support is to be congratulated for sticking with it so long, though!) Since the Ximeta is not working out, I decided to try the Linksys Storage Link. Here's what I've found:
PROS:
-It's dead silent and uses little power, unlike running most PCs as a server.
-You don't need special drivers on the other machines unless you want to access Flash drives with it
-It works with all my systems, unlike the Ximeta (so far)
-It can be set up to act as a webserver to the net
-You can adjust it more accurately to your storage needs than with the Ximeta
CONS
-The fact that it uses a Linux/proprietary format for the drives is a drag, but not a deal-killer.
-You'll need a second USB2.0 drive to do backups on if you want them to happen in a timely manner.
-Not hot swappable. You have to power down the device to add or remove USB devices.
-Can't be used as a fast local back-up drive like the Ximeta.
-Takes up more space and has more wiring than the Ximeta.
NOTES
-Data transfer rate seems slower than a full-bore PC, but I haven't tried any benchmarks to confirm this. Note that you will NEVER achieve anything like USB2.0 speeds; you have to compare it to transferring from other devices on your network.

So there you have it. If the Ximeta worked for me, it would definitely be a more elegant solution, except for the fact you have to install drivers and it's a lot trickier to upgrade.

36 Buyer beware!
Reformats your USB drive --- make sure you save the data elsewhere before installing it. My unit was defective as it failed to maintain a connection and also failed anytime I attempted to transfer more than one file at once. Tech support was useless --- the rep told me that they're having lots of problems and received no training on the device prior to rollout. Not Linksys' finest hour.

37 Undocumented feature: It can be used as a personal webserver
I have been using this for past 1 week. It is a great product. I have learned to work with it rather than against it. Here are some observations that actually add exceptional value to the product. I have discovered some undocumented features too.

1. You can actually use it as a webserver! I am running one, though for personal use. To do this you need to put the files in the public area on the NSLU2, and using webhop like feature from DynDNS, you can map the index.html to a web address.

2. If the above feature is used and the html files are put into the restricted area, it will webserve, but will need password and user name. I serve my family photo site using this method!

3. The file systems seems to be Linux based. I used Acronis True Image 7.0 for backup of the USB drive. It indicated 3 partitions. Two of them were ext3 and one Linux swap! Acronis complained about some errors in the Linux partition. Looks like some propriatory stuff in there.

4. The device features really needs to be explored carefully before deployment and making any judgement call. The features like user+group+password can be used for excellent security. I have multiple pseudo users setup with private directories categorized according to the data, like music, videos, photos, downloads etc. Then I setup most of the actual users without private directories and provided them with selective permission to use the data. This adds to security since I can bump off any user without having to move files or data.

5. Documentation is lacking details and examples. In fact it is inadequate. But this does not make the device any less valuable. I had to explore and experiment with the device to make full use of it.

6. I noticed a number of reviews complaining about the data transfer speed. It is quite true that the speed is slower than USB2.0. In fact it will be slower! USB2.0 is designed for 480 Mbps data rates, while this and any other NAS will be limited by the network speed. NSLU2 is rated at 100 Mbps. This is the most common network speed today. This makes it approximately 5x slower than a direct USB2.0 connection. But, it is not any slower than if you were to share a folder in windows and access it from another computer.

7. I would also like to warn all the users to be careful not to run this device (or any other personal server for that matter) on the default port 80 if you plan to access it over the internet, since every port-scanner on the planet will find you and target you for hacker activity. It is better to change the port to something like 8000, 8081, or any other obscure number HIGHER than 1024 which port-scanners do not generally target. You can use the webhop feature on DynDNS.org in conjunction with cloaking to hide the actual address from normal viewing.

38 Great functionality, very poor Tech Support
I enjoy the network storage link and its ability to allow me to access the 120G Western Digital drive from anywhere in my network. The first NSLU2 I purchased was defective and had to be returned. The defective unit was unable to maintain a connection to the USB drive and backups would cancel prematurely. Also, the "Administrative" functionality was not available through the web interface. It is worth noting that the default user name is: "admin" and the default password is: "admin".

Please note that the Tech Support for this product was effectively useless. The Tech Support rep seemed to completely ignore what I was describing and asked questions remotely or un-related to the problem. At one point the Tech Support rep told me he had to refer to some documentation and fell completely silent. After 10 or so minutes he hung up. I found the Tech Service provided by LinkSys/Cisco to be completely unacceptable leaving me to wonder if this poor service is a new corporate standard as I see several complaints similar to mine. I never believed it could be so bad until I experienced it for myself. I don't understand why LinkSys/Cisco wastes their resources running such a useless Tech Support org.

So far the second NSLU2 unit I received works properly and I am very happy with the functionality it provides.

39 Doesn't Support Windows Format Drives!?!
Beware: you can't just hook up an external hard drive to this thing and expect it to work.

You have to format the drive first using the Linksys utility, which will erase all existing data on the drive and render the drive unreadable by Windows unless it is plugged into the NLSU2.

That's right: if your drive already has data, you'll lose it during the format. Once formatted, the drive can't be attached directly to a PC anymore.

None of this vital information appears on the box, which is very misleading. I've sent mail to Linksys on this issue and heard nothing back.

Misleading marketing.
Bad service.
Dumb engineering decision to not allow a windows formatted drive.

If you have a totally blank hard drive and you don't mind the fact that you'll never be able to use the drive directly on a PC without the linksys box, then go ahead. Otherwise, steer clear.

One star.

40 Simple to use and setup.. But slow
Sharing files was easy to setup and configure... however it does turn your Farrari USB 2.0 device into a 1.0 Yugo..

It has its uses but they need to fix the access time...

41 It is worth a try .... And not for all..
This is truly and sound product If you are looking for speed of access to your drives this one is not for you. It is a snap to set up and had it running in minutes, connected to two 160g external maxtor's. I am running Win XP on a high end P4 system Threading Processor. Down side this device was it required me to format the drives so juggling of current data was needed. I am running a Linksys home network and all devices were compatible. Data transfer is in my opinion slow for a USB device on the 100 Meg transfer. I moved 120g of data on the USB in about 20 min. On this device it was over 2 hours... And do not expect to access the other drive while you're moving large amounts of data. I would rate the transfer as fast a USB 1 device... If that fast... This is truly a good device and allows for sharing. But don't jump in thinking it is fast a a USB 2 device. Plus when you move high volumes on data it will slow down your Internet surfing since the data is traveling on your home network through the router to get to the drives... I think Linksys will see a lot of these devices returned if people are expecting USB 2 speeds and not expecting the Drive to be formatted and not compatible with your PC when direct plugging it into your PC USB. IT can only be read through the Linksys controller.. Spend your money wisely....

42 Linksys storage link is the cure for LAN storage woes
Last week I purchased the linksys storage link. This product is an excellent example or a device that does not try to be all things to all people. Essentially, it is an tiny computer or embeded device with a tiny os that runs code that provides SMB or Windows file sharing. It is 100% compatible with windows, linux, or mac as long as you dont have a personal firewall installed.
Installation is simple.
1. Unbox device
2. Use CD-ROM to set up address, if you have dhcp this is not neccesary
3. Connect drive
4. Format drive via web interface
5. Set any password information
6. Add Users and permissions
7. Enjoy
This is not as complicated as it sounds. The manual is excellent and not neccesary for anyone who is vaguely familiar with file sharing. Performance is excellent. On fast ethernet I was transferring 100 meg files in less than a minute. Over slower networks such as wireless your performance will suffer. This is not the devices fault.
THE BEAUTY OF THIS DEVICE IS NO DRIVERS ARE NECCESARY AS LONG AS YOU HAVE CLIENT FOR MS NETWORKS TURNED ON WHICH IT USUALLY IS. Other NAS drives require you load a proprietary driver, linksys, got it right.
- If you are having performance issues check to make sure that the device is running full duplex when plugged to a switch and half duplex when running to a hub. Over wireless it will be slow, that is the nature of wireless generally speaking.

43 Not Ready for Prime Time
In contrast to some of Linksys' other products, this one is surprisingly unpolished, with buggy firmware, failure to recognize and format various types of flash drives, slow performance, Windows-unfriendly formatting, network mapping and password hassles, and willing, but clueless Technical Support. Instead, get the far speedier Netdisk from Ximeta, a generally superior performer.

44 While it does work quite well there are limitations
As it has been mentioned several times in previous reviews, The Linksys NSLU2 is not directly compatiable with the Windows OS. You can not just plug and play on any windows computer.
If you are running a personal firewall program such as Norton Internet Security, you will encounter some problems unless you disable it when you wish to access the drive or make some modifications to the firewall.
Other limitations include the lack of support of firewire and ability to daisy chain several drives together.
With those limitations out of the way. It is a perfect a way to share files (sucha s MP3's, Photo's, ZIP files, etc..) with several computers in your workgroup.

45 One note of caution...
Do not buy this if you have an existing USB hard drive already formatted with a Windows based file system and wish to keep it formatted that way (so you could still plug it directly into other Window's based PC's if needed).

Your existing external drive will not be compatible with this device until it has been reformatted (and any existing data lost of course)by the Linksys Storage Link and once formatted it will no longer be directly usable on any other PC's. Bummer...

If I had been aware of that limitation I would not have bought this gizmo. A couple of websites that reviewed this device did not mention this limitation and probably should have but ultimately I blame myself for not RTFM .

Other than that limitation (which may or may not be a deal breaker for some folks) the device seems pretty slick. However, until I get another external USB drive I will be unable to actually play with this device so I am only giving it 3 stars until I get another drive to dedicate to this device at which time I will provide an update based on my experience.

Bottom line: read the manual before you buy this to totally familiarize yourself with its capabilities/limitations.

46 Excellent home/SOHO solution especially for backups.
Overall: its the first home backup/storage solution I've found that is fully automated, reasonably priced, and easy to administer. Others have noted the limitations of this device, nonetheless it serves admirably as a home backup solution or shared file server. I have mine running overnight backups for all the machines in my home, and I'm very happy with it.

The Storage Link is more flexible than the comparable Netgear product (which integrates a single USB port into a wireless router) as you can connect it to any existing router or switch in your network, as well as hang more than one disk off. (And if you need masses of storage, just get another one and connect it to another spare ethernet port.) It is also significantly cheaper per GB than conventional NAS disks such as those from DLink. Performance is more than acceptable for a network drive, although an initial full backup of my largest drive (100MB) did take a full 24 hours to complete! Fortunately, subsequent incremental backups run a lot faster. In any case, I don't think any other NAS drive would be faster, since the network is the bottleneck.

Extensive admin features, accessed via a web browser (familiar to owners of other Linksys devices) allow you to set up private password-protected partitions for different users, so you can protect work files from your kids or ensure that nobody deletes your precious backups to make room for music downloads! There is also a built in backup utility that is basic, but adequate for simple regular scheduled backups. If you are feeling brave you can also make attached disks visible over the Internet for remote access.

If you plan to use this in conjunction with a Maxtor OneTouch disk, beware: the OneTouch feature will not work over the network. For backups you'll either have to use the Storage Link's built in utility, or backup software. The Maxtor 250 I bought came with Retrospect - however, you default Install doesn't give you option to install Retrospect alone. You'll need to browse the \bin directory on the CD for the installer for Retrospect (but at least its there!)

47 Your drive will be dedicated as a file server
What a neat device. Now you can setup a file server at home for under $250, very nice solution for sharing files, videos, and photos with the your family PCs or a place to backup stuff.

Note a few warnings before purchasing this device. From the user manual "If the USB hard drive has not previously been used in a Storage Link, its format must be changed. You will be asked to verify if you want to change the format." This means you will lose what ever files you have on the disk before installation. Second big warning "IMPORTANT: The Storage Link's format is NOT compatible with Windows. You cannot swap USB hard drives between Windows systems and the Storage Link." So the drive will become dedicated as a file server, if this device goes down there is no way to read the files on it.

Another warning would be that the speed of the drive would be greatly governed. The speed of USB 2.0 (480Mbits/second) connection would be reduced to 100Mbits/second by the Ethernet connection. So don't except the same speed that you would have with a drive installed locally in your PC.

48 Read the PDF ahead before you make your decision!!
In order for Linksys Storage Link to work with your USB drives... it has to format your drive!!! It doesn't understand any NTFS partition!!! What da... I guess that's NAS!! Not sure it is good or bad... at this point.. i think i might just return the product....