Connecting storage devices to sagemcom f@st 1704n

[Awais Ali]

Hi,

Sorry if my questions feels stupid, but i don't have any knowledge/experience about NAS or using storage device on a network.

Goal (what i want to accomplish):
I want to have a Storage Device which i can access from all of my devices (PC, laptops, mobiles).

Problem / Questions :

1. Do i have to buy a NAS device or can i connect my storage device(through USB Port) directly to my Modem "sagemcom f@st 1704n" ?

My router has usb port in it and it also shows "Storage Service (Samba server)" option in Multimedia section.
For the purpose of testing i connected USB storage drive and my modem detected it(showed total memory available space etc). But i could not figure out how to access the on it.

2. Is there any other option except the 2 i mentioned ?

3.What is the best option (wrt transfer speed) for my purpose? and any idea what transfer rates i will get?

Limitations:

1. Small budget (max $100)
2. Limited knowlegde/expertise

Thanks & Regards

 

[kanewolf]

Your budget precludes a NAS. But a NAS would provide the best performance. The CPU in a router is usually the limiting factor in performance. They just don't have enough CPU. Sometimes the SAMBA software is poor.

You might get 10MB/s read speeds and 2 - 4MB/s write speeds with your USB setup. Most people want to leave the disk as NTFS formatted, but that degrades performance since the router is a Linux based operating system. Using an EXT3 format will maximize your performance.