Archive for August, 2010

Streaming your music collection over the net with a music server

james August 23rd, 2010

iTunes is hugely popular and ubiquitous. I am updating my music collection and trying to organize it so apparently this is a good method. Pandora is a great music system too but sometimes I want to hear my music that is not available elsewhere… from anywhere. I have nice Linux servers so a quick search reveals that a firefly music server is a good option.

To stream this music to yourself on your local network is simplicity itself. Turn on iTunes / Media player and select the shared music.

To stream this music to yourself on your remote network at work, on the road, etc is a little harder. For a firefly server this is straightforward:
Link for Firefly Client -> Firefly Client V 0.9b. There are other options like fireflash but most can connect to a firefly / iTunes music server, so choose your client as desired. I think the iPhone and other Apple products can link up seamlessly. You will need to forward your external ip on port 3689 to port 3689 on your home music server box so some understanding of routers and port forwarding is necessary at the host site but not at the client site. Generally you can just point the client to http://ipa.ipb.ipc.ipd:3689.

Moving forward, we have the increasingly complex scenario where you might want to administrate or actually use iTunes on your remote / work computer but reference your home server where are your music files are stored. Perhaps you hear a song on the radio or you buy a new CD and rip it at the office or just want to define new playlists, etc.

Now, we have to do some more work:

1) Open port 22 from your home music server to some port on your router (I recommend not using 22!. I recommend masquerading this port as some other value on your wan while having it point to port 22 on your lan). This step is only necessary on the host system, not the clients.

2) For client stations, you don’t need any port work, just install the SSH Tunnel Client:

Link for SSH Tunnel Client -> SSH Tunnel Client V 4.0.2.73

Once installed, go to tunnel, then add. Fill out the gui as shown below (the ip can be an FQDN):

images notes

There are some more options for auto-connection that some may wish to choose. Once connected, the icon in the software should show a lock indicating an SSH Tunnel has been created.

3) For client stations, install the Rendezvous Proxy:
Link for Rendezvous Proxy -> Rendezvous Proxy V 0.22

Once installed, go to file, then add new host. Fill out the gui as shown below (the ip can be an FQDN):

images notes

4) Fire up iTunes and/or your music manager and you should have access to your home media as if you were there (provided your connection is fast enough).

As a note, this works with iTunes v7, 8 & 9.

ReadyNAS PRO with WD20EADS Drives & TiVo install with WD10EVDS (How-To)

james August 22nd, 2010

I ordered a ReadyNAS Pro (RNDP6000) and filled it with 6 Western Digital 2TB drives (WD20EADS-32S2B0) that were on the Netgear compatibility list. I immediately ran into a few issues.

I installed the WD drives in the ReadyNAS, plugged it in and installed the RIADar tool on my primary workstation. On first boot with the brand new drives in place, I could not connect to the ReadyNAS. I pushed the power button for 5 seconds and restarted the ReadyNAS which came up and I went through the setup process thought RAIDar, then the web but was never asked about my raid choice. This being my first time using the device, this just seemed odd. After setup, I received an error message to the effect of “No volumes exist.” I called support at 3am on a Saturday and got a foreign fellow who spoke english well and was well informed. He had me shut the device down and then reboot with the reset button in the back held in with a paper clip. I then went through the menu option with the backup button on the front to select Factory Default. I pressed the reset button with the paperclip on the back again to select this option. After the reboot, I was able to choose setup with RAIDar and choose X-RAID2 with dual redundancy (a flexible RAID6 basically).

After this was established, I had an error with one of the drives. It took me some time but after swapping drive positions and playing with a few settings, I concluded that the netgear frontview (web) status messages were correct in that the drive was dead/had errors.

Moving on, I needed to upgrade a TiVo on my network to a 1TB drive. I realized that I needed to change the intelligent drive parking on the TiVo drive (WD10EVDS) and the WD20EADS, so I might as well do them at the same time.

Link for WD Diag Tool -> Western Digital Diagnostic Tool V 1.21
Link for WDidle3 -> Western Digital Idle / Parking tool V1.05 (wdidle3)
Link for WDTLER -> Western Digital TLER Tool (Raid Tool)
Link for bootable iso with WDidle3 & WDTLER -> Bootable CD (ISO) with wdidle3 & wdtler
Link for WinMFS Beta 9f -> WinMFS Beta 9f

Steps to get TiVo migrated:
1. Unplug TiVo, get a T10 torx wrench and open it up and pull out drive.
2. Burn bootable iso with WD Tools. Turn off computer, open up computer and hook up WD10EVDS drive to sata & power inside workstation. If you have WD drives in your workstation, you might want to disconnect them now.
3. Boot computer with bootable cd in drive & immediately go straight to the bios. In my case, I had to turn AHCI mode off, SATA Native port mode off & IDE Controller / compatibility mode on. Make sure your bios is set to boot from CD!
4. Hit enter to enter tools at boot prompt for fdos. Type wdidle3 then enter. It should report that your WD10EVDS drive(s) have this setting on and set to 8 seconds. Type wdidle3 /D then enter. It should report the idle setting is disabled.
5. Remove the boot CD and turn off computer. Connect any workstation drives that you disconnected before. Connect your original TiVo drive.
6. Turn computer on and be damn sure you go into the bios first and turn back on AHCI mode, Native ports and turn off IDE controllers if these were your original settings.
7. Once bios settings are saved and you have rebooted into Windows, install the WinMFS tools (you can use dos based tools too). Basically select your source and destination and copy. Once done, expand the data to the new drive. Turn off the computer.
8. Unplug the WD10EVDS and go install it in the TiVo. Put the old TiVo drive away for safe-keeping just in case of disaster or failure. Close up computer. Hook up TiVo. Done!

Steps to get ReadyNAS working with WD20EADS drives with wdidle3 and TLER on.
1. Burn bootable iso with WD Tools. Turn off computer, open up computer and hook up WD20EADS drive(s) to sata & power inside workstation [I did two drives at a time]. If you have WD drives in your workstation, you might want to disconnect them now.
2. Boot computer with bootable cd in drive & immediately go straight to the bios. In my case, I had to turn AHCI mode off, SATA Native port mode off & IDE Controller / compatibility mode on. Make sure your bios is set to boot from CD!
3. Hit enter to enter tools at boot prompt for fdos. Type wdidle3 then enter. It should report that your WD10EVDS drive(s) have this setting on and set to 8 seconds. Type wdidle3 /D then enter. It should report the idle setting is disabled.
4. Type TLERSCAN and hit enter. This should report the TLER settings which are likely disabled on your drives. If you type TLER_ON and then enter, it will run the command WDtler -r7 -w7. Some people recommend only using a read setting of 7 seconds so you could type WDtler -r7 and that would be fine.
5. Turn off machine and rotate drives as necessary to operate on all drives. Remove the boot CD and turn off computer. Connect any workstation drives that you disconnected before.
6. Turn computer on and be damn sure you go into the bios first and turn back on AHCI mode, Native ports and turn off IDE controllers if these were your original settings.
7. Go put drives back in ReadyNAS now with the idle park setting disabled and with TLER on (for proper raid response to avoid the raid dropping drives)!