Pogoplug V3 OXNAS - USB 3.0 on mPCIe - Main thread

This thread is the working thread for adding USB 3.0 capability to the Pogo V3 (OXNAS) plugs.

Thanks JeffS for allowing this thread to become the "Pogoplug V3 OXNAS - USB 3.0 on mPCIe" thread.

-bodhi

--------

JeffS original question:


OK, I'm kind of getting hooked on Linux / ARM hacking. Thinking about a second Pogoplug purchase. I already have a mobile v4.

What would be your first choice from the supplied list and why? I'm thinking about an Arch based NAS.

http://www.adorama.com/l/?sf=Price&sel=Brand_Pogoplug

I'd also consider an inexpensive ARM based platform like a banana pi because of it's sata. Please share your thoughts and experiences.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/14/2017 07:40PM by bodhi.

Greetz JeffS,
I have a little bit of intro for you, the Pogoplugs will either have Oxnas or Kirkwood chipset things, and Arch discontinued support for one of them. The Pogoplug E02 (not at Adorama anymore) and v4 might take you there.
There's a famous and useful set of tutorials from Qui here (this is about hacking the v4):

You';ll find the remaining Pogoplugs will have 128MB RAM - if you are used to say DDWRT on routers and used to 4 MB RAM, then 128 MB is plenty. And all the Pogoplugs I checked with a watt meter ran at 4-5 watts! Less than a nite light in the bathroom.

The E02 has 256MB RAM and I love it when using RDP from another machine - with minor performance tweaks it's one of my all-time favorite computers regardless of power or cost.

Either the P01 or P02 might be a good one as well (though I think that's not Arch-compatible), with 128MB RAM it should have a bare SATA port inside and wireless MPCIE card inside, but that particular wireless card doesn't work well with Debian.

Good luck; I'm not knowledgeable and can't handle Arch. Debian has been good to me on all the Pogoplugs, runs light, reliable. All in all I'm blown away by these little computers and have amassed 4 of them.

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-

Hello and thanks JoeyPogoPlugE02

Your info motivated me to try to figure out which model Pogoplugs have which specs. I've put together some notes below. Do I have this right and anything to correct, add, subtract?

Id like to stay Arch compatible for now, so the first upgrade would be a V4 "non mobile", after that a V2 if I can find one. I see Newegg has the "office" version of the V4 for 18.00. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA9T03T01499&cm_re=Pogoplug-_-0H9-011R-00001-_-Product

Are there any "real" V2 E02's to be found new anymore? I found some on Amazon, but prefer to not purchase through them due to their mistreatment of workers, and I really have doubts when first 5 sellers claim, "new" and "last one".

An E02 priced at $30.00, I'd probably pass anyway and spend 5 - 10 dollars more for a banana pi m1 with sata2, a powerful CPU, and 1gb ram.

Quote
My Notes

Pogoplug V2 [ ARMv5 Arch Compatible ]

ARM Marvell Kirkwood Single Core 1.2GHz - 256MB Ram

Features:

Pogoplug Pink, Gray [ Note: Reportedly some Pinks are V3 ]

POGO-E02
POGO-E02G

Processor: ARM926EJ-S rev 1 (v5l)
CPU Hardware: Feroceon-KW
Processor: ARM926EJ-S rev 1 (v5l)
BogoMIPS: 1192.75
Total Memory: 256MB

===========================================================================

Pogoplug V3 [ ARMv6 NOT Arch Compatible ]

ARM Oxnas - Dual Core 700Mhz, 128MB Ram

Features: SATA, Gbit Eth, 4 USB Ports, Wireless Pro Only

Pogoplug Pro and Classic

POGO-B01 - Classic
POGO-B02 - Classic
POGO-B03 - Classic
POGO-B04 - Classic

POGO-P01 - Pro (Wi-Fi)
POGO-P02 - Pro (Wi-Fi)

POGO-P21 - V3
POGO-P22 - V3
POGO-P24 - V3
POGO-P25 - V3

Processor: ARMv6-compatible processor rev 5 (v6l)
CPU Hardware: Oxsemi NAS
BogoMIPS: 2 x279.34
Total Memory: 128MB


Wireless specs = AzureWave AW-NE762H 802.11 b/g/n PCI Express RT3090

===========================================================================

Pogoplug V4 [ ARMv5 Arch Compatible ]

ARM Kirkwood - Single Core 800Mhz, 128MB Ram

Features: SATA2 Except Mobile

Pogoplug Series 4 and Mobile

POGO-V4
POGO-V4-A1-01 Mobile

Processor: Feroceon 88FR131 rev 1 (v5l)
CPU Hardware: Feroceon-KW
BogoMIPS: 799.5
Total Memory: 128MB

As for knowledge required for Arch, all I can say is if I can do it, anyone can. I'm definitely not the sharpest tool in the shed .. lol. It's priories (to invest time), stubbornness (I rarely give up), patience (to waste more time). I wanted to learn more about Linux, and using it kind of forced me to.

JeffS,

Your info above is all correct.

Advise: if you want a NAS with SATA and Gbit, then look for Goflex Home or Goflex Net.

-bodhi
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/13/2016 06:10PM by bodhi.

( * Bodhi's words should be taken with more weight than mine because he's the chef and I'm just a glutton LOL)

First of all there was a big sort of controversy with the model numbers. I'm pretty sure all of us who got E02s were forced to buy a model that was labeled different, maybe B02 or something - Qui mentioned it, whatever the exact model. I have no idea how that happened! Second, spring of 2015 Adorama has most Pogoplugs for $15, but with a rebate card that made it $5 including shipping! I got a couple of the Pros.

As for Arch on an E02 it's still a great experience (I have Qui's install on USB stick and can swap it anytime)j, but it's simply not my time until some associations click in my brain. Kind of like a certain higher level Philosophy class at the Uni years ago; I got a respectable grade, but it was 5 years later I was mowing the lawn and had this AHA! moment when I "got it" LOL

As for me, I look at these micro Pogoplugs as the pilot light of a good LAN. My E02 runs at 5 watts 24/7 and is my torrent and uGet downloading box. The other three Pogoplugs have near exact same USB sticks, though one of the Pros has OpenWRT flashed so if there's no USB stick plugged-in it goes to that. But I've never really tinkered with it.

You're right about $30 being a bit steep for an E02, but I think I paid $20 for mine new and it's paid for itself more than I'd admit :-D it all depends what you get out of it - remember original Pogoplugs were over $100 and considered a real good deal a few years ago.

Very helpful group here - I'm extraordinarily grateful to every person here in varying degrees of full tilt.

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-

>
> First of all there was a big sort of controversy
> with the model numbers. I'm pretty sure all of us
> who got E02s were forced to buy a model that was
> labeled different, maybe B02 or something

The story was the Pogo E02 (Kirkwood SoC), Pogo V4 (Kirkwood SoC), and Pogo V3 series (Oxnas SoC) were all phased out by CloudEngine due to their terrible and out of date software. The E02 was either pink color or gray. The V3 series were either black or white. And at one point, (I'm guessing) they must have realized the pink one sells better, so in some stock V3, the pink case was used. To us embedded Linux device hackers, the pink one is more popular because of the 256MB memory. So everybody buys when the pink Pogo was on fire sale at Adorama, and other online shops, and then surprised to see the label said B1 or such. And it became a guessing game based on serial number and stock batch ID, .... :))

To me the best cheap NAS was the Goflex Net (the GoFlex Home was 2nd). Now it became hard to find so price is not so cheap any more for either.

-bodhi
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Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/14/2016 02:26AM by bodhi.

bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> To me the best cheap NAS was the Goflex Net (the
> GoFlex Home was 2nd). Now it became hard to find
> so price is not so cheap any more for either.
>
I would say GoFLEX Net/Home was rather inexpensive than cheap (lemon). I got a couple of GoFLEX Net under US $10 from local Fry's Electronics stores. I also bought some used GoFLEX Home from eBay under US $2 + $10 S/H fee. Some came with 1 TB HDD in its original case and some don't. I have using the one with 1 TB HDD and it runs very solid with OpenWRT even with a 128 MB RAM.

My 5 NAS (2 GFNet 3 GFHome) have been running Debian for 4,5 years. Never ran out of memory or crash.

-bodhi
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The Iomega Iconnect is another excellent bargain which occasionally pops up on ebay. I got mine for $20 and there is now one listed for about that when you include shipping. Ebay listing. They more often are listed for $50 or more though.

Yes, iConnect is a really good plug. Tends to be expensive, though. Need PCI to USB 3.0/SATA to be a NAS.

-bodhi
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May be, this HDD enclosure latest Design External Antennas Signal Boosters WiFi Repeater networking Range Expander hdd case and wifi storage is a better choice.

bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yes, iConnect is a really good plug. Tends to be
> expensive, though. Need PCI to USB 3.0/SATA to be
> a NAS.

I tried a couple dirt cheap PCI to SATA cards but they were so bad that I threw them away :) if anybody knows any inexpensive haft-height PCIe to USB 3.0 cards, I would like to know about that. I have 3 iConnects but only use them as portable plugs with Wifi.

-bodhi
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/15/2016 07:51PM by bodhi.

bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> bodhi Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Yes, iConnect is a really good plug. Tends to
> be
> > expensive, though. Need PCI to USB 3.0/SATA to
> be
> > a NAS.
>
> I tried a couple dirt cheap PCI to SATA cards but
> they were so bad that I threw them away :) if
> anybody knows any inexpensive haft-height PCI
> exepress to USB 3.0 cards, I would like to know
> about that. I have 3 iConnects but only use them
> as portable plugs with Wifi.

One thing I know for sure, if it has Fresco Logic's FL1100 or higher it's mind blowing good. Most Linuxes work with it with no additional tom foolery and the FL009 chipset is great too. But it seems Fresco Logic came into their own with the FL1100. The most recent acquisition I got is this, admittedly for laptop but the chipset is over-the-top. I've got a USB 3.0-to-Gigabit plugged-in as well as two USB 3.0 hard drives and it's flawless so far.

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-

Joey,

Sorry I mis-spoke! it's mini PCIe :) like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Mini-PCI-Express-to-USB-3-0-19pin-Header-Card-with-Dual-Type-A-Femal-Ports-Cable-/181864466698?hash=item2a57f7890a:g:DQ8AAOSwBahVYY4n

The iConnect has no room for a full height one. So mini half height PCIe is a must.

-bodhi
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Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/15/2016 07:55PM by bodhi.

If you have the jing, this looks good:

The reason being, I've never seen a seller on eBay with that many transactions and 100% happy customers. Unless you count 7 out of 14,000 in the past year. Yes, it's safe to say if there's anything objectionable they'll make it right™ LOL

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/15/2016 08:13PM by JoeyPogoPlugE02.

JoeyPogoPlugE02 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If you have the jing,
> this looks good:
>
With that budget + additional US $3.02, I would rather get 3 units of PogoPlug Pro 01 from Adorama.

Let's analyze the difference.

iConnect has 256MB RAM and 512MB NAND and Wifi.

Pogo Pro V3 has Wifi, but Pogo Classic V3 does not. Pogo V3 has 128MB RAM, 128MB NAND.

-bodhi
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habibie Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> With that budget + additional US $3.02, I would
> rather get 3 units of
> PogoPl
> ug Pro 01 from Adorama.

Depends. If you own more than one USB 3.0 hard drive/USB stick/SSD, then it's wise to have at least one USB 3.0 station. You could make arguments otherwise but there comes a time to copy a hard drive or USB stick, and USB 2.0 to copy a multi-TB drive is a false economy and asking for trouble. Or even accessing your files over USB 2.0 can get old if they're big files.

Everybody's different. Remember, I didn't think I'd have heart failure and have pennies for my income since. So I've muddled along, trying to work within limitations. And if, after many great deals there's an impasse until one key, expensive item is bought, then maybe that's a leap of faith as easy to recognize as 20 good deals falling in place previous to said leap.

Or, get $60 and buy both LOL

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-

> Everybody's different.

Very true. That's the bottom line. For example, if you want everything on NAND, and don't want to put up with the lack of security updates using OpenWrt as a main system, you could squeeze Debian rootfs into 512MB NAND. The differences between the plugs and what you'll use it for will determine which plug is better. Or sometime 256MB RAM is just what get you through a roadblock of 128MB RAM for something you want to run.

-bodhi
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JoeyPogoPlugE02 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> habibie Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > With that budget + additional US $3.02, I would
> > rather get 3 units of
> >
> PogoPlug Pro 01 from Adorama.
>
> Depends. If you own more than one USB 3.0 hard
> drive/USB stick/SSD, then it's wise to have at
> least one USB 3.0 station.
>
I thought we are talking about a SATA port on a Pogoplug Pro. For a USB3 port, perhaps a combination of this inexpensive USB 3.0 PCI-E PCIe card and an inexpensive PogoPlug Pro 01 from Adorama will do, too.

bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> > Everybody's different.
>
> Very true. That's the bottom line. For example, if
> you want everything on NAND, and don't want to put
> up with the lack of security updates using OpenWrt
> as a main system, you could squeeze Debian rootfs
> into 512MB NAND. The differences between the plugs
> and what you'll use it for will determine which
> plug is better. Or sometime 256MB RAM is just what
> get you through a roadblock of 128MB RAM for
> something you want to run.
>
Exactly.

For me, I build my own OpenWRT/LEDE and only add the needed packages. My preference is to boot off of an external USB memory stick and leave the internal storage intact with a stock firmware. I like this approach for some upgrade convenience.

habibie Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> For me, I build my own OpenWRT/LEDE and only add
> the needed packages. My preference is to boot off
> of an external USB memory stick and leave the
> internal storage intact with a stock firmware. I
> like this approach for some upgrade convenience.

Can't wait to try some of that. The mPCIE item Bodhi is looking for, that might take the v3 Pro to another level altogether. Let's say you had an MPCIE-to-wires-to-3-port USB 3.0 (with FL chipset), right? You could plug in 2 external hard drives and an additional Gigabit-to-USB3.0 and maybe have a mind-blowing NAS that includes 2 Gigabit access points.

That's what I forgot to mention, sooner or later we'll see sales in mpcie plug-ins, and since we know it can be plugged-in to the two devices mentioned in this thread, heck, like I say, if you've got the jing at least you'll know and can even measure differences in performance.

Those are some of my most satisfying purchases, stuff you don't need now but foresee might be a problem solver in the future.

And Habibie, anytime you post about using openWRT I'm all ears. So far I couldn't so much as get Samba going. But these things eventually associate in my brain.

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/16/2016 12:53PM by JoeyPogoPlugE02.

habibie,

> For a USB3 port, perhaps a
> combination of this inexpensive USB 3.0 PCI-E PCIe...

That's very interesting! and so for a few bucks I'll give it a try. Hopefully it won't be another dud like most cheap SATA adapters out there.

-bodhi
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bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> habibie,
>
> > For a USB3 port, perhaps a
> > combination of this inexpensive USB 3.0 PCI-E
> PCIe...
>
> That's very interesting! and so for a few bucks
> I'll give it a try. Hopefully it won't be another
> dud like most cheap SATA adapters out there.

Looks like Amazon has similar items available also PCI-E PCI Express 16X to 1X Riser Card Adapter for $7.25 with free shipping. I might try this as well!

Ray

I'm not sure I understood the product habibie posted above (have read the description).

I did some searches but it seems the average normal selling price for mPCIe card is about $US 20 (with UBS 3.0 cable). For example: Syba. But there seems to be no half-height card out there. Looks like this is not even worth worrying about.

-bodhi
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habibie,

Running OpenWrt/LEDE on an external drive is just absolutely pointless, and you're limiting your system comparing to running Debian or Arch. Sorry to say that's not a good configuration at all :)

-bodhi
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/16/2016 06:24PM by bodhi.

bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'm not sure I understood the product habibie
> posted above (have read the description).
>
> I did some searches but it seems the average
> normal selling price for mPCIe card is about $US
> 20 (with UBS 3.0 cable). For example: Syba. But
> there seems to be no half-height card out there.
> Looks like this is not even worth worrying about.


Is this in the same league? That leaves options open for USB 3.0 hub to connect to this. Again I can only vouch for Fresco Logic chipsets, but this one doesn't say. My first two FL-chipset devices didn't say either, so maybe that's a good thing.

So the upfront cost is $10 before final interface hub even, but knowledge, priceless :-)

-update-
1. Searching "USB 3.0 19-pin Header Splitter Cable" on ebay gets a lot of inexpensive cables including one with angled plug which may work for tight spaces.
2. It looks like the $10 card I mentioned above is same as Syba with Renesas chipset, if Linux would need to know that.

I'm fairly certain I'll order something like that before Jan 21 :-) Just to find out. Not expecting much but if USB performance is even 5x, that's significant and certainly worth the money.

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/16/2016 07:55PM by JoeyPogoPlugE02.

I hope this is worthy of another post. This is the only one of these I've seen, a Mini PCIe TO PCI Express 1x slot adapter Mini ITX mPCIe to PCI-e x1 Riser Card

Since the world of PCIE cards include everything practically, this might be the card I order and take care of other details elsewhere. There are PCIE ribbon cables cheap that can run out to the outside of the box.

I could see having one of these. And for Pogo3, it was so cheap I wouldn't care if I cut a large hole in the side.
In fact, even in a worst-case scenario if the Pogo had a bus speed equating SATA I, my laptop proved a USB 3.0 hub can have wild speeds at the end between hublets, or whatever lol

As an afterthought, if Pogo has PCI specification 2.0, then this I think only goes to v1. (sigh)

=========
-= Cloud 9 =-



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/16/2016 08:45PM by JoeyPogoPlugE02.

JoeyPogoPlugE02 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> bodhi Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I'm not sure I understood the product habibie
> > posted above (have read the description).
> >
> > I did some searches but it seems the average
> > normal selling price for mPCIe card is about
> $US
> > 20 (with UBS 3.0 cable). For example: Syba. But
> > there seems to be no half-height card out
> there.
> > Looks like this is not even worth worrying
> about.
>
>
> http://www.ebay.com/itm/Mini-PCI-Express-PCI-
> E-to-USB-3-0-19pin-Header-Card-Adapter-For-Win-7-8
> -HR-/252541988688?hash=item3accacef50:g:Fu4AAOSwOy
> JX23K6]Is this in the same league?[/url] That
> leaves options open for USB 3.0 hub to connect to
> this. Again I can only vouch for Fresco Logic
> chipsets, but this one doesn't say. My first two
> FL-chipset devices didn't say either, so maybe
> that's a good thing.
>
> So the upfront cost is $10 before final interface
> hub even, but knowledge, priceless :-)

That's is a very good card. Renesas is already supported. I need to look to confirm that the kernel config is ready. If only we can find this in half-height then it would be exactly what I am after:) but for the Pogo Pro V3 this full height is cool!

>
> -update-
> 1. Searching "USB 3.0 19-pin Header Splitter
> Cable" on ebay gets a lot of inexpensive cables
> including one with angled plug which may work for
> tight spaces.

This.

> 2. It looks like the $10 card I mentioned above is
> same as Syba with Renesas chipset, if Linux would
> need to know that.
>
> I'm fairly certain I'll order something like that
> before Jan 21 :-) Just to find out. Not expecting
> much but if USB performance is even 5x, that's
> significant and certainly worth the money.

I'll think this has lot of potentials.

-bodhi
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Wow, looks like we all are into something with PCIe2USB3.

I was doing some searches on both AliExpress and eBay about SATA to USB3 with a lot of hits, but they are all basically USB3-to-SATA and not SATA-to-USB3. I wonder if a USB3-to-SATA with some proper adapters can be used to convert a SATA port on a Pogoplug Pro into a USB3 port.