Share a USB drive

[UO]

I have a Samsung TV UE43TU7175U. It's connected to a router by cable, and to an external hard drive with the TV's USB port. Internet access from the TV works fine, and it can play videos on the drive. But how can I share the hard drive and make it accessible over the network?

Scanning the network from my PC (Win10 Home) finds the TV, and it shows up in the router settings. But I can't find the USB drive or any way to share it from the TV.

[Pugs1957]

You can only access via a browser with your set up. It's probably better to connect the USB stick to your PC and share across your network.

[antikythera]

You can't do that unfortunately

[antikythera]

Or directly to the router if it has a USB connection designed for NAS functionality

[UO]

Thanks, that sounds like a better idea.

The router doesn't have a USB port, but I connected the drive to a separate NAS: a Raspberry Pi running openmediavault. Shared the drive with "Only guests" access. I can read/write to the drive from my PC, but no luck from the TV. I tried Source -> Remote Access -> Connect to remote computer and entered the local IP for the NAS. Am I on the right track?

[Pugs1957 · Accepted solution]

No, you don't need the Pi, connect the drive to the PC, share the drive in PC settings. Install Windows Media Player or similar on your PC, confirm the folders to share and enable streaming. You may find it hard to find WMP as it's discontinued, it works fine so I never replaced it. VLC media player or zune are suitable alternatives.

[UO]

Yes! That did the trick (with WMP). Thank you.

[Pugs1957]

You're welcome

[Naemoor]

You can mount the external HDD in a casing that has multiple port options: USB SATA and Ethernet. Choose one that will allow both (USB or SATA) and Ethernet access simultaneously. Your TV will want to format the drive if you are using it for Frreview HD or Freesat HD. You can then download and install a driver for you your PC to enable it to access the Ext-3 Partition

If there is a limit on partition size, accept it, then unplug it from the TV and use a partition manager on your PC to max the size of the partition to the available space.