Hello brother. 🙏 May I talk to you for a minute about our lord and savior Brother Laser Jet Printer.

It’s not “exactly like” physical media. The license portion is a similar concept. But the difference is that the variables that determine whether I can keep watching the content whenever I want, in perpetuity, lie solely with me as the person who physically possesses the media. The corporation from which I purchased the license can’t unilaterally decide to revoke my access to the content.

Since I don’t know your level of expertise, I’ll go step by step. Forgive me if you already know how to do some of this.

In terminal, type “sudo nano /etc/fstab” (without quotes). This brings up a file where you can add the mount point so it mounts at boot and set options for the mount. Go to the end of the file and enter a line like the following, substituting your info in the appropriate places:

//[static ip for nas]/[top level folder on nas you want to mount] /[mount point in Linux] [file system type for mount] [mount options, nas login credentials, permissions] 0 0

Mine looks like this: //192.168.1.0/Media /mnt/Media cifs _netdev,user=anonymouse,password=*****,uid=1000,file_mode=0777,dir_mode=0777 0 0

The “_netdev” option is the one that delays the mount until after your network is up. The “file_mode” & “dir_mode” set the mount permissions. There is info out there showing how to insert a reference to a credentials file instead of placing them in fstab in plain text, but I didn’t bother since I have my computer and user profile pretty well locked down.

To get _netdev to work, I had to enter the following in terminal (without quotes): “sudo systemctl enable systemd-networkd-wait-online”.

I couldn’t find all the sites I visited while setting this up, but here are a few:

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/98707/how-do-i-mount-a-cifs-share-so-i-can-fully-control-the-mounted-volume-on-the-cli

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/429604/fstab-not-automatically-mounting-smb-storage?rq=1

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Fstab#Options

Hope this helps!

I’ll look up the exact info when I get home and provide links if I can find them again.

The summary is that I had to add a line to /etc/fstab with the ip and folder route of the nas drive and folder, then the mount point in linux, the file system type for the mount, options that give login creds/group id + establish permissions I want to apply to the mount, and an option that keeps the drive from trying to mount until my network is connected.

Finally, for that last option to work, I had to enable a process that I forget the name of. I think it was in systemd, but I was able to initiate it from the command line.

Maintenance has been negligible - $250 a year for oil changes & a couple hundred for replacing damaged tires. I might check into my state’s tax credits to see if that would make up the difference in cost.

The range problem is that I can’t charge at home. I could probably go as low as 140 miles if I’m willing to visit a charging station every weekend. But, the one to three times a year when I do drive somewhere for vacation or to visit family, I’d either have to plan very carefully or rent a car.

Initial cost and lack of charging infrastructure are the two biggest drawbacks for me. The lease on my current car ends in a year, and I’m looking for a viable EV. But most EVs that are bigger than a breadbox and have a 250+ mi. range start around $7-10k beyond my budget.