[jrochet]

The OP is amazing! Quick question - for somebody with no NAS or other PC, would it be unwise to waste money on a big SSD (250/500GB) for one of these (standalone)? Or possibly a 128GB SD card (boot from SD option)?

I'm pretty sure I could survive on that little of space since I don't keep stuff for long. Just would be nice to have a fully self-sufficient setup, but would also suck to spend the extra money and have it not work.

I tried searching this but wasn't getting any luck.

I'd think an external USB-powered HDD would be the most cost effective option, but there's no reason you can't use a large internal M.2 SSD. I'd avoid an SD card for the OS for speed reasons (the SD card reader is USB2.0), but for media storage it's fine as well.

Thanks for the advice. I also found by Googling "2242 SSD Chromebox" this other post where you had provided a link and it's still valid. Very tempting, though I think I'll sleep on it and check out all of my options. I will cut the SD card / USB plan out from my options now - thanks for the warning.