I have many Tbs I want to download & don’t have the space plus I don’t have the $ to invest in large amounts of storage so I’ve been trying to learn about Seedboxes here and around the net and it seems like it might be a solution to my needs but I have so many questions.

Is a seedbox just for remote torrenting and moving files to and from your computer?

Can you logon to a seedbox and direct download files from a website into the seedbox?

Can you create torrents in the seedbox for posting to torrent sites?

Are seedboxes mainly for keeping ratios up on private trackers or do they also accept open trackers as well?

Do you have to worry about DMCA notices with a seedbox?/Can seedboxes see what you transfer?

Can seedboxes be used with a VPN for optimum privacy or is there even a need?

What are some of the best seedboxes which leave a minimal, trackable footprint & preferably use US currency?

Any helpful guidance would be most appreciated. Thank You!

  • Imprint9816@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
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    2 days ago

    It would be way cheaper to pay for something like RD to just download all these torrents for you and then stream them use streamio.

  • Marafon@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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    2 days ago

    Seedboxes are great, and I can’t recommend Whatbox.ca enough. I’ve been with them for almost a decade and they have excellent documentation and support. I think I pay 15 bucks a month for 4tb storage and use it as a seed box first and foremost, a media server via Jellyfin and the arr suites, and a VPN with OpenVPN. To really get the most of it though you’ll need to be comfortable connecting to your server using ssh. Which is a command line environment, but it’s not too intimidating because of the excellent documentation that guides you step by step.

    • Rodrigo_de_Mendoza@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
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      2 days ago

      I appreciate the recommendation. I’m just afraid I’m not tech-savvy enough to work these things plus I don’t want to get stuck with a DMCA or something like that, you know?

  • mspencer712@programming.devEnglish
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    2 days ago

    Think of a Seedbox as a cloud service provider with convenience features focused on enabling piracy, by keeping the hardware in a jurisdiction that doesn’t care what you pirate and giving you one-click easy installation methods for apps that make piracy simple. But without going so far as “Thank you for your payment, download these specific media files here.”

    You debatably have to be a techie. But by techie standards it’s very easy to use.

    If you really hate piracy, I suppose you could pay for one for a month, get the identity of who you paid, and use one of the apps to host a shell script that listens on one of the few public ports you have access to, that answers every incoming connection with “this is a seed box operated by ABC, with cards payments accepted by LMNOP Inc in Athens, Greece.”

    But the most common usage is running packaged software they let you run (like BT clients you can remote-control, sickchill, radarr, sonarr, Plex, etc.) or remote desktops or shells. Usually implemented as docker containers.

    • Rodrigo_de_Mendoza@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
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      2 days ago

      Thanks for the response! I understood some of that. I used to be a techie but technology has left me in the dirt in the past years. You kinda lost me starting with paragraph 3.

  • wheres_frank@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
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    2 days ago

    I use Ultra.cc. They give you the disk space and you can host all your apps there. Plex server, radarr, sonarr, torrent client, etc.

    I travel a lot so it is better than running my own hardware.

    • ShepherdPie@midwest.socialEnglish
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      2 days ago

      How much are you paying for that if you don’t mind my asking? I looked into seedboxes very briefly in the past and they typically didn’t offer much storage. It was either lots of storage and little bandwidth or lots of bandwidth and little storage when looking at options to configure some sort of remote media server.

      • wheres_frank@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
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        2 days ago

        I have 8 TB and it is $23 with a promo code I got. I’m going to have to move up to the 12 TB plan for $32 soon. It has 20 TB of upload bandwidth.

          • wheres_frank@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
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            2 days ago

            Depends on the plane type. The App Vault plan is $32. That comes with 20 TB of upload bandwidth. I have quite a few friends that have access to my Plex library and I never get close to the upload quota.

  • bad_news@lemmy.billiam.netEnglish
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    2 days ago

    I would check your assumptions about the price of a large external drive versus monthly seedbox fees on an indefinite timeframe for equivalent storage. If a hard drive doesn’t fail almost out of the gate, it runs for a long time for free, and monthly fees never go down.

  • FuckyWucky [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
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    2 days ago

    1. Yes its just a remote server that you can torrent on

    2. Yes you get SFTP and shell (non-root/root depending on which provider) access

    3. Yes, you can with Deluge, rTorrent etc which run on seedboxes

    4. Depends on the provider, some seedbox providers don’t support public trackers (or cap upload speeds)

    5. Depends on the provider, major ones like seedhost or ultraseedbox don’t. And yes they can see what you transfer, it’s a shared linux server.

    6. No, you need root access to run torrents over a VPN, not available on shared seedboxes but you can do it on dedicated servers/seedboxes.

    7. I’ve tried seedhost, ultraseedbox, whatbox.ca, hostingby.design. all pretty good.