Hardware Upgrade to support Frigate add on and number plate recognition

I Currently have HA on a Zotac Z-Box CI320 nano with Intel N2930(quad core, 1.83 GHz, up to 2.16 GHz) but want to install Frigate add-on to connect my CCTV cameras. I have therefore purchased an Intel NUC i5-5250U which has SATA and an M.2 slot to install a coral TPU. I have a couple of questions before setting it up:-

  1. The new system comes preinstalled with HA 17.1. If I install the coral TPU before booting the system for the first time will HASOS recognise the Coral or do I need to reinstall HA from scratch so the Coral is recognised at install time?

  2. I believe Frigate writes files directly to HASOS filesystem and therefore system drive. I understand some users have found a way of using the samba share addon to use an external drive. this was back in 2024 Have things changed since allowing Frigate to see external storage directly without this hack?
    the latter may be a question for Frigate forum but the first question is more related to HA
    Many thanks