expired Posted by iconian | Staff • Jul 11, 2023
Jul 11, 2023 7:16 AM
Item 1 of 1
expired Posted by iconian | Staff • Jul 11, 2023
Jul 11, 2023 7:16 AM
Prime Members: Synology NAS Enclosures: DS1522+ 5-Bay $560, DS923+ 4-Bay
+ Free Shipping$480
$600
20% offAmazon
Visit AmazonGood Deal
Bad Deal
Save
Share
Top Comments
The reason I like a QNAP/Synology solution is that they do a better job of abstracting the underlying technology into a smaller set of configurations. NAS is a specific type of application that doesn't require powerful CPUs or a ton of RAM to run well at very high-performance levels. So with something like a Synology, you get the benefit of streamlined configuration, predictable/stable performance, and a rich set of management/access/security/backup/sync/notification features that would take very complicated configuration to replicate. TrueNAS makes this easier, but it's not as easy as Synology/QNAP. For those that want to ticker with their NAS, they can try building a TrueNAS system. For me, my NAS holds important files that I just want to be available so I'm not tinkering with it. I do my tinkering with the Proxmox VMs.
Lastly, want to mention that my self-built NAS pulled about 80 watts on idle and that was quite an achievement with under-volting an AMD processor. The QNAP I have now run about 20-40 watts depending on load. For the 8 years I ran my self-built NAS, that's 2800kWh of additional electricity used, or about $420 at 15 cents a kWh. Your mileage may vary, but a Synology/QNAP will have lower energy costs over the years.
75 Comments
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
I wonder if a 3rd party might make one someday or if the market is too niche or licensing would be an issue?
As my switch is not 10G, nor do I have 10G in my main PC, for now it doesn't matter. I sure wish they had at least one port as 2.5G though.
I have a 4 bay NAS running unRAID with 1x NVME for cache. I'm running it on an HP Elitedesk 800 G3 TWR with i5 7600T that cost me $70. Idles at 13W. I actually retired my DS218+ after migrating everything over.
Ease of administration & time spent - the Synology still wins, though at a monetary cost.
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
Ease of administration & time spent - the Synology still wins, though at a monetary cost.
I have a Dell 7060 MFF that I'm about to spin up with a i7-8700t with 32GB RAM and 500GB NVMe - curious what the power draw will be.
On your point about software, Synology has a few key applications that work well and are well maintained, but many of their other apps are not. For example, Download Station is pretty poor, and even Plex, one of the most popular use cases, is not really packaged well by them (the version that they provide through their add on store is way behind the version directly from Plex). It seems like most people who use their NAS for a little more than file storage have migrated to using Docker containers, and Synology probably realized this and just updated the Docker manager in DSM 7.2 to have a new name and sleeker interface. But if you're just using Docker containers, you can do that on any OS. On that note, while I haven't used them myself, it seems like TrueNAS and OpenRAID have much more robust offerings than they did just a few years ago.
On the power note, I definitely agree that it has been hard to match them due to the lack of embedded/mobile boards available to the consumer. However, recently there have been a few of these boards available from CWWK / Topton among others. Check out the J6413 or N5105/N6005 ITX boards. The J6413 is 2 years newer than the R1600, supports AV1 decoding, has 4 cores vs 2 cores, and is on a smaller process with a lower TDP. These boards also come with 2.5Gbe ports. You could pair one of these with one of the newer NAS ITX cases like the Jonsbo N2. Also, ASRock recently announced they will have a DeskNAS product which may be similar to one of those setups.
All that said, I haven't gone that route yet as I'd prefer to use ECC RAM in a NAS/home server and Intel's embedded offerings don't support ECC. There are rumors of possible Ryzen mobile based boards coming, and those would probably be a sweet spot power wise for many including myself.
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
I have a 4 bay NAS running unRAID with 1x NVME for cache. I'm running it on an HP Elitedesk 800 G3 TWR with i5 7600T that cost me $70. Idles at 13W. I actually retired my DS218+ after migrating everything over.