4-Bay TERRAMASTER D4-320 External Hard Drive Enclosure (USB 3.2 Gen 2, Diskless)

slippydealer

Today 01:03 AM

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Joined Aug 2008

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Anyone looking at this, make sure you're looking for a DAS and not an NAS. This is a DAS.

For those that don't know the difference, a DAS is basically just a external enclosure for drives, without networking or file server capabilities of its own. It needs to be attached to a computer or NAS in order to do anything useful. An NAS, on the other had, runs its own OS, connects to the network, serves files, etc. all by itself.

Last edited by slippydealer June 15, 2026 at 06:16 PM.

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tigerkurtz

Today 01:55 AM

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Joined Nov 2009

tigerkurtzToday 01:55 AM

10 Posts

Would this be good to attach to a NAS as a backup? (Part of a larger backup scheme)

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Azrael_the_Cat

Today 03:29 AM

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Joined Feb 2006

Azrael_the_CatToday 03:29 AM

5,146 Posts

Quote from tigerkurtz

:

Would this be good to attach to a NAS as a backup? (Part of a larger backup scheme)

Sure that would work.

jk_black

Today 04:41 AM

503 Posts

Joined Sep 2014

jk_blackToday 04:41 AM

503 Posts

Quote from tigerkurtz

:

Would this be good to attach to a NAS as a backup? (Part of a larger backup scheme)

That's one of a very few reasons to attach this to NAS. Just don't add these to your main array. I have done that without knowing too much a few years ago, and now I regret it. Although this DAS has been running quite well without any issue, a single disruption of USB or power to this DAS could drop all 4 drives at once. And you better have 4 parity drives at that point… yeah… I am moving them back into a larger server case now Frown

topherlooks

Today 11:02 AM

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Joined Oct 2014

topherlooksToday 11:02 AM

17 Posts

I've had this attached to a Mac Mini for the past year acting as the storage for my Plex server. Reasonably quiet itself and hums along 24/7 without any problems so far. The only thing I'd mention, and I'm not sure if this is the fault of the Terramaster or something else, but I have it plugged into a UPS along with the Mac Mini and it doesn't behave correctly after a power cut. The Mac and DAS don't lose power or restart due to the UPS but something is interrupted because the drives in the DAS start going into idle mode and waking up at random until a power cycle of the DAS and Mac.

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AquaGalley8616

Today 02:30 PM

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Joined Feb 2021

AquaGalley8616Today 02:30 PM

2,054 Posts

I have 3-4 4-bay DAS'S and so far one of them is plugged into my MAC MINI m4. I use alexa to turn on and off my DAS saying "alexa turn on the 4-bay", and in about 30 seconds, it shows all 4 drives of the DAS in desktop, ready to use. But I should add this, my DAS is turned on maybe 1 hour a month, and off the rest of the time. I transfer/backup stuff from my 4TB external NVMe to the DAS ... and move stuff I want to have on the NVMe over to PC. This saves wear and tear on Mech drives. I have Plex Server on my MAC MINI m4, and I have 2 NVMe 4tb crucial drives from my Mac Mini m4. Everybody had to decide what options are available for you.
I have around 8 14TB enterprise drives empty ... waiting to be filled up. I bought the drives and DAS's before the AI SCAM started. I went to seagate page yesterday and they were selling a 28TB drive for 850 dollars, (before AI Scam I bought 2 of the for 240 dollars a piece). If you have drives to fill the DAS's go for it. I'm set for the future buy low (it is hard to know what is low, so I luck out buying my DAS and hard drives at good time). Now is not the time.
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c0bra99

Today 06:48 PM

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Joined Jul 2006

c0bra99Today 06:48 PM

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I've had this for a bit over a year, using it with OpenMediaVault running in a ProxMox VM. I've had not issues with it losing connectivity or anything like that

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AnneR4868

Today 07:07 PM

144 Posts

Joined Nov 2018

AnneR4868Today 07:07 PM

144 Posts

Quote from topherlooks

:

I've had this attached to a Mac Mini for the past year acting as the storage for my Plex server. Reasonably quiet itself and hums along 24/7 without any problems so far. The only thing I'd mention, and I'm not sure if this is the fault of the Terramaster or something else, but I have it plugged into a UPS along with the Mac Mini and it doesn't behave correctly after a power cut. The Mac and DAS don't lose power or restart due to the UPS but something is interrupted because the drives in the DAS start going into idle mode and waking up at random until a power cycle of the DAS and Mac.

FWIW, this houses data banks for one of my Plex Media Servers which is connected to a Beelink MINI S12 Mini PC Intel 12th Lake N95---for about a yr. Both are powered through a UPS. We have frequent brown-outs with occasional outages, but I haven't noticed any issues.

huehue

Today 07:21 PM

213 Posts

Joined Oct 2017

huehueToday 07:21 PM

213 Posts

I have the D8. Awesome little thing, and crazy fast with usb c 3.2. Use a short cable and you'll get the max speed out of it. Cant tell its not directly plugged into the motherboard with typical use

adnj

Today 07:41 PM

394 Posts

Joined Dec 2007

adnjToday 07:41 PM

394 Posts

Quote from slippydealer

:

Anyone looking at this, make sure you're looking for a DAS and not an NAS. This is a DAS.

External Hard Drive Enclosure in the title kind of made that distinction already.

1

adnj

Today 07:47 PM

394 Posts

Joined Dec 2007

adnjToday 07:47 PM

394 Posts

Quote from AnneR4868

:

FWIW, this houses data banks for one of my Plex Media Servers which is connected to a Beelink MINI S12 Mini PC Intel 12th Lake N95---for about a yr. Both are powered through a UPS. We have frequent brown-outs with occasional outages, but I haven't noticed any issues.

Yes. I do something similar. All of my Plex media is manually mirrored to drives connected directly to my PC server. I keep another array with the original media connected to a different PC. That setup allowed me to easily recover a few Tbytes that became corrupted on the mirror array. .

eibgrad

Today 08:30 PM

12,448 Posts

Joined Oct 2004

eibgradToday 08:30 PM

12,448 Posts

Quote from c0bra99

:

I've had this for a bit over a year, using it with OpenMediaVault running in a ProxMox VM. I've had not issues with it losing connectivity or anything like that

Anyone know the internal (unpublished) specs for this thing? CPU, memory, etc.? If I bit on this, I'd probably do the same, but I'm reluctant unless I know the specs are worth the trouble. I assume it's pretty anemic given the manufacturer's intended usage.

1

Azrael_the_Cat

Today 08:39 PM

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Joined Feb 2006

Azrael_the_CatToday 08:39 PM

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Our community has rated this post as helpful. If you agree, why not thank Azrael_the_Cat

Quote from eibgrad

:

Anyone know the internal (unpublished) specs for this thing? CPU, memory, etc.? If I bit on this, I'd probably do the same, but I'm reluctant unless I know the specs are worth the trouble. I assume it's pretty anemic given the manufacturer's intended usage.

Um, no CPU, no memory. Does that help? it's not a computer, it's just a box with a circuit board containing either 4x USB to SATA bridges and a USB hub, or 1x or 2x multiport SATA to USB bridges.

for this product the interweb says it has 4x ASMedia ASM235CM chips and an internal USB hub.
TLDR; it's not a NAS.

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CaesarOfSalads

Today 09:41 PM

76 Posts

Joined Jan 2018

CaesarOfSaladsToday 09:41 PM

76 Posts

I've been using one of these for a couple of months for some extended and non-important data. Works great and don't seem to have any connectivity issues.

4-Bay TERRAMASTER D4-320 External Hard Drive Enclosure (USB 3.2 Gen 2, Diskless)

$152

$190

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