New 12-Bay AMD EPYC Synology SA6400 and SA6200 Rackmount NAS Coming Soon
Synology has really been hitting the business/enterprise button hard in 2022, with several very high-profile top-tier solutions introduced into their portfolio (with rackmount/rackstation solutions seemingly getting the lion’s share of attention). Today I want to discuss a couple of new entries into the arguably less familiar ‘SA’ series, the highly storage scalable range of solutions from the brand that have tended to arrive with excellent internal hardware that is combined with an unparalleled level of storage expandability – with the newly uncovered Synology SA6400 and SA6200 rackmount solutions seemingly pushing things further than ever! Both systems arrive in 12-bay rackmount form, supporting SAS and SATA drive media (with Synology’s own HAT5300 and HAS5300 drive media being the recommended drive of course) and full support of DSM 7.1.
The SA6400 and SA6200 have yet to be confirmed as to whether they are refreshes of the later 2019 released SA3400 and SA3600 (as they were the original releases in this product family and therefore there is little to no data on the upgrade cycle for this series), however with certain components worldwide being subject to continued shortages, there is every possibility that these new SAS rackmounts are in response to this. Let’s discuss the information we have on these new Synology solutions.
Hardware Specifications of the Synology SA6200 and SA6400 Rackstation NAS
Before we go into details on what we know about the SynologySA6400 and SA6200, it is worth highlighting that the source of this information is unverified at the time of writing. I think that it IS true/real and a slew of quick google searches online show that these model IDs definitely exist, but the exact specifications might well be subject to change and/or confirmation. There is ALOT to unpack here, with the CPU that is purported to be featured being one of the most interesting parts of all! Let’s go through it:
| Model ID | Synology SA6400 Rackstation
|
Synology SA6200 Rackstation
|
| Number of Bays | 12x 3.5″/2.5″ | 12x 3.5″/2.5″ |
| Storage Interface | SATA / SAS | SATA / SAS |
| Expandable | Yes, 8x RX1223RP 12-Bay | Yes, 8x RX1223RP 12-Bay |
| CPU Model ID | AMD EPYC 7272 | v |
| Core Count | 12x | 8x |
| CPU Threads | 24x | 16x |
| CPU Frequency | 2.9Ghz (3.2Ghz Burst) | 3.1Ghz (3.2Ghz Burst) |
| CPUBenchmark Rating | 26,446 | 17,017 |
| Default Memory | 32GB DDR4 ECC RDIMM | 32GB DDR4 ECC RDIMM |
| Memory Frequency | 3200Mhz | 3200Mhz |
| Number of Memory Slots | x16 | x16 |
| Maximum Supported Memory | 1024GB (64GB x 16) | 1024GB (64GB x 16) |
| 1GbE Ports | TBC | TBC |
| 10GbE Ports | x2 | x2 |
| 25GbE Ports | TBC | TBC |
| USB Ports | TBC | TBC |
| PCIe Slots | TBC (However, this CPU supports upto PCIe4) | TBC (However, this CPU supports upto PCIe4) |
| Expansion Ports | 8x MiniSAS HD | 8x MiniSAS HD |
Ok, so first things first, THAT Processor. Synology has recently been making increased moves towards AMD for the CPU inside their 2022/2023 generation NAS devices (the R1600, the V1500B and perhaps even further) and therefore the switch from a Xeon to the AMD EPYC family in this series. However, this CPU is more than just light equivalent to the Xeon D1541/1567 used previously. The More powerful AMD EPYC 7272 in the Synology SA6400 is a hugely powerful and capable 12 Core processor that rates significantly higher on most CPU benchmarking sites. It is also a PCIe 4-ready processor and, although no details have been confirmed about the PCIe expandability of the system, I kinda hope this is the point where we see Synology start rolling out a PCIe Gen 4 equipped solution (for faster media, but also for improved combo cards and network interface cards hitting the 100GbE level).
The AMD EPYC 7272 brings a bunch of advantages over the Xeon D-1541, such as being capable of dual-processing. This feature allows two processors to be used in multi-socket servers to achieve better performance and memory bandwidth. Also, the EPYC here on the SA6400 vs the SA3400 features CPU cores on the AMD EPYC 7272 help to tackle multiple applications or heavily multi-threaded tasks (though typically you would compare the SA6400 vs the SA3600 and SA6200 vs the SA3400). Finally, there are the base and burst clock speeds, with the EPYC having a frequency of the processor is higher than the frequency of the D-1541 chip. Alot of this comes from the AMD chip arriving on the market several years later, benefiting from improvements in technology/R&D of course, but aside from noticeably higher power consumption, the AMD EPYC is certainly the superior processor. Then there is the EPYC 7232P processor in the SA6200 NAS. How does that compare with the older/previous gen?
In like-for-like comparisons, this 8-Core EPYC processor still compares very favourably versus the 8-Core Xeon D-1541, still with a higher clock frequency/speed vs also high power consumption of course. Interestingly, alongside each of the new EPYC processors supporting PCIe4, these CPUs also support a higher frequency of memory (of 3200Mhz, plus ECC support). The table below gives you a little bit more information on how these CPUs all compare:
Another interesting feature of the hardware architecture that the SA6400 and SA6200 Rackstation NAS’ will seemingly arrive with is an astonishing maximum 1024GB (1TB) of memory! These systems will feature 16 RDIMM DDR4 Memory slots (with each default model arriving with a single slot occupied by a 1x 32GB module), each of which can support a 64GB Memory module. This is a frankly incredible amount of memory, but once you factor in the overheads of these systems being expandable to a staggering 8x 12 Bay expansions, this CPU and Memory makes alot more sense.
Carrying on with the subject of expandability, that has always been a big, big part of the Synology SA series. Along with the support of SAS drives, these systems have always been designed to be hugely expandable in terms of storage, arriving with EIGHT mini-SAS HD ports, with each one connecting the new RX1223RP expansion chassis. Meaning you can add an additional 96 SAS/SATA drives of HDD/SSD storage to either of the SA6400/SA6200 12-Bay rackmount NAS servers. Add to that the recently released 18TB drive from Synology (HAT5300-18T / HAS5300-18T) and that means a potential for 1,944TB of storage (or close to 2 Petabytes of storage!!!). So yeah, to support that kind of storage scale, you are going to NEED that CPU/Memory potential
I am still in the process of verifying the network connectivity of both the Synology SA6400 and SA6200, but I think it’s quite likely that we will see the repeat of the dual 10GbE and 1GbE of the previous SA releases. How does all this hardware translate into the DSM software?
Software Specifications of the Synology SA6200 and SA6200 Rackstation NAS
Synology NAS solutions all arrive with Diskstation Manager (DSM) and the SA6400 and SA6200 are no exception. This means a tremendous range of services and features are available to you that can work alongside your existing range of SaaS 3rd party applications, as well as completely replace them with the 1st party Synology alternatives. Highlights of the Synology DSM 7.1 software include:
Synology Office – Create documents, spreadsheets, and slides in a multi-user environment. Real-time synchronization and saving make collaboration a breeze.
Synology Chat – Aimed at businesses, Synology Chat is an IM service that transforms the way users collaborate and communicate.
Synology Drive – Host your own private cloud behind the safety of your NAS with 100% data ownership and no subscription fees.
Synology Photos – Manage your photos and videos with deep-learning algorithms that automatically group photos with similar faces, subjects, and places.
Synology Calendar – Stay on track, share calendars, and schedule meetings, while ensuring sensitive information remains safely stored on company premises.
Synology Active Backup for Business (ABB) – Consolidate backup tasks for virtualized environments, physical servers, and personal computers, and rapidly restore files, entire machines, or VMs – completely license-free.
Synology Hyper Backup – backup your NAS safely and efficiently to multiple destinations with deduplication, integrity checks, compression, and versioning.
Synology Surveillance Station – Safeguard your business, home, and other valuable assets with reliable video surveillance tools.
Synology Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) – An intuitive hypervisor that supports Windows, Linux, and Virtual DSM virtual machines. Its powerful disaster recovery tools help users achieve maximum service uptime.
Synology High Availability – Synology High Availability (SHA) combines two Synology NAS servers into one active-passive high-availability cluster, alleviating service disruptions while mirroring data.
Synology Central Management System (CMS) – Synology CMS allows you to manage multiple Synology NAS servers quickly and conveniently from a single location.
Synology Video Station – Manage all your movies, TV shows, and home videos. Stream them to multiple devices or share them with friends and family.
Synology Audio Station – Manage your music collection, create personal playlists, stream them to your own devices, or share with family or friends.
Synology File Station – Manage your Synology NAS files remotely through web browsers or mobile devices.
Synology C2 Cloud Services – Back up your Synology NAS data to the cloud with Hyper Backup or sync requested data between C2 Storage and branch offices using Hybrid Share
C2 Backup – Back up your Windows PCs, MAC devices, and Microsoft OneDrive data to the cloud and never lose a file again.
C2 Object Storage – Simple, scalable, and affordable cloud object storage with S3 compatible APIs
C2 Transfer – Take no risks with file transfers. Start sharing and receiving files the secure and reliable way
C2 Identity – Secure your organization with centralized identity and device management
C2 Password – Store all your credentials in one place securely
C2 Surveillance – Keep surveillance footage stored on your Synology NAS safe by enabling simultaneous recording to the Synology C2 cloud
Although several of the C2 services are subject to subscription payments, the rest of the software is included completely or in an entry form with all Synology NAS hardware. Below is the full review of DSM 7 from the NASCompares YouTube channel.
When will the Synology SA6200 & SA6200 Rackstation NAS Be Released and what will the Price be?
Details on pricing and availability of the Synology SA6400 and SA6200 Rackstation NAS are still unknown at the time of writing. With the current SA3600 at around £7000 and the SA3400 around £5000, it is quite likely that we will see these newer releases exceed this, in line with inflation, recent release status, hardware shortages and the change to a more proficient and recent CPU. The fact that these two NAS and the RX1223RP have appeared on a few online eShops vaguely means that release is likely not exceedingly far away and perhaps sometime in September, but this is by no means confirmed at this time.
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