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GENERAL NAS FEATURE COMPARISON

NAS	Plex (local 4K)	Plex HD (remote)	Plex 4K (remote)	BACKUP (MS/GOOGLE OFFICE)	BACKUP (BAREBONE)	PHOTOS (OBJECT AI)	VIDEO EDITING (4K)	VIDEO EDITING (8K)	DOCKER	VIRTUAL MACHINES	PC MODE (QVM)	2.5GbE	10GbE	25GbE	Thunderbolt	NVMe	Pcie	Expansion	HDMI	Drive Mixing
TS-632X	✓	-	-	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓			✓	✓	ⓘ			✓	✓
TVS-h674T	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	ⓘ	ⓘ	✓	✓	✓	✓	ⓘ	ⓘ	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
TS-855X	✓	-	-	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	✓	ⓘ		✓	✓	✓
TS-664	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	ⓘ		✓	✓	✓	✓	ⓘ			✓	✓	✓	✓
TVS-675	✓	-	-	✓		✓	ⓘ	ⓘ	✓		✓	✓	ⓘ	ⓘ		✓	✓	✓	✓
TVS-672X	✓	-	-	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	ⓘ	✓	ⓘ			✓	✓	✓
TS-673A	✓	-	-	✓		✓	ⓘ	ⓘ	✓	✓	ⓘ	✓	ⓘ	ⓘ		✓	✓	✓	ⓘ
TVS-672XT	✓	-	-	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	ⓘ	✓	ⓘ	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
TS-h886	✓	-	-	✓		✓	ⓘ	ⓘ	✓	✓		✓	ⓘ	ⓘ		✓	✓	✓
TS-673	✓	-	-	✓		✓	ⓘ	ⓘ	✓		ⓘ	ⓘ	ⓘ	ⓘ		✓	✓	✓	ⓘ
DS620slim	✓	-	-	✓	✓				✓	✓		ⓘ						✓		✓
AS6806T	✓	-	-				✓	✓		✓			✓			✓	✓

LATEST PRICE LIST

BEST FOR Virtualisation

BEST FOR MULTIMEDIA

BEST FOR FILE STORAGE

BEST FOR BACKUP

BEST FOR VIDEO EDITING

BEST FOR SURVEILLANCE (CCTV)

BEST FOR SMART HOME/ AI

LATEST VIDEOS RELATED

AVAILABILITY / RELEASE DATE

Brand	Model	TW	USA	UK	Released
Qnap	TS-632X	•	•	•	2024-07
Qnap	TVS-h674T	•	•	•	2023-09
Qnap	TS-855X	•	•	•	2023-03
Qnap	TS-664	•	•	•	2022-03
Qnap	TVS-675	•		•	2021-10
Qnap	TVS-672X	•	•	•	2021-02
Qnap	TS-673A	•	•	•	2021-02
Qnap	TVS-672XT	•	•	•	2020-07
Qnap	TS-h886	•	•	•	2020-07
Qnap	TS-673	•	•	•	2020-07
Synology	DS620slim	•	•	•	2020-06
Asustor	AS6806T	•	•	•	2024-10

LATEST POSTS RELATED

SOFTWARE - 9/10

HARDWARE - 7/10

PERFORMANCE - 7/10

PRICE - 7/10

VALUE - 8/10

7.6

PROS

👍🏻Affordable 6-Bay Solution
👍🏻Incredible low footprint in your environment
👍🏻Supports Plex Media Server
👍🏻4K Media Playback and Transcoding
👍🏻LAG/Trunking Support
👍🏻Supports 15mm Drives
👍🏻VERY quiet
👍🏻Supports DSM 6.2.2 Very Well
👍🏻2.5″ Focused, but very capable

CONS

👎🏻Shame it’s not the 4-Core J3455
👎🏻Only 2x RJ45, Bottleneck for Faster Media
👎🏻10Gbe would have made this INCREDIBLE

SOFTWARE - 8/10

HARDWARE - 8/10

PERFORMANCE - 7/10

PRICE - 9/10

VALUE - 10/10

8.4

PROS

👍🏻Dual 10GbE Ports: Provides high-speed network connectivity, enabling fast data transfer and reducing backup times, which is great for businesses with heavy data flow.
👍🏻Energy Efficiency: Powered by an ARM-based processor, the TS-632X offers low power consumption, making it ideal for 24/7 operation without significantly impacting electricity bills.
👍🏻Support for ECC Memory: Offers enhanced data integrity by supporting ECC (Error-Correcting Code) memory, reducing the risk of data corruption, which is crucial for critical data storage.
👍🏻Scalability: Includes a PCIe slot for expansion, allowing users to add additional network cards or SSDs, making it adaptable to growing network demands.
👍🏻Affordable Pricing: Priced competitively between $699-$749, it offers a strong set of features without breaking the bank, providing excellent value for small to medium businesses.
👍🏻Compact Design: Its tower form factor and relatively small footprint make it easy to fit into a variety of environments, from small offices to home setups.
👍🏻Quiet Operation: Even when fully loaded, the TS-632X operates quietly, making it suitable for use in noise-sensitive environments like offices or shared spaces.
👍🏻Versatile Storage Options: Supports both 3.5-inch HDDs and 2.5-inch SSDs, providing flexibility in balancing cost and performance for different storage needs.
👍🏻Robust Software Ecosystem: Runs on QNAP\'s QTS operating system, which includes a wide range of apps for backup, synchronization, multimedia management, and more, catering to various business and personal needs.
👍🏻Eco-Friendly Packaging: Uses fully recyclable packaging materials, demonstrating QNAP\'s commitment to sustainability and reducing environmental impact.

CONS

👎🏻Base Model Lacks ECC Memory: Although the TS-632X supports ECC memory, the base model does not include it, requiring users to purchase additional RAM to take advantage of this feature.
👎🏻Limited Processing Power: The ARM processor, while energy-efficient, limits the NAS\'s ability to handle resource-intensive tasks such as virtualization and high-end multimedia transcoding.
👎🏻Only Two-Year Warranty: The standard warranty is relatively short for a device targeted at business use, where a longer warranty period (e.g., three years) would be more appropriate.
👎🏻Write Performance Could Be Better: While read speeds are impressive, write speeds are somewhat lower, which might be a limitation for users who need high write throughput for applications like live video editing or large-scale data ingestion.

SOFTWARE - 8/10

HARDWARE - 10/10

PERFORMANCE - 9/10

PRICE - 8/10

VALUE - 9/10

8.8

PROS

👍🏻Very compact chassis design, despite large storage potential
👍🏻A BIG jump in hardware and scale from the TS-453Be and TS-653D, but with a largely identical RRP at launch
👍🏻Easily one of the most hardware packed SMB/Mid-range 6-Bay on the market
👍🏻Up to 16GB of Memory is fantastic
👍🏻m.2 NVMe SSD Bays AND a PCIe Upgrade Slot (no need to choose one upgrade path)
👍🏻8x Included Camera Licenses
👍🏻Includes Anti-virus, Firewall Tool, VPN client tools, Malware Remover, network manager and Security Councilor Tool
👍🏻3 Different Container/VM tools that also feature image download centers
👍🏻10Gb/s (1,000MB/s) USB Ports will be incredibly useful
👍🏻Large range of expansion options in the TR/TL series in 2, 4, 6, 8 and 12 Bays

CONS

👎🏻The PCIe Slot is PCIe 3×2 and the M.2 SSD Bays are PCIe 3×1 (likely limitations of all this H/W on a Celeron+chipset
👎🏻QNAP Has had 3 ransomware hits in 2019-2021 (Qlocker, Qsnatch and Deadbolt). Lots of Security app/changes since, but people remember and QNAP needs to win back that trust in 2022/2023

SOFTWARE - 8/10

HARDWARE - 8/10

PERFORMANCE - 9/10

PRICE - 8/10

VALUE - 8/10

8.2

PROS

👍🏻Large Storage Potential (Especially in ZFS)
👍🏻Sensible Choice of CPU
👍🏻QTier Tool is VERY Appealing
👍🏻ZFS in QuTS but with a User Friendly GUI
👍🏻Three Tier Storage Opts
👍🏻Support of ECC Memory & 128GB Max
👍🏻Tonnes of Expansion Options
👍🏻8 Camera Licenses with QVR Pro/QTS
👍🏻Well Ventilated Design
👍🏻Supports Latest 22TB and 24TB (soon)

CONS

👎🏻2x SATA SSD Bays Would Hva ebeen Better if U.2
👎🏻Initial 8GB Memory is low for all ZFS services + is not ECC in default/Base Model
👎🏻Software can be a little inconsistent under excessive use
👎🏻Features a steeper learning curve than Synology
👎🏻Early Pricing is a Mixed Bag

ASUSTOR provides their own ADM server software platform with all of their solutions and although it is not quite as advanced as offerings from most expensive NAS solutions in the market, it still arrives with a huge range of applications, services and is accessible via a web browser, mobile applications and desktop client tools. Their latest revision of this software is remarkably responsive and this alongside a number of their solutions also arriving with HDMI support means that you have a wide range of ways in which to access the data on your Asustor NAS in a tailored and appropriate way. The majority of their NAS solutions also arrive with BTRFS support too, as well as possibly the widest support in the market for 3^rd party tools available in their application center. They are a little less polishing in the design of some of their tools compared with their biggest competitors Synology and QNAP, but they also provide a better value for money in their hardware with many solution such as the Locksterstor series featuring some genuinely game changing hardware for the price point. Here are some of the highlights of the ADM software catalogue:

Plex - Hardware Transcoding (with a Plex Pass) is likely and with 1080p handled very well indeed, as well as some Plex 4K transcoding in H.265 - lower tier stuff though

Virtual Machines - A graphical embedded CPU like the Gemini Lake in this Nimbustor NAS will run Windows 10 and Android VMs very well. With the added support for Ubuntu and Hackintosh with VirtualBox

Storage Management - BTRFS Support, as well as EXT4 for the traditionalist, Multiple Snapshot storage and browsing for recovery, a large number of ISCSI and LUN target creation, fast-acting SSD caching use

Network Management - Support of LAG, Load Balancing and virtual switches, as well as maintaining top transmission over 2.5/5Gbe for editing or gaming over the network. As well as Jumbo Frame control, DDNS automation, Wake on LAN support and internet/external NAS access with EZ Connect

Backups - Supporting a wide range of multi-tiered backup options that can be carried out simultaneously thanks to the powerful CPU in the Nimbustor NAS, such as network RSync, USB Backups, NAS-2-NAS migration, Cloud Backups with Google Drive, Dropbox and Backblaze and numerous RAID levels internally for redundancy.

Content Management - Numerous Content Management Systems (CMS) and Customer Relationship Managers (CRMs) available in 1st and 3rd party forms, with simultaneous operations supported by the Asustor Nimbustor 4 NAS

User Account Control - Supporting over 4,000 accounts, each with their own bespoke privileges and access levels, as well as grouping methods to automate the process easily

Security - AES 256bit hardware encryption on data in/out of the device, as well as over backup methods, with the J4105 CPU in the AS5304T maintaining high R/W speeds throughout, as well as Windows ACL permission and configuration, auto blacklisting and multiple VPN provider support

Antivirus (ClamAV) – Scheduled Scans, Automatic Virus Definition Updates, Quarantine Infected Files

Download Center – Supports BT(Torrent & Magnet Link), HTTP and FTP Downloads, Torrent Search, Bandwidth Control, RSS Subscription and Automatic Downloading (Broadcatching), ASUSTOR Download Assistant for Windows & Mac

DropBox, OneDrive and Google Drive Sync – Each ADM Account is Able to Individually Log into one cloud Account, supporting Sync, Directly Upload Files to cloud from the NAS, or from cloud to NAS

LooksGood Media App –Built-in three main video library categories; movies, TV shows, home movies and smart video sorting management

• • The efficient global search function allows for searches by keywords followed by the execution of more detailed searches for the purpose of finding categories of movies, TV shows, home movies and parameters such as actors, director, year, genre, writer and title

  • Attractive poster wall and thumbnail display

  • Automatic production of video poster thumbnails

  • Centralized management and ability to configure the order of favourites and playlist history

  • The system administrator is able to configure video library and editing permissions according to user preferences

  • Can configure access permissions to share with

  • Multimedia conversion feature

  • Self-defined smart folder for video conversions

  • Supports digital TV recordings via digital

  • Easy streaming with Chromecast and DLNA

  • Supports playback of videos in Apple TV via AiVideos tvOS version

Mail Server – Each ADM Account can Become an Independent Email Account, Provides SMTP, IMAP and POP3 Mail Protocols, Spam Filter and Black List Settings, Antivirus Scanning for Emails, Exclusive Email Backup Mechanism, Auto-Forwarding and Auto-Response Protocols

Photo Gallary – “Album” and “Browse” Viewing Modes, Manage Photo Album Access Rights: Public Access, Restricted to Certain Accounts, Album Password, Multi-level Folder Structure Support, Supports Tagging of Photos, One-click Sharing to Social Media (Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Plurk, email), Intuitive Drag and Drop Management, Slideshow Viewing Mode, Supports a Wide Range of Image Formats: JPG/JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, TIFF, RAW and Supports Video Playback

Surveillance Center – Up to 64 channels in 720p on single live view display, On-screen camera controls including camera PTZ, manual recordings, take snapshots, configure camera settings and open Maps, Up to 4 channels of synchronous and non-synchronous playback with audio, Intelligent video analytics including motion detection and foreign object detection, Supported Browsers: Windows Internet Explorer, Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Mac Safari, Mac Firefox ESR, Event notification supports SMS, E-mail, and mobile push notification, AiSecure mobile app for iOS and Android with Push notification, Maximum IP Cam (4 Free Licenses; Additional Licenses to be Purchased)

Takeasy – Download from YouTube, Vimeo, Twitch and More, Selectable Video Type and Quality, Automatic Downloads with YouTube or Twitch Subscriptions, Preview Downloads in Progress and Online Playback

SoundsGood Audio App – Import Personal/Public Music Collection, Personal/Public Music Collection Permission Control, Playlist Editor, ID3 Tag Editor, Local Speaker Support: HDMI, USB, Audio Jack, Supported Audio Formats for Browser: MP3, WAV, Ogg, Supported Audio Formats for Transcoding Through Browser: AIFF, Flac, Supported Audio Formats for Local Speaker: MP3, WAV, Ogg, AIFF, Flac

Backup Tools – Rsync (Remote Sync) Backup, Cloud Backup, FTP Backup, External Backup, One-Touch Backup, EZ Sync, Btrfs Snapshots

How many of these tools are supported on any particular Asustor NAS and the frequency of applications your can run at once will still depend on the hardware of the solution you are looking at in their portfolio, but the bulk of them are available on ALL solutions from the brand. Find out more below in my reviews of ADM:

In terms of these two brands, there is been a long-running theme all the way through that Synology has focused on FIRST-PARTY (i.e. Synology-brand) software and hardware priority, then supporting THIRD-PARTY services/hardware when they haven’t got a viable alternative in-house – to mixed degrees of popularity. Whereas QNAP has been a much more level playing field where they have released their own innovative hardware/software (occasionally a little too quickly) and singing its praises, but also tried to keep customization and flexibility for 3rd parties as open as possible and shouting loud-and-proud about that too – which can be a tad overwhelming for the less tech-savvy. Both brands have done an incredible job evolve their platforms as much as they have to date, especially when Microsoft, Google and Amazon are pouring BILLIONS into the SaaS (and PaaS and IaaS – Platform and Infrastructure as a Service) in order to create entirely streamable ecosystems for businesses, with NAS brands like Synology and QNAP not only integrating with them but also thriving alongside them as a local/bare-metal failsafe. These are all very lofty ideas and ones that most home or small business users will likely have little time for right now (aside from where NAS fits in with their Google/Office 365 office tools like documents, email and spreadsheets at a pinch) and for those users, who the NAS stands on its own two feet is what is going to matter most. Synology is earning its position in the market as the complete 1st party software and hardware package, with a genuinely groundbreaking range of available services, but still managing to make NAS accessible for all in DSM 6.2/7.0/7.1. That said, the trends we are seeing in those sub-enterprise services that are slowly receding in support of popular 3rd party hardware, software and services, making using a Synology NAS alongside your own existing setup in a frictionless way cannot be ignored and leading some to think Synology is shifting their industry position towards something higher.

QNAP NAS on the other hand, although maybe trying to cover too many bases at once, is still trying to cover as much as it can to appear to their audience. Their support of considerably more 3rd party platforms/software/services, even when they have their own software available, is certainly admirable and aside from rather aggressive pricing on their QVR Pro surveillance platform, are still the better choice for those who want a much more adaptable and customizable platform. Its a pretty understandable fact that most people who buy a NAS will be arriving with an existing collection of software in their daily workflow (Office 365 for docs, Gmail for their email, Plex for their media, Chromebook for their commute, Skype/Whatsapp for their communication, TB3 for their editing, etc) and it has to be said that QNAP keeps a more open platform to adapt a NAS into this mix than Synology – occasionally less intuitively and not without a little setup-friction, but certainly to more customizable results. Unsurprisingly, I am going to tell you that both Synology and QNAP NAS are good NAS brands and have earned their place at the top of the industry (whilst both making their own respective moves to integrate into the next tier – ie SaaS providers, Hyperscale environments and Boundless cloud storage), but there is no denying that no one brand has managed to do EVERYTHING to perfection. So, if in double, below is how I would recommend QNAP and Synology NAS to you, for each user case scenario and I hope this guide and my recommendations help you with your next big data storage purchase.

LATEST PRICE LIST

DEAL WATCH - Is It On Offer Right Now? Synology Disk Station DS620slim - NAS server - 6 bays - SATA 6Gb/s - RAID 0, 1, Amazon UK 26.49 OFF (WAS 521) [LINK] QNAP TVS-675-8G 6-Bay NAS KX-U6580 Amazon UK 310.76 OFF (WAS 1477) [LINK] QNAP TS-855X-8G 8 Bay Desktop NAS Amazon UK 80.83 OFF (WAS 1761) [LINK] QNAP TS-673A-8G 48TB 6 Bay Desktop NAS Solution | Installed with 6 x 8TB Seagate Amazon UK 302.31 OFF (WAS 2508) [LINK] These Offers are Checked Daily