CONCLUSION

   Rackmount NAS models have two things going for them, endurance/durability (even more so when they have redundant power supplies – this of course translates to higher data integrity) and improved performance levels compared to their equivalent (same CPU/RAM combo) desktop counterparts. At the same time, they take more space (depends however on the where you plan to place your NAS), require more power (higher consumption) and are much louder. Still for professional/business use performance and endurance/durability are the two defining factors of any NAS model so these “downsides” don’t really matter (at least not to that target audience) and as you can tell from our charts the XCubeNAS XN3004R does quite good, for an Atom CPU based model that is. However, it’s also evident from our charts that in heavy workloads the performance of the XN3004R falls somewhat short so for really demanding users we’d have to recommend a model from the higher-end lines by QSAN (like the XN5004R). I also have no clue as to why QSAN decided to add an M.2 slot in the XN3004R when you practically can’t use it (unless that is you have the Samsung SM951 M.2 NVMe SSD or you plan on getting one). As for the limited applications this shouldn’t be a problem for business use, still since many of you have been asking from us to ask QSAN to expand them we sure hope they will eventually.

   The XCubeNAS XN3004R model was released 5 months ago and currently retails for around USD700 inside the USA and for around 1400Euros inside the EU a price tag which although very appealing on the other side of the Atlantic just feels way off over here. Price aside the XCubeNAS XN3004R offers good performance with most of the features small businesses are looking for from an affordable NAS and that’s why it comes highly recommended by us, especially for USA residents.

PROS

- Excellent Build Quality
- Good Performance (For An Atom Based NAS)
- 4GB DDR3-1600 RAM (Expandable To 8GB)
- 2 RJ45 Gigabit Ethernet Ports (Link Aggregation Supported)
- PCIe Slot (PCIe Gen2x4)
- 4 Drive Bays (3.5”/2.5”)
- Power Consumption (For A Rackmount Model)
- Drive Temperatures
- XReplicator Software
- RAID 0/1/5/5 + hot spare/6/Z3/10/50/60/JBOD
- QSM 3.2 OS
- Price (USA)

CONS

- Price (EU)
- Overall Performance (Compared To Higher End Models)
- USB 2.0 Ports
- M.2 Slot Compatibility
- Limited Apps (Both NAS And Mobile)
- Noise Levels