INTRODUCTION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   With the "arrival" of Raspberry Pi based systems many people are wondering if it's worth turning towards NAS servers for their needs and although i do have to admit that prices for Raspberry Pi products are extremely appealing my personal opinion is that NAS servers are still way ahead primarily due to their straight out of the box functionality and in many cases nowadays a lot better hardware specifications. Once again it all always comes down to what your needs are and how much you're willing to spend in order to cover them so although obviously the really good NAS models cost quite a bit there are many excellent choices out there priced just right with plenty of features and good performance levels (there's always something available for every need). Well according to our good friends from Thecus their latest N4310 is amongst those models and today we will be taking a very thorough look.

   In 2004, Thecus Technology was founded to design, manufacture, and market digital storage products. Now, 10 products and over 100 awards later, Thecus is recognized as a global leader of digital storage solutions. With decades of R&D experience, the Thecus team has developed an entire range of state-of-the-art storage products for consumers and enterprises alike. With its global sales channel development, quality Thecus products are now distributed in over 30 countries and territories across the globe. Thecus products are designed not only to be powerful and flexible, but easy-to-use. Users have increasingly growing digital libraries, and they need to access their digital media as quickly as possible Thecus storage solutions consistently deliver top-notch performance, able to deliver digital media at an impressive clip. To keep data completely safe, Thecus products are designed with data security in mind, each coming with numerous security options for the user to select. Thecus storage products also have the unique ability to support third-party software modules, making Thecus products infinitely customizable. And to make sure our products are accessible to both novices and experts alike, Thecus makes sure that each of its products can be easily installed and used. Secure and flexible storage products that simply work. That is the Thecus guarantee.

   Once again Thecus has taken an entirely different approach compared to let’s say QNAP, ASUSTOR and Synology so this time around they have equipped the N4310 with a single-core 1.0GHz Applied Micro Catalina APM86491-RKB1000T SoC processor (with Hardware XOR Engine) and with 1GB of DDR3 memory by Sk Hynix. Now i know that you're all probably thinking the same thing i did since a single core CPU seems way outdated and right from the bat we knew that it wouldn't set any new performance records. Still we do have faith in Thecus so although for their own reasons (power consumption and low cost probably) the chose to go with that particular CPU model we hope it will not disappoint. Other features include support for RAID 0/1/5/6, iSCSI, 128-bit AES encryption, Power Redundancy (via an extra external power supply), HDD spin-down, USB 3.0 connectivity (2 rear ports), DDNS, mobile apps and an somewhat large selection of built-in servers (FTP/iTunes/DLNA Media/Plex Media/BitTorrent). So the time has come for us to check and see how this little 4 bay NAS server performs.

 

 

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The main product features are placed at the front and rear of the box along with the company logo and a product picture.

 

 

Some of the features are presented in detail on the left side.

 

 

On the right side we see the specifications of the N4310, available applications, supported languages and the contents of the bundle.

 

 

The entire bundle is placed inside thick Styrofoam spacers covered with pieces of cardboard.

 

 

Alongside the N4310 you will find the 60W external power supply with its power cord, Ethernet cable, software CD, quick start guide, warranty card and two small plastic bags with all the necessary HDD mounting screws.

 

 

THE N4310

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The matte black aluminum enclosure of the N4310 measures 135mm in height, 170mm in width and 217mm in length.

 

 

The company name/logo is placed on both sides.

 

 

The fascia reminds me of some older "industrial" grade designs (that's not really a bad thing).

 

 

Aside the 4 drive trays here we see the activity LEDs (power/drives/Ethernet/USB) and the USB copy and power on/off buttons.

 

 

All of the drive bays feature spring-loaded release mechanisms and can be used both with 2.5" and 3.5" drives.

 

 

Moving at the rear we find a large 92mm exhaust fan (dual-bearing) along with 2 USB 3.0 ports, Ethernet port, reset switch, Kensington lock and two DC in ports (here you can plug in a second external PSU to enable the redundancy feature.

 

 

There’s a wide opening at the top of the enclosure which is probably used to allow hot air to exit easier.

 

 

Six screws placed at the rear of the drive keep the enclosure attached to the main body.

 

 

I was surprised to see that the APM86491 SoC CPU had no heatsink on it but that's how we found it.

 

 

SETUP

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To setup the N4310 you will need to run the Thecus intelligent NAS program which you can either download from the online support page or use it from the bundled CD.

 

 

Once the device is detected you can initiate the setup procedure from where you can choose the type of HDD mode you want (automatic or manual).

 

 

The procedure is quite fast and the moment it finishes you can login to the NAS.

 

 

The very first thing you should do once you enter the main menu is to setup the HDDs through the RAID Management tab.

 

 

The N4310 allows you to setup your drives in JBOD and RAID 0/1/5/6/10 modes.

 

 

After you are finished with this chances are that an update will be flashing on the top right corner so you will need to click on that (the latest OS upgrade was flashing in our case).

 

 

WEB INTERFACE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even after we updated to the latest Thecus OS6 Build 809 version we saw no noticeable GUI changes as you can see from the login and main screens.

 

 

You can quickly access the shared folders, drive details and networking options via the lower right corner.

 

 

The control panel can be accessed from the upper left corner and although the N4301 may not be as complete in terms of available options and features as the N7710-G it does offer almost everything the majority of consumers will ever need.

 

 

So through the control panel you can access the hardware information page, enable/disable the redundancy option (if you have another external adapter), adjust the day/time options, check longs, enable/disable FTP support, enable/disable DDNS, burn data onto a CD (if a CD writer is connected), backup your data onto Amazons S3 service and you can also add more applications onto the NAS (official and 3rd party ones).

 

 

To download 3rd party applications you will need to head over to the official page by Thecus as seen above.

 

 

MOBILE APPS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thecus has 2 mobile apps for the N4310 which you can download from the Play Store the T-OnTheGo and T-Dashboard ones.

The T-OnTheGo app allows you to access media files stored in your NAS whether you're at home or away.

 

 

To use the T-Dashboard app you will first need to install the corresponding application onto your NAS from the above page.

 

 

The T-Dashboard app is pretty simple and allows you to access the status of the NAS.

 

 

TESTING METHODOLOGY – PERFORMANCE RESULTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   Originally we had decided that since some of the NAS servers/devices we've tested in the past are no longer in our possession (naturally) we would keep performing the exact same testing methodology we did in the past for as long as possible in order to provide accurate comparison results. However since our real-life tests are not enough for some people we also decided to throw in ATTO and Crystal Disk Mark to cover the more demanding users (it will take time to "populate" those charts however). However as always we will be using Seagate Constellation ES.3 4TB SATA III hard disk drive(s) (in order to also perform RAID tests we were able to switch from the old ES.2 model to the ES.3 since we recorded no differences between them when used inside NAS servers) with the unit at hand and perform several upload/download tests with 10.9GB (Single) and 40,8GB (RAID) files. Tests are repeated a total of 4 times after which we record the average numbers (from the 4 peak ones) into our charts. Finally the network device used is the same Netgear DGN3500 Gigabit ADSL2+ Modem/Router we always use when performing tests on NAS servers (however we will soon start using the Prosafe 10GbE switch by Netgear – once manufacturers focus on such tests).

SINGLE DISK TESTS

RAID TESTS

 

 

 

TEST RESULTS – TEMPERATURES / CONSUMPTION / NOISE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TEMPERATURES

 

POWER CONSUMPTION

 

NOISE LEVELS

 

 

CONCLUSION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   Over the years many of you have obviously figured out that we never like to hide so we always come clean about what we really feel about a product and that's the thing with the N4310 since it left us with mixed feelings. On one side you have the all-time classic GUI by Thecus which we really don't like as much as for example the ones QNAP and ASUSTOR offer so that has always been perhaps the sole thing we'd like Thecus to improve on. True it's not hard to navigate and most professional users don't care about design but low/mid-end NAS servers are not aimed towards that category so we feel that it needs more work in order to compete with what's out there. Another drawback is the lack of an HDMI output although in all likelihood the single core SoC CPU may not be enough for serious media playback use. On the other side however we have very good performance levels (something which surprised us) from that Single core SoC CPU and a good number of features which should cover the majority of consumers out there. We also have very low power consumption which once the drives spin down it gets even lower (we recorded 8W with that feature running) so that's another plus for the N4310.

   So what about price? Well while I’m typing these lines the N4310 NAS Server by Thecus retails for just USD246.56 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and for 289.90Euros inside the EU (Amazon.de) so it's priced extremely well for a 4 bay model. Now it goes without saying that the N4310 is not the ideal choice for very heavy workloads something which Thecus doesn't really deny since this model falls under their SMB (Small Business) line. Still it has room for 4 drives (2.5/3.5"), offers good performance levels (very good for a single core CPU), packs enough features to cover even demanding users and carries a very good price tag so it deserves our Golden Award

PROS

- Build Quality
- Good Performance
- Features
- Single/JBOD/RAID0/1/5/6/10 Support
- Android/iOS Apps
- Power Consumption
- Noise Levels
- Price (For Some)

 

CONS

- No Video Output (VGA/HDMI)
- GUI Remains Unchanged