INTRODUCTION

   There are currently three main categories/types of NAS devices/servers in the market large ultra-high-end rackmount models that feature up to 24 drive bays and are primarily aimed for enterprise use, high-end rackmount and desktop models with an equal number of drive bays aimed towards medium and small sized businesses and finally mid/low-end desktop models designed and developed for both professionals and "casual" consumers (home use). Now what sets the home use aimed NAS devices/servers apart from all the others is that they too are divided in two categories and so you can either choose go with what we like to call a "full-fledged" model which can be used for a wide range of things (including web hosting, emails, downloads, media sharing and playback and network video recording) or you can opt for a far more "basic" model featuring just a single function, file sharing. Today we'll be testing one of the latest home use models to hit the market the My Cloud Home Duo (8TB variant) Personal Cloud Storage from WD.

   Western Digital creates environments for data to thrive. The company is driving the innovation needed to help customers capture, preserve, access and transform an ever-increasing diversity of data. Everywhere data lives, from advanced data centers to mobile sensors to personal devices, our industry-leading solutions deliver the possibilities of data. Western Digital® data-centric solutions are marketed under the G-Technology™, HGST™, SanDisk®, Tegile™, Upthere™, and WD® brands.

   As clearly stated by its name the My Cloud Home Duo is a dual HDD (both drives are removable and can be configured in either JBOD for full capacity or RAID 1 for data mirroring) NAS currently available in 4/8/12/16/20TB capacities (higher capacity models may get added later on). Under the hood of the My Cloud Home Duo WD has placed the RTD1296PBCG A53 Cortex 1.4GHz quad-core processor by Realtek along with 1GB of DDR3 RAM. The My Cloud Home Duo also features a slim power on/off button (not something featured by every NAS in its category), active cooling for the two internal drives via a 60mm exhaust fan located at the rear of the enclosure, two USB 3.0 ports and a single RJ45 Gigabit Ethernet port. Unfortunately unlike most NAS models currently available in the market today the My Cloud Home Duo was developed for use primarily via the WD smartphone app so it will be interesting to see exactly what features and functions it offers.