Gadgetory

in my opinion one of the most innovative companies in the network-attached storage business right now is QNAP having just reviewed their niche but still very cool TBS 453 a a compact book size Nast we now have an ass that doubles as a massive USB storage device the new TSX five point a series that's a few tricks up its sleeve the most unusual of which is called USB quick access of course you can do all the other stuff that we've come to expect from Coon apps high-end home storage devices for example the inclusion of HDMI means you can connect these new Neph servers directly to your TV allowing them to act much like a home theater PC 4k playback and transcoding as an offer year - powering this new series is the latest generation Intel SOC codenamed Braswell the particular model in question is the sour one and 30-60 at least this year it's a 4 watt system-on-chip featuring a dual-core processor clocked at 1.6 gigahertz but can run as high as 2.4 gigahertz depending on the workload there are two models of this nass one supporting just two three and a half inch drives and the other supporting four on hand with the larger 4 bay version notice the t s 4 or 5 1/8 apart from the snappy little sour on process that this model also comes with a base memory configuration of 2 gigabytes and those were the bit more cash to splash you can pick up the 4 gigabyte version the 2 gigabyte model retails for 407 u.s. or 700 Aussie while the beefier 4 gigabyte model sets your back 510 or roughly 740 Ozzy my advice would be to grab the 2 gigabyte model and then spend the difference upgrading to 8 gigabytes using a pair of four key but modules low voltage ddr3 1600 memory is very cheap right now suspending for us or a little over 50 Ozzy won't break the bank the advantage to running more memory in this device is much the same as the Disney's standard desktop system you can run more stuff at once without getting bogged down externally the ts 4 or 5 1a looks good it comes exclusively and wide and features a greenish looking strip down the side which houses all the activity lights and i/o stuff speaking of which you'll find 8 LED status lights which indicate things such as Network hard drive USB and SD activity speaking of which there's an SD card reader position alongside the led it's and this is the nice type so it'll be greatly appreciated by content creators and photographers below that we have the power button which illuminates blue and active followed by a quick copy button and an accompanying USB 3 port then we have a USB 3 micro beep or which seems strange until you realize that that's part of the USB quick access feature more on that shortly the device measures 160 millimeters wide 169 millimeters tall 219 millimeters deep and tips the scales are just three kilograms when empty of course once loaded with four hard drives that would get a good bit heavier and I can't imagine to many will be keen on lugging it around with them around the back there's a surprising amount of additional connectivity starting from the bottom we have a connector for the 96 watt power brick dual Gigabit Ethernet ports two USB 3 ports an HDMI output 2 audio jacks for audio out and in and finally a system maintenance port as you might expect there are four hot-swappable drivetrains these can't be locked into place and said simply unclip and slide out as the hard drives themselves you're free to use any two and a half inch or three and a half inch drives the latest and greatest 10 terawatts are also supported of course whatever you install you'll be limited by the Gigabit Ethernet connection which is good for roughly a hundred megabytes per second the biggest performance limitation on today's high performance nas devices is unfortunately the gigabit network interface recently IAEA which is short for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers did approve the new standard for two and a half gigabit per second and five gigabit per second Ethernet which will deliver up to five times the bandwidth across existing cat5e or cat6 cables very cool stuff indeed but it'll be some time before supporting controllers arrived so this won't impact the tiers 4 or 5 1a at all I just thought it was cool and well I got a bit off-topic getting back on track let's talk more about bandwidth but this time focusing on the USB quick access port so the idea here being that those without convenient network access at a certain location can just use the USB port to access data on the NASS using it much like you would a large USB hard drive they'll be at a massive one alternatively at home you didn't have a wired connection available but wanted to backup your laptop for example rather than spend all week doing it wirelessly you can connect it by your speed of the NASS and do it that way sadly you won't be able to enjoy full USB three speeds though rather you're still limited to a gigabit bandwidth as the controller supporting this function is actually a gigabit network controller with USB functionality so a bit of a downer but still worlds faster than most wireless connections the only other issue being for some reason Cunha didn't include a USB 3 micro B cable in the package so if you plan to use this feature and make sure you acquire that cable because the TS 4 v 1a is much more than just a dumb USB Drive you can change the authentication mode required for access and data for those not concerned with security measures you can set access to anyone meaning any user can access the data without needing to authenticate with a username or password alternatively accessed by a USB can be restricted to certain users or groups or set to the NASS default which means users will have access using the username a password USB quick access is a unique feature though I'm not sure how many of Coon apps customers will find it useful it isn't a feature I personally find useful although that doesn't mean others won't what I do find useful the home theater PC like functions largely made possible by the HDMI output it is worth pointing out that while 4k playback is supported it is limited to 30 Hertz still for movies and other media this shouldn't be an issue complementing these media functions isn't included cüneyt remote which is an essential bit of kit when using the ps4 v 1a as a home theater PC replacement performance wise the ts4 v 1a is more than fast enough when moving large files that easily maxes out the Gigabit Ethernet connection and even when moving heaps of smaller files such as images we found that upload and download speeds staying above 70 megabytes per second for this review I'm not gonna dive into the qts operating system it's simply too massive and feature-rich to cover here I will say that software setup and usability is amongst the best in the business the user-friendly interface will keep even the most inexperienced users out of trouble while the tech savvy guys will still enjoy getting to the more advanced stuff combined with the excellent software hardware and features said the QNAP ts4 v 1a is without question one of the best nas devices have seen for home users the only problems I have a mostly focused on the new USB quick access feature the package should include a micro beaker and ideally we want the true USB three speeds when using this feature I strongly recommend the forebay version over the smaller tube a model as well as you get the most bang for your buck other than that it was happy times with the TS four five one nine what do you guys think cuz this an ass you'd be considering for home use let me know in the comments I'm your host menace always and I'll see you guys next time cheers guys for joining me for another episode of Hardware unbox so those of you that already support the channel thank you so much it's truly appreciated and to those of you that would like to support the channel directly I do have Amazon links and a patreon link in the video description below thanks a lot and I'll see you guys next time