$679.99
www.thecus.com
The holidays arrive at businesses, too, only it’s called using the year-end budget. Many organizations have policies such that if the IT budget doesn’t get used, it vanishes. One of the highest priorities for any business now is data storage, so if money has to get spent, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better application for it than centralizing information. Obviously, a five-drive NAS like the Thecus N5200XXX isn’t aimed at data centers. It’s meant for SMBs, enterprise branch offices and/or workgroups, and even single power users who might be supplying Web services. Stocked with 3 TB drives, one N5200XXX can store up to 15 TB of data, although buyers may wish to start with a much smaller pool.

Unlike many NAS boxes that use low-end SoCs, the N5200XXX is fueled by a 1.8 GHz Intel Atom D525 accompanied by 1 GB of DDR3 memory for improved RAID processing performance. Thecus supports RAID modes 0, 1, 5, 6, 10, and JBOD, along with drive hot-swapping, online RAID migration and expansion, hot sparing, and auto-rebuilding. In-system volume encryption is handled with AES-256, so data protection is bulletproof against theft.
Thecus throws in a copy of Acronis True Image for data and bare metal image backup. Native rsync support lets users back up to remote locations. You can copy bi-directionally with attached USB devices. The NAS also supports UPnP AV streaming, iTunes Server, and photo Web serving via Piczza! Other standard issue services, such as USB print serving, FTP, and secure FTP support, are present.

More advanced, business-oriented features include power management scheduling and Wake-on-LAN support. This may only account for a few dollars in savings per year, but it remains a notable feature as part of a broader green office policy. RAID volume management can be done while the drive is active and accessible by users, thus saving considerable downtime. Admins will appreciate the inclusion of iSCSI thin provisioning, and those concerned about security should make use of having a USB flash drive act as the key that unlocks the NAS device’s AES-256 encryption.
With dual gigabit ports for failover and balancing, plus an eSATA port to accompany the four integrated USB 2.0 ports, the N5200XXX comes loaded with all of the expansion capability and storage power a small office could ask for.
- Ultrabook: Acer Aspire S3-951-6646
- Flash Drive: Super Talent USB 3.0 Express RC8 50 GB
- Monitor: Dell U2410 24”
- Custom PC: Falcon Northwest ICON2
- Networking: Linksys E4200 v2
- External Storage: Seagate GoFlex Desk 4 TB USB 3.0
- Network Storage: Thecus N5200XXX
- Mouse: Microsoft Touch Mouse
- Mini PC: Zotac Zbox nano AD10 Plus
You must be in your teens. Not all readers here are kids you know...
Why? Because I can mount it on the back of the TV in the lounge for the family and stream my media files to it from my home server.
I can then throw in an external BD drive and boom, fully capable home entertainment system, which is even capable of light gaming.
Of course.. I'd reserve my gaming for my gaming rig!
as usual, the one with the monitor is the best because she resembles mariah carey.
blonde one is ok, redhead is too old.
But I enjoy it too...
You must be in your teens. Not all readers here are kids you know...
Falcon's Icon2 reminds me of Silverstone's Raven series with much need improvements.
The N5200XXX sound like a great addition (and I like the model's poses too
No. Some of us like women.
saving to my PC....
In fact I demand that you do more articles like this one ... please?
Can you please post a few more pictures of the Supertalent USB drive ... move the drive down a bit and zoom in ... its a bit fuzzy from here.
If other users agree please rate my post up so the reviewers can guage interest in these products !!!