iXsystems FreeNAS Mini NAS Review

iXsystems' FreeNAS Mini incorporates enterprise features, an advanced file system and a flash cache to deliver superior performance in its price range.

By Chris Ramseyer
published

Early Verdict

The iXsystems FreeNAS Mini is the top of the food chain when it comes to performance. The 8-core SOC coupled with 16GB of DRAM that acts as a cache are superior to other products in this price range. Expect a learning curve if you live in a Windows only world. The wizard gets you up and running but after that expect to read a lot about the FreeNAS operating system.

Pros

  • +

    Enterprise features • PCIe expansion • Performance • ZFS file system

Cons

  • -

    Enterprise-like setup after the setup wizard • Expensive but well under similar Avoton-based products

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Introduction

There is a good chance the data on your computer was downloaded from a FreeNAS-based server at some point. FreeNAS, a storage-specific operating system derived from FreeBSD, is a timeless classic that gets better with age. iXsystems, a seasoned server and open source storage builder, continues to develop the software, making improvements to performance, reliability and ease of use.

Most of iXsystems' products are traditional rackmount storage servers. The company specializes in custom builds with a large number of options available, from 1U single-core configurations to 4U eight-node systems. It also sells a number of preconfigured systems, the type you see in datacenter pictures with lots of drive bays that light up like a runway. 

The FreeNAS operating system is open source; that's where the free portion comes from. Anyone can download the software, burn it to a disc and install it on a system. Since the software is free and works with a wide range of PC hardware, a great many storage enthusiasts have opened it up, modded it and contributed to the project. iXsystems took over development several years ago and continues to develop it today. With so many using the software on home-built machines, iXsystems saw the opportunity to leverage its experience in a low-cost volume server.

Chris Ramseyer
Chris Ramseyer
Chris Ramseyer is a Contributing Editor for Tom's Hardware US. He tests and reviews consumer storage.
19 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Thanks for this review! I've been looking at this NAS for a while, ECC ram and ZFS where two strong points.
    Reply
  • DarkSable
    $1000 for a diskless system?

    How much is the case itself? That I might be interested in, but...
    Reply
  • hmarafi
    Thank you, a great review, if you can make a review how these devices can handle transcoding (Plex) Please.
    Reply
  • colinstu
    $1000 for a diskless system?

    How much is the case itself? That I might be interested in, but...

    The case is a Supermicro CSE-721TQ-250B which is $160.
    A great motherboard would be the X10SDV-F which is $850 (dual GBe Intel nics, Xeon-D 8 core, check Anandtech they did a great review on it). Stronger CPU than the one in this review.

    Then for $1017 you can get the X10SDV-TLN4F which includes built in 2x Intel 10GBe as well as 2x Intel GBe.
    or for $?? (probably more) the X10SDV-8C-TLN4F which is the same as above but has Hyperthreading (16 threads).
    Reply
  • Lulzon
    Can someone explain what the market for these are? The form factor and limitations in expansion make it feel consumer level, but the power packed inside and price tag feel more enterprise for small teams or high workloads.
    Reply
  • ammaross
    utilizes the DRAM as a cache for in-flight data, you'll want to stick with ECC memory to protect that information from corruption.
    Just by way of correction, ZFS has memory page checksums in addition to disk block checksums so even a memory bit corruption on non-ECC RAM can be healed on-the-fly.
    Reply
  • James Mason
    Can someone explain what the market for these are? The form factor and limitations in expansion make it feel consumer level, but the power packed inside and price tag feel more enterprise for small teams or high workloads.
    Smaller businesses. I'm thinking law firms and architectural businesses, that just have a ton of documents and pictures to store. Which would fit right in at between 4-24tbs.

    The price still seems kinda high, I'd like to see "real world use" as opposed to benchmarks but that's so difficult to actually do.
    Reply
  • BulkZerker
    All that processor for a nas... Asrock's avaton board still seems like a better choice IMO. Than again, I'm more looking at max storage vs max speed., esp considering how this nas can and will be set up.
    Reply
  • photonboy
    Price is very reasonable for small business assuming someone with enough tech knowledge to setup properly.

    If the price seems high then it's not for you, but as said this is not a consumer product for home users. You want a basic, easy solution then investigate some of the WDMYCLOUD options instead. I bought a 4TB model and added a 4TB WD Elements as backup but that's for video storage and not as reliable nor as fast as a business class solution.

    $2000 with drives for business is really not bad considering the cost to run a business, loss of data costs, and the fact you can probably write of some as a business expense.
    Reply
  • Mike Bethany
    FreeNAS with ZFS is a fantastic combination but the FreeNAS Mini needs one more drive for the RAID.

    On a side note, some guy vehemently argued against using ECC memory with ZFS. He admitted it was really stupid to *not* using ECC memory but he just couldn't admit he was wrong so he kept doubling down on dumb. His major argument? I was a few dollars off on the price of ECC memory.

    You have to love the Internet.
    Reply