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Thecus N5810 Pro NAS Review

Thecus' N5810 Pro is the only NAS in its price class with a built-in battery backup that allows the system to save your data even after the power goes out.

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Multi-Client SMB Performance

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The multi-client test is straightforward, even though it's complicated to configure and run. We use 120 real gigabit Ethernet ports from hosts that run custom software. Each system runs a trace-based test recorded from Microsoft Office. This mimics a real office environment where no single machine pushes the performance limits of the NAS. But as the number of clients increases, so does the load. Consequently, this benchmark is a real challenge for all NAS products. Many of the operations are random in nature, and even the sequential portions become random as the number of clients increases. Systems needs to be efficient with multiple streams to do well.

The first chart shows total throughput performance, while the second shows latency. We feel that the latency test carries more weight since it has a direct relationship with the user experience in this large office environment. Thecus' N5810 Pro performs particularly well thanks to its host processor and file system.

System administrators can optimize the stripe level of the array to deliver a better experience. Not all NAS products allow users to adjust this, so its availability is notable on the N5810 Pro. We used the default 64KB setting to get balanced performance with random and sequential data.

6 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Karsten75 28 July 2015 12:48
    You don't mention if it does data scrubbing to protect against bit-rot?
    Reply
  • Lulzon 28 July 2015 14:14
    Typically battery backups are SLA (sealed lead acid) which is most likely why they don't get packaged with NAS systems - they're heavy, they're a dangerous good by transportation and shipping rules, they expand and can release gasses when under load and charged. The upside? They have way more capacity than that of a lithium-ion as shown in this little unit, they (probably) cost much less, and they last longer (5+ years vs 2-3). In terms of a NAS though, the capacity isn't really an issue if the only thing the NAS is doing is shutting down to avoid data loss/corruption.
    Reply
  • ldun 28 July 2015 14:24
    What's the idle and load power draw for one of these?
    Reply
  • Aris_Mp 28 July 2015 18:17
    55.3W under heavy throughput and 35.1W at idle with 5x Seagate ST500DM005 HDDs and RAID 6 configuration.
    Reply
  • TontNZ 06 August 2015 02:43
    I'm not sure if I've just missed it - but: How many drives of what brand and capacity, in what raid mode were used for the testing?

    It would be good to single this information out into one of the section headings. It may be redundant as you presumably standardise this across NAS of a given bay capacity - but it would still be useful.
    Reply
  • 18 August 2015 04:22
    This is an impressive device. I'd definitively give it a try for home office solutions. The only downside I can see to it is that if the internal memory were to die (flash, ram), the backups are probably gone unless they keep using the same system/setting organization and it is forward compatible with other similar systems.

    5 years is a long time and unless they intend to have the same product line around for a long time, it will either be EOL or replaced with an updated version.
    Reply