Introduction

We would like to thank QNAP for supplying the review sample.

QNAP is a key player in the NAS market, and after many years of sticking to the simple but highly usable interface of the proprietary operating system for their products, they decided to upgrade to something more elegant, more appropriate to our times, with icons and lots of customization options. Their new operating system, the QTS 4.0, can easily be called a major upgrade of the older one. Offering many interesting features that will thrill most users, it makes QNAP’s products even more competitive as the QTS 4.0 is a multi-windowed, multi-tasking OS with a nice GUI resembling that of modern smartphones (IOS, Android). It is also highly customizable, allowing you to install dozens of applications to make your NAS server suit your needs. More about the QTS 4.0 can be found here. We will also take a rigorous look at it in the following review, so you had better read all or most of this review--don't skip to the conclusion!

The NAS server and our vessel for our trip into the QTS 4.0 world is the TS-421, a mid-level unit primarily for home and SOHO environments. It doesn't cost a ton but can't be called mainstream either, especially if you add the value of the four HDDs it needs to be fully operational. It makes use of a Marvell CPU that runs at 2 GHz and comes with 1 GB of DDR3 memory installed, allowing it to easily cope with most tasks. However, it doesn't have an HDMI port like the higher-end models, so it can't play the role of a media player too, but that may not be as important to most buyers. It does, after all, support DLNA streaming, which will allow you to watch its multimedia content on any compatible device. But enough has been said--time to start the review!