QNAP TS-473 4-Bay NAS

[crmaris]

The QNAP TS-473 is a four-bay NAS with high performance and an affordable price for its specifications. It uses an AMD R-Series CPU, and its capabilities can be further expanded thanks to its two PCIe slots, which let you add 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Wi-Fi or an M.2 SSD.

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[FreedomEclipse]

@crmaris Minor bone to pick with your review....

You listed this as a negative...

• Instead of a single 4 GB DIMM, 2x 2 GB DIMMs are used

But if they did this. It would hurt stock performance as the AMD R-Series RX-421ND supports Dual Channel memory configurations so why not 2x2GB???

• Plastic trays without locks

Thats kind of nitpicky as Qnap has this kind of tray for almost all of their devices. My TS-251+ isnt any different. In my experience. Once the drives are all locked in. they dont rattle around, so they are pretty secure unless youre going to boot your NAS around like a football then that might be a issue... Not for the corrupted data and Destroyed NAS but also your broken foot.

 

[springs113]

I agree with the above poster...I think we need to see more of these reviews on TPU.

 

[crmaris]

But if they did this. It would hurt stock performance as the AMD R-Series RX-421ND supports Dual Channel memory configurations so why not 2x2GB???

I had in mind this Personally I would be ok with the lower performance, which won't be noticeable especially in a NAS, if it was to save money once I decide to upgrade the RAM by only getting one 4 GB DIMM instead of two.

Also locks are an added measure for physical data protection, which is essential for business environments, even small offices. Such capable NAS servers will be most likely used in small and even medium sized offices, so it is good to have trays featuring locks.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

I had in mind this Personally I would be ok with the lower performance, which won't be noticeable especially in a NAS, if it was to save money once I decide to upgrade the RAM by only getting one 4 GB DIMM instead of two.

Also locks are an added measure for physical data protection, which is essential for business environments, even small offices. Such capable NAS servers will be most likely used in small and even medium sized offices, so it is good to have trays featuring locks.

I understand your point, however I still feel that it's not right to criticize them for it (the ram that is)

They released it in the best stock configuration they could. If you wish to upgrade then that's an issue that lies with you. not Qnap. For the folks that don't wish to upgrade it would be absolutely fine

 

[maukkae]

• Long boot time

Since NASes are rarely restarted, how long was the boot time if it warrants a negative? An hour? I couldn't find the measurement.

 

[bug]

Does anyone else think these NAS solutions draw too much power at idle?

And while I was reading this, I thought: we can make these things way smaller if we ditch the 3.5" bays. When do you figure we will start see solutions like that?

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Does anyone else think these NAS solutions draw too much power at idle?

And while I was reading this, I thought: we can make these things way smaller if we ditch the 3.5" bays. When do you figure we will start see solutions like that?

my NAS is said to idle at 10w while operating at 18w (give or take but i dont use low power NAS drives) but then again its only a 2-Bay NAS compared to whats reviewed here.

There are smaller NAS's that take only 2.5" drives that are available from the usual manufacturers.

I dont think the entire industry will move to 2.5" time soon because (1)The capacity just isnt there and (2) The overall reliability isnt there either. not to mention you'll probably lose some read/write performance.

DiskStation DS416slim

Qnap - TVS-882ST3

Some more 2.5" stuff from QNAP

QNAP SS-439-PRO

I think Netgear used to make their own... Some of these NAS units are very very old and have been discontinued completely. The first 2 I linked still exist though. But like i said. It just doesnt seem to be a very popular choice. maybe even a niche market. so why waste money making it if nobody wants to buy it?

 

[bug]

my NAS is said to idle at 10w while operating at 18w (give or take but i dont use low power NAS drives) but then again its only a 2-Bay NAS compared to whats reviewed here.

10W is way too much (in my book) for device that does nothing, but stand by.

There are smaller NAS's that take only 2.5" drives that are available from the usual manufacturers.

I dont think the entire industry will move to 2.5" time soon because (1)The capacity just isnt there and (2) The overall reliability isnt there either. not to mention you'll probably lose some read/write performance.

DiskStation DS416slim

Qnap - TVS-882ST3

Some more 2.5" stuff from QNAP

QNAP SS-439-PRO

I think Netgear used to make their own... Some of these NAS units are very very old and have been discontinued completely. The first 2 I linked still exist though. But like i said. It just doesnt seem to be a very popular choice. maybe even a niche market. so why waste money making it if nobody wants to buy it?

Thanks, I really didn't know about those. And yes, I'm with you these won't rule the world anytime soon. But they make nice solution for home users that don't need tons of extra space, but just the means to share between a handful of devices.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

10W is way too much (in my book) for device that does nothing, but stand by..

Not fussed. There are times during the day where i might not be home for a good few hours so i put it in sleep mode. you can get lower powered NAS units or build your own.

Thanks, I really didn't know about those. And yes, I'm with you these won't rule the world anytime soon. But they make nice solution for home users that don't need tons of extra space, but just the means to share between a handful of devices.

How do i put this... I find your response to be a bit of an oxymoron??? (i dont think thats the correct work for what im trying to describe) but a NAS is a NAS. they come in all sizes. Some are bigger than others while some are the size of a small bookshelf speaker like mine that can easily be stowed away ANYWHERE.

The advantages of 3.5" NAS units outweigh the 2.5" units while both of them perform the same action. so why not 3.5" where the storage capacity is. where the reliability/speed. Unless you really really need something super compact then there are other solutions available. There are devices you can buy on Amazon where you can literally create a 'pop-up-NAS' and share files from a USB Stick/hard drive or a memory card.

Its like having 2 of the same car in a showroom -- Both are identical from the outside but one has an engine from some unknown manufacturer but offers near enough identical performance more or less, but replacement parts might be harder to get if something should go wrong...

Obviously youre going to go for the car with the engine from the manufacturer.

 

[peschool]

This was a really in depth review except it seems like all the data is useless and at first I was concerned about buying this NAS as your numbers are way lower than any other review I've seen. Is there some rationale behind using old-as-dirt 500GB drives with 16MB cache in 2018? I still have no idea how this NAS would perform as most users would set it up. Something like 4x6TB drives with 2 or 4 port aggregation. Also showing how adding some m.2 SSDs and 10gb ethernet would affect performance would have been nice. Well I guess you did used 10gb but your drives probably top out at 50MBPS so they barely saturate a 1gb link.

 

[ewsb]

This is a very interesting review as it rates the 473 significantly lower than the 451+? That does not seem to make sense unless I have misread the report. Qnap themselves indicate that that is not true?