The Asustor Drivestor 2 Gen2 AS1202T might be a foreshadowing of things to come, as hardware pricing has increased exponentially over these last few months. The comparatively entry-level Realtek RTD1619B SoC and 1 GB of RAM feels like a throwback to what a consumer NAS was like a decade ago. That said, we can't really fault the performance too much, even thought it can't quite manage to take full advantage of the 2.5 Gbps Ethernet interface at all times. What did surprise us though was that Asustor decided to use a Realtek RTL8156 Ethernet controller, as it connects over USB rather than PCIe and is normally found is USB dongles. This is a first for any NAS that we've tested, but it didn't give us any trouble during our testing.

On the performance side of things, we can't really knock the AS1202T, it delivers better performance overall compared to Ugreen's DH2300, even when the latter is also connected over 2.5 Gbps Ethernet. It doesn't beat it outright, but apart from sequential file copying with quite large files, there are not many scenarios between the two where the AS1202T falls behind. It might not be as quiet during normal use, nor quite as power efficient, but we're looking at about a single watt difference here, which isn't going to cost much more, even if it's left on 24/7. During heavy use, the AS1202T beats the DH2300, even at full fan speed, but considering that both devices are entry level NAS appliances, it's unlikely either will be worked that hard.

On the software side, Asustor is still behind the competition, but the AS1202T still felt smoother in use than the AS5404T, possibly due to the updated version of ADM. It's a shame that we once again see a NAS with a rather old Linux kernel, but as mentioned, this is unlikely to be entirely down to Asustor, as Realtek is likely to have some blame here. What was somewhat disappointing was finding that many apps that are supported on the x86/x64 side of things, aren't supported by Asustor's Arm based models, even simple tools like iPerf3 weren't available. On the other hand, with only 1 GB of RAM, the AS1202T will be limited when it comes to what software you can run on it, yet fairly resource heavy software like Docker, Plex, Emby and Jellyfin can be installed, which is quite surprising, especially as Ugreen decided that 4 GB of RAM wasn't enough for Docker support. That said, if you're planning on running a lot of software but find Gigabit network speeds acceptable, then the DH2300 might be the better option, despite Ugreen having fewer native apps compared to Asustor.

Overall, the Asustor Drivestor 2 Gen2 AS1202T is a surprisingly capable NAS, despite the hardware limitations and some odd hardware design choices. We're not sure if PQC will be a big decisive factor when it comes to buying an Asustor NAS over a competitor's product either, but at least it seems like you're getting some extra protection if you configure your NAS properly. As a budget NAS, the AS1202T feels like a decent purchase, especially for those that are looking for a part of a backup solution and don't have particularly high demands beyond that.