Specifications

The STMicroelectronics STiH412 Synology uses with this NAS is an ARM Cortex A9-based dual-core SoC that is clocked at 1.5 GHz. It supports up to 2160p30 decoding for H.265 HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) and up to 1080p60 decoding for H.264 AVC (Advanced Video Coding). This SoC is also supported by an ARM Mali-400 MP GPU that runs at up to 350 MHz and has a fill-rate of 1400 Mpixel/s with 35 M triangles/s at 1080p30L30R resolution. The GPU's utilization will most likely be low unless someone decides to develop a game that takes advantage of it and makes it available through Synology's App center. The STiH412's specifications also mention an HDMI interface (1.4b), and it is a shame Synology didn't make use of it with the DS216play.



This NAS only comes with 1 GB of RAM. Although its custom-tailored Linux OS doesn't need more RAM to operate properly, some apps, especially multimedia-centric ones, would see large performance gains with more memory. While the DS214play also only had 1 GB RAM, we strongly believe that such models should at least come with 2 GB instead.

Another feature of the DS214play the new model lacks are the HDD trays. Synology tried to reduce production costs significantly and, in an effort to do so, removed the trays, taking away the hot-swap feature. This won't affect home users as much since most of them will probably never have to deal with their HDDs after installing them. The trays Synology uses in its lower and mid-end NAS servers are also out of plastic, which makes them prone to vibrations and potentially noisy. Mounting HDDs into this NAS's HDD cage will avoid such issues. You will obviously have to open this NAS up if an HDD fails or you need to switch one out. Not terribly difficult, just pulling an HDD tray out rather than having to crack the NAS open would still be much more convinient.

Only the necessary I/O ports have been included: an Ethernet port, a USB 3.0 port, and a USB 2.0 port. You won't find a USB 3.0 port or an SD card reader at the front this time around, which is a big deficit for a multimedia-centric NAS for home users.

The DS216play is very compact since it doesn't use an internal PSU but a power brick, which can deliver up to 60 W of power. Given how little power this unit consumes according to Synology's specifications, this small PSU will easily cover its needs. A 92mm diameter fan is used to keep this unit cool since there is no space for a larger one. The fan uses a relaxed fan profile, which will keep it nice and quiet. At two years, the warranty is as long as is normally the case for NAS servers, and this one is much cheaper than the DS214play was at its release. Synology is obviously looking to enter the mainstream NAS market with the DS216play, and if it performs well, Synology will have a strong offering with which to segue into it.