Synology DS420j 4-bay NAS

[crmaris]

The Synology DS420j is a highly affordable four-bay NAS running the fantastic DiskStation Manager (DSM) operating system. It comes with a quad-core CPU that copes well with consumer tasks, and Plex also supports it. If you are on a tight budget, you should take a look at this NAS.

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[FreedomEclipse]

Friends.

If you cant build your own NAS.

Do yourselfs a favour and get yourselfs a Qnaps. You dont want to wait more than a week for this thing to rebuild raid arrays.

 

[crmaris]

I have included the rebuild array time for various scenarios in the review. I haven't noticed anything like that not in this review, but in all the previous ones, as well. Moreover, in my lab, I have multiple Synology NAS so I work with them on a daily basis and I would have noticed this if there was an issue.

 

[bug]

Performance seems to barely move whether you use a single disk or RAID 0, 1, 5 or 6. Weird.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Performance seems to barely move whether you use a single disk or RAID 0, 1, 5 or 6. Weird.

Or maybe the SoC is the limiting factor?

I can't believe this still use this super dated housing design though...

 

[bug]

Or maybe the SoC is the limiting factor?

It could be, but limiting everything to the speed of single drive? Though it could be ok for home usage, as long as you get the RAID to guard your data.

 

[TheLostSwede]

It could be, but limiting everything to the speed of single drive? Though it could be ok for home usage, as long as you get the RAID to guard your data.

It's "only" a quad core Cortex-A53, but yeah, it shouldn't be that slow. Could be a software related issue? Or maybe a SATA controller bottleneck? But it shouldn't be that either, as Synology already has several other models based on the same SoC.

 

[bug]

It's "only" a quad core Cortex-A53, but yeah, it shouldn't be that slow. Could be a software related issue? Or maybe a SATA controller bottleneck? But it shouldn't be that either, as Synology already has several other models based on the same SoC.

I honestly couldn't say, but it's almost as RAID wasn't even there.

 

[Yttersta]

• exFAT* (optional purchase)

How is the exFAT an optional purchase on an embedded Linux machine, when there are open-source and free libraries to support it? Exfat-fuse is what I have used for as long as I can remember on my desktop. It's not that important of a feature for many but it is one of my primary uses for my current backup solution. Where I weekly bring my work portable, which is exFAT as we have a Windows/Linux/Mac combined workspace in the lab, and archive weekly work if any.

I'm looking for a NAS right now rather than having my desktop as the RAID host; and I cannot find anybody (QNap, Asustor, Synology) who distribute exFAT support out of the box or at least for free.

Am I missing something here?

 

[bug]

• exFAT* (optional purchase)

How is the exFAT an optional purchase on an embedded Linux machine, when there are open-source and free libraries to support it? Exfat-fuse is what I have used for as long as I can remember on my desktop. It's not that important of a feature for many but it is one of my primary uses for my current backup solution. Where I weekly bring my work portable, which is exFAT as we have a Windows/Linux/Mac combined workspace in the lab, and archive weekly work if any.

I'm looking for a NAS right now rather than having my desktop as the RAID host; and I cannot find anybody (QNap, Asustor, Synology) who distribute exFAT support out of the box or at least for free.

Am I missing something here?

exFAT support was not in the kernel until recently. This probably uses an older kernel, without the necessary modules added.
Though when you consider the lack of btrfs support, it seems they disabled even things that are mainlined.

 

[notb]

It could be, but limiting everything to the speed of single drive? Though it could be ok for home usage, as long as you get the RAID to guard your data.

Single drive?
These Toshiba HDDs are perfectly capable of ~200MB/s.

Yes, NAS boxes in this price range are limited by the SoC. Encryption, versioning etc take their toll.
Synology provides some performance results for each NAS. They're usually accurate.

Performance | Synology Inc.

Compare the performance of all Synology NAS models and find the product that best suits your needs.

www.synology.com

For example:
Synology stated "1GbE SMB - Sequential Throughput (64KB)" == 112.96 MB/s
RAID5 "DiskSpd Throughput" from the review == 110.8 MB/s

Which brings me to a more general matter.
@crmaris
You focus on performance in your NAS reviews. That isn't really why we buy these entry-level boxes, is it?
Have you considered covering features as well?
This isn't a storage-focused site and most frequent readers probably don't have much NAS experience.
I'm afraid they will go through this review fairly bored and left with a feeling that there's no point in buying such a product.
In the end DS420j - with all that expense, load noise and RAID5 glory - is essentially 2 times slower than a decent USB HDD (encrypted one too).

Also, could you provide a bit more info about the testing process?

Synology DS420j 4-bay NAS Review

The Synology DS420j is a highly affordable four-bay NAS running the fantastic DiskStation Manager (DSM) operating system. It comes with a quad-core CPU that copes well with consumer tasks, and Plex also supports it. If you are on a tight budget, you should take a look at this NAS.

www.techpowerup.com

It's hard to grasp what "Program to NAS" or "Game from NAS" mean. Of course I can guess it's some combination of small and large files.
Why not do this on synthetic data? You can generate files of particular size. That would also make this test replicable for readers.

 

[crmaris]

I provide all information on this page: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/synology-ds420j-4-bay-nas/6.html

I don't use just plain transfers, but I have made my own software for real-life file transfers, in both single and multi-client scenarios and I take the overall reading and not the peak values. This is why you will never see 100-110 MB/s speeds in my tests. Those speeds can be only achieved in ISO file transfers.

Synthetic data is not close to real-life conditions, it will only show ideal results and you won't be able to see the differences between products. For me, the future owners of this product need to know what it really can do under daily transfers, and not synthetic benches. This is why I devoted time to make my own benchmark suite.

On the page mentioned above, I also state that I use ADATA SSDs in all of my tests. They provide much more stable results, contrary to HDDs where I was noticing large deviations between each test run (mostly in the DiskSpd scripts).

Have you considered covering features as well? I 've included two videos in the review showing an overview of the features in the first, and Plex performance in the second which is why most users will buy it. If you believe that I should cover any other feature, in particular, feel free to tell me so and I will try to, in the next review.

We are a site that covers every product category in detail, from Storage and GPUs to PSUs, Chassis, Keyboards you name it. TPU is among the very few IT sites left providing in-depth impartial information in every major IT category and we are here to educate users to invest better their money on products that need their needs.

The main reason to buy a NAS is to have a reliable and fast network storage space, so the comparison with a USB external disk doesn't make any sense. Moreover, I believe I am among the very few covering so many aspects of a NAS in my reviews and if I provide even more data, then the review will be really difficult to follow. Plus the day only has 24h and I need a month for each review. Contrary to others, I run all tests for about a month to check on the NAS reliability and if I notice anything out of order I share it with my readers. I don't just do an unboxing, run 2-3 tests for a couple of days and then jump to the next review. I could do 10x more NAS reviews if I didn't run so many tests, but this is not my way.

 

[notb]

I'm looking for a NAS right now rather than having my desktop as the RAID host; and I cannot find anybody (QNap, Asustor, Synology) who distribute exFAT support out of the box or at least for free.

exFAT is a proprietary MS tech, hence the extra license fee.

Also, exFAT add-on costs $4.
DS420j is $300 and you mostly pay for Synology software and support anyway.

I provide all information on this page: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/synology-ds420j-4-bay-nas/6.html

Not really. You've created some custom test that I'm unable to replicate or understand. That's the point. It's good that you use DiskSpd as well.

This is why you will never see 100-110 MB/s speeds in my tests. Those speeds can be only achieved in ISO file transfers.

Of course. But Synology also provides data for few scenarios.

Synthetic data is not close to real-life conditions, it will only show ideal results and you won't be able to see the differences between products.

I think there's a misunderstanding here. The word "synthetic" means data can be reproduced (generated).
It doesn't have to be a single 100GB or millions of identical 4kB files.

Idea to consider: you could collect the size of all files in the "Program" scenario and add a histogram to the review.
As a result, it would be easier for a reader to understand what's going on (in relation to the raw Synology figures).

Furthermore, you could include a script that generates an identical file structure (because not every TPU reader codes).
The files would be synthetic (generated), but suitable for reproducing your test results.

For me, the future owners of this product need to know what it really can do under daily transfers, and not synthetic benches. This is why I devoted time to make my own benchmark suite.

Obviously, I have nothing against your custom testing suite. It's just hard to understand what's going on.
"Program" and "Game" really don't mean much.
Also, as this is meant to be "real-life" testing, I'm not sure that many people copy whole program/game folders to their NASes.

 

[bug]

exFAT is a proprietary MS tech, hence the extra license fee.

Not anymore:

exFAT in the Linux kernel? Yes! - Microsoft Open Source Blog

We’re pleased to announce that Microsoft is supporting the addition of Microsoft’s exFAT technology to the Linux kernel.

cloudblogs.microsoft.com

The New Microsoft exFAT File-System Driver Is Set To Land With Linux 5.7 - Phoronix

www.phoronix.com

Also, I'm not sure where I stand wrt using SSDs. Virtually no home user is rich enough to use SSDs in their NAS solutions. At the same time, I realize there are so many HDD variants out there, varying in rotation speed, cache sizes and even manufacturing technology, that I wouldn't know where to start if I were to benchmark myself.

 

[Yttersta]

exFAT is a proprietary MS tech, hence the extra license fee.

Also, exFAT add-on costs $4.
DS420j is $300 and you mostly pay for Synology software and support anyway.

Oh I agree that it is not an amount worthy of notice, but the fact that it has an amount I thought was worthy of notice. It is an MS Tech but it is supported freely and in open-source libraries, not to mention the 5.4.x kernels support it natively as well. Therefore, it is not a costly implementation. Why charge for it, then, even in the older kernel versions?

BTRFS not being supported I can understand as it is still an enthusiast use mostly and the company wants to turn some extra cash for one of the best supported features in the market out there right now. Synology says that it is supported in "select models", and when I look up prices those are definitely with the best turn in - the plus models.

 

[notb]

Not anymore:

Adding exFAT to Linux kernel doesn't affect the licensing part.
Companies will still have to pay MS to offer exFAT in their products. Of course until MS decides to make it free.

Oh I agree that it is not an amount worthy of notice, but the fact that it has an amount I thought was worthy of notice. It is an MS Tech but it is supported freely and in open-source libraries, not to mention the 5.4.x kernels support it natively as well. Therefore, it is not a costly implementation. Why charge for it, then, even in the older kernel versions?

Because Synology has to pay MS to use it commercially.

 

[bug]

Adding exFAT to Linux kernel doesn't affect the licensing part.

Of course it does. The kernel is GPL/free. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/legal/intellectualproperty/mtl/exfat-licensing.aspx

Edit: Com to think about it, Synology has probably licensed a non-free solution (https://arstechnica.com/information...o-linux-paragon-softwares-not-happy-about-it/) and may still be bound by that. Anyway, the point is largely academic: if you can't stick your USB drive directly in the NAS, you stick it into your PC/laptop and move the files. A slight inconvenient if you don't want to pay for the feature.

 

[Yttersta]

Edit: Com to think about it, Synology has probably licensed a non-free solution (https://arstechnica.com/information...o-linux-paragon-softwares-not-happy-about-it/) and may still be bound by that. Anyway, the point is largely academic: if you can't stick your USB drive directly in the NAS, you stick it into your PC/laptop and move the files. A slight inconvenient if you don't want to pay for the feature.

The inconvenience is slight, indeed. However, my entire justification of having a discrete storage solution rather than to use the direct attached setup I already have was to save on power. If I already have my desktop switched on, which is already on the network, and can do BTRFS, and exFAT; then, what is the point of having this NAS?

I know I don't backup all the time that I access my NAS and hence my aforementioned argument is less valid from a general view point. But I'm simply protesting the lack of features that are basic to any up to date device. Evidently, an up to date device I don't think this is.

 

[newtekie1]

Not anymore:

exFAT in the Linux kernel? Yes! - Microsoft Open Source Blog

We’re pleased to announce that Microsoft is supporting the addition of Microsoft’s exFAT technology to the Linux kernel.

cloudblogs.microsoft.com

The New Microsoft exFAT File-System Driver Is Set To Land With Linux 5.7 - Phoronix

www.phoronix.com

Also, I'm not sure where I stand wrt using SSDs. Virtually no home user is rich enough to use SSDs in their NAS solutions. At the same time, I realize there are so many HDD variants out there, varying in rotation speed, cache sizes and even manufacturing technology, that I wouldn't know where to start if I were to benchmark myself.

The Microsoft licensing, from what I've seen, still requires commercial products that want to use it to pay a fee. It can be included in freely distributed linux distros but not distros used on commercial products.

On one hand the $4 isn't a huge amount, but on the other hand I feel that cost could have just been included in the price of the NAS. I mean, we're talking ~1.5% of the cost of the unit, Synology could have absorbed that cost. Maybe include it in devices over $200 but make it a separate fee for devices under. IDK, asking for an extra $4 after buying a $300 product just feels like a cash grab move.

 

[bug]

The Microsoft licensing, from what I've seen, still requires commercial products that want to use it to pay a fee. It can be included in freely distributed linux distros but not distros used on commercial products.

I'm going to need more than that, I've never seen GPL code needing a commercial license.

On one hand the $4 isn't a huge amount, but on the other hand I feel that cost could have just been included in the price of the NAS. I mean, we're talking ~1.5% of the cost of the unit, Synology could have absorbed that cost. Maybe include it in devices over $200 but make it a separate fee for devices under. IDK, asking for an extra $4 after buying a $300 product just feels like a cash grab move.

Agreed.
It feels like Synology just doesn't want the support headache for exFAT.

 

[notb]

The inconvenience is slight, indeed. However, my entire justification of having a discrete storage solution rather than to use the direct attached setup I already have was to save on power. If I already have my desktop switched on, which is already on the network, and can do BTRFS, and exFAT; then, what is the point of having this NAS?

The point is: imagine you don't have a desktop, but a laptop with a 256GB SSD.
So you have a choice: carry around a USB drive around the house or pay a premium for something that exposes that data over the home network.

And the benefits start to stack up if you have more PCs or more people at home.
You don't pass stuff on pendrives or send via e-mail. It simplifies many everyday tasks. A lot.

Plus, when you pay a premium for a NAS with rich software package, you get some extra functionality, so it replaces other devices.
For example: Synology offers a VPN Server. What are the alternatives? Well, I could set it up on a Raspberry Pi ($20), but that's unattainable for most people. They would probably have to settle for a router with that feature ($50+).
It can also serve as a remote storage/backup ("private cloud") - again, making some expenses unnecessary. I use OneDrive anyway, but the extra capacity on home NAS is useful from time to time.

 

[bug]

The inconvenience is slight, indeed. However, my entire justification of having a discrete storage solution rather than to use the direct attached setup I already have was to save on power. If I already have my desktop switched on, which is already on the network, and can do BTRFS, and exFAT; then, what is the point of having this NAS?

I know I don't backup all the time that I access my NAS and hence my aforementioned argument is less valid from a general view point. But I'm simply protesting the lack of features that are basic to any up to date device. Evidently, an up to date device I don't think this is.

I think the (only) point of this NAS is to slap Plex on it to easily access your media. And maybe giving you somewhere to put your backups. Come to think about it, it's all I'd need from a NAS solution.

 

[notb]

I'm going to need more than that, I've never seen GPL code needing a commercial license.

You can't charge for GPL software.
They will probably dual-license it, with a paid and supported option for OEMs.

If MS wanted to let it go as FOSS, they would do it already.

 

[bug]

You can't charge for GPL software.
They will probably dual-license it, with a paid and supported option for OEMs.

If MS wanted to let it go as FOSS, they would do it already.

That's what I said (and linked): it's done, it's in the Linux kernel. I don't know how anyone can charge for that.

 

[notb]

I think the (only) point of this NAS is to slap Plex on it to easily access your media. And maybe giving you somewhere to put your backups. Come to think about it, it's all I'd need from a NAS solution.

Obviously, NAS is not a product for everyone.

The key factor why NAS may not attract you that much (and many here) is that you own a desktop with as much storage as you want. And it's probably turned on most of the time, right?

But in a more typical scenario, with multiple notebooks, smartphones, TVs etc, it really makes a difference. Just like a shared network drive at work does.

That's what I said (and linked): it's done, it's in the Linux kernel. I don't know how anyone can charge for that.

They won't charge for the implementation in kernel. That's GPL.
But they can offer it with a paid license as well (with support or some extra perks).