HybridDesk Station

The inclusion of HDMI ports with most multimedia-oriented NAS servers virtually transforms them into fully capable multimedia players. However, you need the software to fully exploit their multimedia capabilities, and QNAP provides users with HybridDesk Station to do so. HybridDesk Station will allow you to install the apps you need to reproduce multimedia files stored on the NAS, all while browsing the net, listening to music, controlling and monitoring IP surveillance cameras, etc.

According to QNAP, HybridDesk Station is a platform onto which the famous Kodi (formerly known as XBMC) application and Chrome, along with other tools, can be installed to browse the web or playback multimedia content, via a TV you can connect to the NAS through its HDMI port. Home users will probably find this feature incredibly interesting since it makes multimedia players and HTPCs redundant. That said, HybridDesk Station can still be very useful in business environments as well since it makes locally accessing a NAS server's administration interface without a client possible.


Before you install HybridDesk Station, you should connect the NAS to a TV with an HDMI port. QNAP states there to be three different ways to control HybridDesk Station:

1. Through the provided IR control
2. Through a USB keyboard and/or mouse
3. Through Qremote: A QNAP remote app exclusively designed for HybridDesk Station. This is probably the best option if you have an Android or iOS device.

Click on "Applications", "Hybrid Desk Station", and the "Get Started Now" button to install HybridDesk Station. Your NAS will now automatically install HybridDesk Station. You should also pick which applications you want to install as Kodi, Chrome, YouTube, CodexPack, and MyNAS are available, along with several others. We went ahead and installed all of them.


The resolutions HybridDesk Station supports depend on which TV or monitor you connect to the NAS. Unfortunately, the maximum refresh rate with UHD-1 resolution is restricted to 30 Hz because of the HDMI 1.4a ports. Only the newer HDMI 2.0 version supports refresh rates of up to 60 Hz with DCI 4K (4096×2160p) resolution.

Linux Station

A new feature of QTS 4.2.1 is Linux Station. Some of you will question its usefulness since you can already install any OS through Virtualization Station. Well, the answer is fairly simple since Linux Station offers to install a pre-configured Ubuntu distribution, which makes its installation a breeze (not in our case, though, as you will see below). Linux Station is essentially nothing more than a Virtualization Station with a pre-configured Linux installation. While you can only install Ubuntu, there is the option to use Virtualization Station to install another Linux distribution.


With only a few clicks and a bit of patience, you can transform your QNAP NAS into a PC with a Ubuntu Linux distribution, or at least that's the idea.


In our case, every attempt resulted in failure. We even completely uninstalled HybridDesk Station to make sure it wasn't the root cause, along with all the other apps, but none of those measures helped. The result was still a failure, and we couldn't install the Ubuntu Linux distribution. While the procedure should be fast and easy, it proved to be problematic instead. However, Linux Station is still a beta application, so such problems are to be expected. We unfortunately couldn't afford to spend more time on this and are hoping for a stable version of Linux Station once it goes public.

HybridDesk Station Portal

Before you pick Chrome or the MyNAS application, connect a USB mouse to the NAS or use the Qremote app. MyNAS allows you to enter the local NAS administration webpage for a look at all NAS functions and settings.

HyribdDesk Station's interface includes a Settings menu with options that allow you to configure various settings. You can enable or disable applications, and the Display group of options allows you to change the screen's resolution and set the screen to turn itself off after a certain amount of time in idle. Options under the Preferences tab also allow you to change the language or type of remote control you will use.



Some screenshots from the Kodi app.

Multimedia Performance - High Bitrate Videos

In the following tests, we will, at first, play several high bitrate video clips from an external USB 3.0 compatible disk, before playing them from the TS-453A's four HDDs configured in RAID 6. All tests include playbacks of videos with a bitrate of 20-90 Mbps, including M2TS files. The test results can be found in the table below.


The TS-453A easily reproduced every video we tried, including the very high bitrate ones.


Here is a screenshot of the last test with a 90 Mbps file. It is a short scene from Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, a masterpiece that was released in 1963.

Multimedia Performance - 4K Videos

Since the TS-453A supports 4K video playback, we evaluated that feature as well.


Both 4K videos we tried were reproduced without any problems, and the seek function was fairly quick even though it usually slows down with 4K videos because it puts a lot of stress on the CPU and GPU.


CPU utilization spiked during the reproduction of a 4K video. While the reproduction of 4K content puts a lot of stress on the system, there were no noticeable hiccups.