A Look Inside

It's time now to strip this NAS down to discover what components it hides inside.


Breaking apart this NAS was relatively easy, but we had to remove a lot screws and some of them where rather hard to reach.


The metal chassis is sturdy and holds the LCD screen.


A Microchip PIC16F73 8-bit microcontroller takes care of the LCD screen's functionality.


The mainboard is small, but holds enough controllers and ICs to get the job done well.


The mainboard's solder side looks rather empty.


There are two RAM slots on the back of the motherboard. With the TS-453A-8G, both RAM slots are occupied by DDR3L ADATA 1600 MHz DIMMs.


The CPU is an Intel Celeron N3150 with four cores that run at 1.6 GHz and can burst to frequencies of 2.08 GHz. This CPU's TDP is only 6 W, so there is no need for active cooling. The tall heatsink will do just fine without a fan. Intel's CPU supports up to 8 GB of memory and Intel's Quick Sync Video technology, which will allow this SOC to handle video conversions well.


Very close to the CPU is a Texas Instruments SN74LVC07A Hex Buffer/Driver.


Next to the CPU are three power phases that cover its power needs. Each phase uses two Fairchild FETs and Chemi-Con and Sanyo polymer caps.


There are Chemi-Con polymer and several Sanyo caps. Both of these brands are known for their high quality products, and we were pleased to see QNAP use reliable capacitors with such an expensive NAS.


This VRM probably feeds the RAM slots with power.


In total, four Intel WGI210AT Ethernet controllers are used. Two of these are on the mainboard's solder side, while the other two are on its primary side.


A SATA expansion card occupies the mainboard's only PCIe port.


Here is the PCIe expansion card that hosts all four SATA ports.


On the SATA expansion card are an ASMedia ASM1466 Serial ATA repeater, which is capable of a bandwidth of up to 6 Gbps, and two Marvell 88SE9215-NAA2 controllers.


An ITE IT8528E is used on the mainboard.


The flash memory has a capacity of 512 MB and is by Toshiba. Its model number is TC58NVG2S0FTA00.


Here is a photo of both SN75DP139 ICs for HDMI 1.4a compliance.


This is the first time we see a NAS with a dedicated soundcard.


A Realtek ALC262 is the audio codec. It is a basic audio IC with support for 2+2 channels.


This audio card uses a LM358 dual-operational power amplifier and a AMS1117 voltage regulator.


An ADM202EARNZ is the RS-232 driver. It most most likely controls the NAS's service port.


Here is a Macronic MX25U6435F Serial Flash module.


Here are the power and copy buttons.


The fan is by YS. Tech, and its model number is FD121225LB (120 mm, 12 V, 0.18 A, 1800 RPM, 73 CFM, 34 dBA, 80,000 h MTBF). It uses ball bearings and will, as such, last fairly long.