Testing:
We have reviewed a number of Synologys units here at TechwareLabs. Im going to be comparing today’s DS416j to my existing DS411+II.
On paper, the main difference between the two units are the processor and ram. The DS411+II has the advantage with an Intel ATOM D525 Processor and 1Gb of Ram. The DS411+II is equipped with 4 4TB Hitachi Ultrastar 7k4000 The DS416j is running 4 4TB Seagate NAS HDD. I will save you some reading, the drives are very similar in specifications.
Two notes that will impact the testing.
- The DS411+II has roughly 1.4Tb of data on the array.
- The drives in the DS411+II have seen some workload.
In the screenshots below please see the smart information for the first drive on each of the two NAS Units.
Tests will be run from my wired desktop computer and both NAS Units are plugging into the same Netgear Prosafe GS308 Switch as the Desktop computer. Below I have run LAN Speed test with five different File Size/Qty combinations. These numbers represent the maximum speeds obtained. The results surprised me.
The charts above are the max readings take for each speed test. The speeds recorded are in Mega bits per second.
I didnt believe the results so I re-ran them after running a consistency check on the volume and the results came out so similar it wasnt relevant to post them.
Conclusion:
For almost five years the Synology DS411+II has been entrusted to protect and serve my data to a myriad of devices over both LAN and WAN. Some technology you buy feels useless after one year, some technology wears out after two or three. I have been incredibly happy with my Synology DS411+II for the entire time I have owned it. I have received dozens of operating system upgrades in that time and have never seen a decrease in performance or capabilities. Today, in a crushing blow the DS416j unit has ruined my love affair with my DS411+II. The DS416j has amazing performance despite targeting a non-business demographic. I was thoroughly impressed by how quiet the unit was even while processing files. As stated above the ability to disable the lights on demand is spectacular. When you look at the competition in the 4bay NAS market, there is no question the DS416j is a clear front runner for value, the DS416j can be purchased from Newegg for $289.00 without any disks. Many vendors can store your data, but none of the others bring the feature set and capabilities that are packed into the DSM. Without a doubt this deserves our Gold Hardware Award!
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