Discussion Points
- Included Drives: Seagate Barracuda Green 1tb. While these Hard Drives don’t have the best reputation (The 2big Network 2 came with Samsung Spinpoints), LaCies’ 3 year warranty does cover the drives. However, attempting to replace the drives yourself voids the warrenty.
- NAS 2.0: LaCie has done a great job upgrading their OS for the Network 2 line. The widget-based software makes everything very simple to understand and change. With that ease-of-use comes a lack of advanced options for user privileges: A user is either Admin or he/she isn’t. The 5big Network 2 can also act as an iSCSI target, something the 2big Network 2 cannot. The 5big Network 2 also supports dual network connections allowing for Load Balancing and Failover.
- Cooling: The 5big Network 2 boasts an active cooling solution (unlike the hybrid passive/active found in the 2big Network 2). While it is silent, I question its efficiency: The NAS runs cool (room temperature) when eco management turns the drives off after inactivity. However, when this is on the unit itself is warm to the touch making me wonder how warm the drives are (Simply putting a cloth on the unit forces it to overheat). Unfortunately the NAS 2.0 does not support SMART drive monitoring.
