Synology DS1812+ 8-bay SMB / SOHO NAS Review
by Ganesh T S on June 13, 2013 4:00 PM EST- Posted in
- NAS
- Storage
- Synology
- Enterprise
Miscellaneous Factors and Final Words
The Synology DS1812+ is a 8-bay NAS, and there are many applicable disk configurations (JBOD / RAID-0 / RAID-1 / RAID-5 / RAID-6). Most users looking for a balance between performance and redundancy are going to choose RAID-5. Hence, we performed all our expansion / rebuild duration testing as well as power consumption recording with the unit configured in RAID-5 mode. The disks used for benchmarking (Western Digital WD4000FYYZ) were also used in this section. The table below presents the average power consumption of the unit as well as time taken for various RAID-related activities.
| Synology DS1812+ RAID Expansion and Rebuild / Power Consumption | ||
| Activity | Duration | Avg. Power Consumption |
| 4TB Single Disk Initialization in RAID-0 | 10h 23m 40s | 32.59 W |
| 4TB RAID-0 to 4TB RAID-1 (Expand from 1 to 2 Disks) | 9h 26m 7s | 42.83 W |
| 4TB RAID-1 to 8TB RAID-5 (Expand from 2 to 3 Disks) | 34h 32m 9s | 51.85 W |
| 8TB RAID-5 to 12TB RAID-5 (Expand from 3 to 4 Disks) | 27h 18m 58s | 64.15 W |
| 12TB RAID-5 to 16TB RAID-5 (Expand from 4 to 5 Disks) | 29h 41m 29s | 74.12 W |
| 16TB RAID-5 to 20TB RAID-5 (Expand from 5 to 6 Disks) | 32h 39m 26s | 83.88 W |
| 20TB RAID-5 to 24TB RAID-5 (Expand from 6 to 7 Disks) | 35h 51m 29s | 92.79 W |
| 24TB RAID-5 to 28TB RAID-5 (Expand from 7 to 8 Disks) | 38h 42m 13s | 101.93 W |
| 28TB RAID-5 Rebuild (Replace 1 of 8 Disks) | 35h 28m 14s | 102.42 W |
Due to the nature of the CPU, RAID expansion / rebuild takes progressively longer as the number of disks increase. Coming to the business end of the review, the Synology DS1812+ has plenty of positives (applicable to other Synology units that I have evaluated also): It is simply the most reliable NAS that I have encountered. All RAID expansions and rebuilds complete without issues, performance is solid and consistent, and the DSM interface is a joy to use. I haven't even touched upon the breadth of apps available which extend the functionality of the NAS beyond the basic firmware features. The combination of stability, price and expandability (coupled with extensive virtualization support) makes it ideal for many small scale virtualization setups. The number of bays available also makes it possible to create multiple disk groups and run volumes with different RAID levels on the same unit (each disk group can have multiple volumes, but all of them have to be of the same RAID level). The DS1813+ carries forward the DS1812+ with the addition of two more GbE network ports (Synology plans to sell both models in parallel).
Despite our extensive praise for the DS1812+, we feel that Synology has left open some areas for improvement. From the hardware perspective, I would have been happy if they managed to provide a AES-NI enabled platform at the same price point. A USB port or two on the front side of the chassis would have been nice. From the firmware side, it would be good to have support for volume encryption in addition to folder encryption. In addition, it would be interesting to see if provision can be made for dynamically expandable volumes with the ability for a disk to be part of multiple volumes (possibly in different RAID levels). This would make the Synology NAS units even more appealing to the crowd currently using WHS / Windows Storage Spaces.
In closing, Synology manages to hit yet another home run in the 8-bay SMB / SOHO NAS space. They are miles ahead of the competition in almost all respects. Even the few quibbles that we outlined in the previous paragraph are just aspects which might make it even more difficult for competitors to catch up.
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SirGCal - Friday, June 14, 2013 - link
UPDATE: After looking carefully over these screenshots - I think their review might be SERIOUSLY lacking... I see a RAID 6 option in the setup for the box. But it's greyed out. Probably because they didn't have any drives in it when they were there is my guess. need 4-5 drives MINIMUM to do it to start. But with this many drives, Even testing a RAID 5 is just honestly a bit stupid. It should have been tested RAID 6 and in that situation, might actually be a more attractive option if it is capable and performs.But then again, RAID 5 generally is faster then RAID 6 due to the added calculations for the extra parity.. And it's RAID 5 performance was pretty weak unless I'm reading the numbers wrong. That is, if the RAID 6 is actually activatable within this device and not just an option within their software that is disabled in this device all together. But I would have thought this review would have tested that mode since that is what an 8-drive setup should have been setup for.
ganeshts - Friday, June 14, 2013 - link
The benchmarks were done with all 8-bays filled with WD RE Drives in RAID 5.The screenshots show that we can have disk groups. So, for example, you could allocate 4 disks to one disk group and run a RAID 5 volume on it. Then, the other 4 disks could be in another group and you could run a RAID 6 volume in that group.
What is the problem with performance that you are seeing? These Atom-based NAS units basically saturate the network link (accounting for overheads). Remember two links teamed is 2 Gbps in this case and that translates to a maximum of 250 MBps. Accounting for overhead, I see units saturate between 210 - 230 MBps and never have had any unit go above that unless I am teaming 4 ports or more (as you can see in our QNAP TS-EC1279U-RP review)
I will take your feedback about RAID-6 evaluation into consideration in the next round of benchmarks.
Jeff7181 - Monday, June 17, 2013 - link
How is single client, 1.5 MB/s throughput at about 100 ms latency "stellar?" That sounds absolutely abysmal to me. I'm curious to know how you set up IOMeter... I'd like to repeat the test on my own box and see how it fares.mitchdbx - Saturday, June 15, 2013 - link
There comes a time in your life where you just want things to work without the hassle of them breaking every time you turn around. I OWN the 5bay unit (for over a year now) and can say that the UX is wonderful on these. They configure to let you know when something goes wrong (send email, beep, send SMS, etc) so you can fix the issue. Please look at the product before you make conclusions that they are only "dumb" boxes. You can run Plex, and Many other media servers in addition to a DNS, DHCP, Web server with PHP and various CMS installs. Photo Management, Surveillance, etc....On another note, a inexperienced individual commented that an issue will arise when a drive fails and the array must rebuild. If you are using quality drives and constantly spinning the drives, the chance of a two drive failure is very low. As anyone that has years of experience with computers, keep the drives spinning and things will be fine, it is when you shut down and start up that issues come into play.
mitchdbx - Saturday, June 15, 2013 - link
More FYI about the RAID levels....http://forum.synology.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_S...
Micke O - Monday, June 17, 2013 - link
Synology aren't using some "nonstandard raid" with SHR. They are using mdadmThis is how to restore an array in standard PC using linux if your DiskStation would fail:
http://www.synology.com/support/faq_show.php?lang=...
I'd say that's even better than using some H/W Raid controller. Good luck replacing one of those with something else than an identical controller with the very same firmware etc.
Insomniator - Thursday, June 13, 2013 - link
Wow great timing! Been looking for a NAS with huge storage capabilities to transfer data offsite. Haven't seen many around... Buffalo Terastation looks good but I haven't seen reviews for those or any other modern NAS systems. Thanks for the review!SirGCal - Thursday, June 13, 2013 - link
Did I miss it? But I didn't see it support Raid 6? But Raid 5, ESPECIALLY with large drives, is just asking for failure. I personally have one 8-drive array, building my 2nd now. First with 2TB drives, new one with 4TB drives. Both are Raid 6. Old one 12TB, new one will be 24TB. Ya you lose 2 drives of usable space but that creates 3-drive failure protection. Or basically, when a drive fails and you're rebuilding, you have protection from another drive failing. Cause THAT is what it will happen...But I didn't see anything in the whole thing about Raid 6 at all. I would Never build an 8-drive system with Raid 5... Not especially with consumer grade hardware... Without Raid 6... It's just not worth it for large array...
Gigaplex - Thursday, June 13, 2013 - link
No, it only creates 2-drive failure protection. Lose 3 drives in RAID6, and you're toast.SirGCal - Friday, June 14, 2013 - link
3-drive failure, as it it takes 3 to kill the array.. Point is you can be repairing one, if another one fails, your not dead yet... As you would be with RAID 5...