27.9.2020

Edit:If you want a NAS for Plex, get a better one than this! Plex will run on this one, but it can be tediously slow (because this NAS doesn't have enough processing power or RAM). My original review is below. I haven't changed my rating, because this is a good NAS, just not so good for Plex!Original Review:This is my first NAS and I bought it solely for use with Plex, so that's what my review is about. I bought the 2 x 10TB Toshiba N300 package.I was in two minds whether to buy this model as when doing research, I kept hearing people say that the lack of RAM (512MB), as well as the fact it's not upgradable, means it's not ideal for Plex use. Based on my experience so far, I would agree with this,however that's not to say Plex won't run. I have been able to install Plex and play my media without any major issues - sometimes it's a bit slow though, and sometimes videos will randomly stop, which is annoying, but most of the time there are no issues (I suspect something else is happening in the background that causes videos to pause - maybe it's the NAS doing something, or maybe it's Plex doing a library scan). Also, bear in mind that I live alone and I am the only one accessing the NAS - if you plan to use it with multiple users (i.e. more than one) accessing Plex at the same time, I imagine it will struggle.However, for me, I thought I may as well take a punt on this model as the price of the enclosure + hard drives was pretty good. If you consider the cost of buying the drives separately, the NAS enclosure itself worked out at about £25, so I thought I may as well buy it as it will be handy to have as a backup (literally) when I upgrade to a more powerful / expensive NAS in the future.I also purchased a Chromecast from Google and paid the £5 one time fee for the Plex iPhone app - I'd highly recommend both as this will allow you to access your content on any TV very easily - I've not experienced any play back issues at all so far.In summary, if you are a single user wanting this for Plex, it's not a bad option. It would be better to buy a more powerful NAS with more (and expandable) RAM, but it does seem to be quite a big price increase for that. So if you don't have big bucks available and want something now, I would recommend this as it works well with Plex and let's be honest, most of the money is in the drives themselves, which are easily transferred to another NAS in the future if needs be.I should also mention that the first NAS Amazon sent out came with two drives that had completely failed. No idea if that was just bad luck, or if something else was to blame, but needless to say it went straight back in exchange for a replacement. Amazon were fairly easy to deal with in that regard, but it was a bit annoying. I also note that Amazon's pricing is very erratic. I paid £530 for the 2 x 10TB Toshiba N300 deal, yet I've seen it increase to as much as £640 for absolutely no apparent reason, only to come back down again the next day. I would be pretty furious if I'd paid that much only to see it reduce the next day.

18.3.2021

Let me first start by saying that this is a very good starter NAS, however remember it is an entry level model and may not have everything you need or require.I did my research, but not enough! I purchased it along with some cheap enterprise 4T disks and away I went.As I was still evaluating the product I decided to go straight into the Beta DSM 7. Installation was pretty straightforward, and there as some very good installation guides on YouTube if you need more help.The first thing I noticed was that I could not format the disks under Btrfs. For security, I wanted snapshots, so issue number one. Should have done my homework better!But everything else seemed OK, I set up Hyperbackup to both local storage,

31.7.2020

This is a bit of a hard item to review. For someone with basic NAS requirements, it's an excellent choice. It ticks Alot of boxes, it's easy to setup and use, the user interface is superb, and comes with an appropriate entry level price tag.For me however, I was disappointed, there were quite a few hidden restrictions on this entry level module that you only discover once you try and move beyond the basic requirements. If all you want is basic drive failure redundancy, cloud backup, mediaserver, download manager and basic applications, then it's a fine choice. Just don't expect it to be able to do the more advanced functions (you need the "play" or "plus" models for this,

6.2.2021

I do dabble in computers but this is my first attempt at setting up a NAS drive. The Synology DS220J seemed an ideal starting point .I also ordered 2 Iron Wolf 6TB drives .I was a bit disappointed with quick installation guide .Just 6 pages on how to connect it up .Nothing about setting it up .Just said on the last page “PC CLIENT web browser http//find.synology.com” .a bit baffling at first . As my iron wolf drives where delayed I installed 2 Samsung 1TB drives to test the setup . Once I had typed http//find.synology.com into chrome it started to make sense . A few pages of info to put in then after about 15 minutes I was on the DLS desktop .Then I was stuck .What do I do now .Well thanks to YouTube I got all the answers ,not from Sinology’s help pages .

4.5.2021

Great. Got the 2 bay version. Stuck it up in the loft where I have a network point and put all my stuff on it.it's a bit noisy to be put anywhere habitable in my opinion. Even if you turn the fan down to minimum, you can still hear the hard drives rattling around like a bag of glass marbles in the corner of your room. Hence why I banished mine up to the loft, and even then I had to place it on foam to drown out the low pitched hum down below the ceiling.Other than that, all good. Now I've got an 8TB cloud in my home that all my devices can connect to.Using my Nvidia Shield as a Plex server for it's progressing power,

25.6.2020

On the surface, this is a pretty great entry model NAS. It will do everything you need if you're after something for your home and don't plan on too much heavy usage. It holds up well streaming 4k movies, but you will notice a performance dip if you do too much while streaming.If you're not overly technical, it can be a bit tricky to set up to back up your files and folders properly, but there are super useful guides on the web that will walk you through how to prevent the two-way sync on folders you don't want all over your network.BUT, the biggest issue by far is that the WD Red version that is less than 12TB comes with SMR drives. WD have been shipping SMR drives out to smaller NAS installations,

2.4.2021

I use this NAS for two things: a) as a storage location for my digital image files, which I can now access from many locations; and b) the destination for my Mac Time Machine backups. (I also backup the image files to an attached external USB drive.) All of this is working.Setup was straight-forward, but it helped me to have watched several relevant YouTube videos first - this is a significant piece of network kit, and you do need to have some understanding as to what it's doing. There is a "Gotcha!" - if you use the easy install method you end up with one Storage Pool and just one Volume in that pool, in EXT4 format and using SHR (if you have more than one drive). You can't change any of this after set up.

1.6.2021

Excellent little device for a starter NAS setup. Installation was a breeze using the manufacturers recommended method. If you're new to the world of NAS then my advice would be to just let the Wizard guide you through the setup on recommended settings. There's plenty of add ons available in the DSM software or you could just map it as a network drive, drag and drop whatever you want to store and let the box do it's thing. Your data will be fairly well protected in RAID so you can just set and forget. Despite the comments of some reviewers, noise is not an issue. Ours sits on the living room on a shelf and we never hear it. The LED indicators can even be dimmed/switched off if you find them distracting.

22.7.2020

A replacement for a much older NAS enclosure that had exceeded its usable lifetime. Synology's DiskStation software is an ongoing facility. Apps for both Android and iOS are also available if required.It now joins two other Synology enclosures with the advantage of them each having an essentially identical front-end although with different contents. This arrived with an EU mains lead with no UK lead supplied but a spare was available and used.Assembly, such as it is, is fast and simple and requires a small Philips screwdriver (not included) but the needed screws are. Once powered up, it should offer to download DiskStation - it can also be downloaded to a PC and uploaded from that - and any of the optional utilities including anti-virus can then be installed as and when required,

22.1.2021

This is an excellent NAS but you have to use a fast ethernet switch to get the best out of it.It's not a good idea to connect the NAS directly to a slow, ISP-supplied router and then access the NAS using WiFi. If you do then, unsurprisingly, it will be limited by the slow router and/or WiFi and it will upload or download files at a snail's pace. Use it as recommended by Synology (i.e. with a fast ethernet switch) and it is very fast.Other reviewers have claimed that it's slow — this is nonsense. It's not slow, but it will definitely be slowed by a slow router and/or the limitations of WiFi.You should consider connecting your ISP's router to a fast ethernet switch,

31.5.2021

We purchased this NAS Drive to increase our backup storage. It is the third unit we have purchased. We have the DS215j, DS216j and have now added the DS220j.This latest version uses the same DSM Software as the previous two drives. This software is continually improved and updated by Synology.It is relatively easy and straightforward to set up. In addition, it is straightforward to install the hard drives.We have installed two Western Digital Red NAS 10Tb Drives into this unit as we have used them in the previous two units without a problem.One thing of note is that the unit is noisier than its predecessors, although I would suspect that is due to the choice of hard drives.The performance of this unit is greatly improved over the previous versions.

1.12.2020

WOW!Got this for £120 in the cyber Monday sale. I was contemplating getting one of the 4 bays and was concerned with the 512Gb of ram. But for £120 it was a no brainer, it arrived the next day!Upgrading from my DS212j (yea from 2012) it is a massive improvement. The process was easy, just followed their web guide, backed-up, moved the HDD over and powered on and followed the migration prompts. Toom maybe 20min.The read/write is 8x faster and uses the gigabit Lan (see the crystal diskmark from my PC over the Lan)The USB3 is also much much faster and make my USB backup go much better.The UI is just far more responsive.The memory does not seem to be a problem and the CPU takes things in its stride,

28.9.2020

Got this to replace my old dlink nas as that was not compatible with later versions of smb. The Synology nas was received well packaged with drive screws and a few smaller screws to secure the case once you had put your drives in. The os, viewable through a Web browser, is responsive and very similar to Linux desktops. Setup was quite straight forward although there is some unique terminology regarding partitions and drive groups so worth downloading the manual. One gripe I have is the user permissions, I think it was luck rather than judgement that got me through the users/home setup! To begin with my kids could access my home drive!Overall 4 out of 5,

13.2.2021

Bought this item (sold by BOX via AMAZON) to second a WD DRIVE, the SYNOLOGY is dead easy to start, and to set up, a bit of a hassle with the BT HOME HUB (need to open the port 5000-5001) as it can't be set up by the SYNOLOGY. But after that, it is a great product, exactly what I needed, a safe way to store data, to share it and to access on the internet. The speed to access the data on line is a real benefit compare to the WD drive, photo, music video in no time you can cast them on all your devices. Not for absolute beginners though as you need to understand a bit about ITAlso I have to say, great service from SYNOLOGY and BOX to support the installation and for any question. They are quick,

9.4.2021

Perfect NAS plenty of support videos because it’s not easy to setup especially remote access; I opted to use a 3rd party app called FileBrowser Professional which has a small one off charge and it’s connected via the free built in OpenVPN app (FileBrowser support is excellent). Their is a free Auto backup app and auto delete option for which are great. I have 2 additional external USB drives attached to the NAS for extra backup. Really pleased. Replaced my obsolete Apple TimeCapsule. Unless you opt for a 3rd party additional chargeable Cloud Backup then there is always a risk of loss of data if stollen / flood / fire damage. 5 Stars

Synology DiskStation DS220j - Reviews

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