One minute review
If all you're looking for is a place on your network to back up or blind save your files, then the TerraMaster F5-5 fully meets that need. It's fast enough to grant file access to multiple users on your network, and setting up a Time Machine backup or related backup routine isn't that difficult. Its network options also allow flexibility in how you want to set up the unit on your network, which is why TerraMaster is commendable. Where the F5-5 can have problems is if you want to use it beyond a simple storage repository. The TerraMaster app store may not be as big as Synology's or QNAP's offerings, but it has enough essential apps to get you rolling. The F5-5 is rigorously built for easy storage and networking, so while it's capable of running Plex or other media services, we'd suggest ignoring them as streaming performance can lag a bit. cloudy. The XNUMX drive bays offer many storage combinations, but to get the best speeds from the FXNUMX-XNUMX, you'll want to sacrifice one of those bays for use with a speedy SSD to enable drive caching in the system. With this in place, you are going to see much better performance and truly enjoy using the FXNUMX-XNUMX on your network.Prices and availability
The TerraMaster F5-four hundred twenty-two is now free and has a cost of € fifty-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine.Integrated
TerraMaster NAS versions are fairly uniform in appearance: a brushed metal casing that puts performance over style. On the front, you'll find the 5 drive bays, which you can access by simply lifting a single latch and sliding the bay out. Unfortunately, installation of the reader is not tool-free, and TerraMaster includes screws and a screwdriver in the box. But it's not as easy as installing drives in, shall we say, a Synology NAS, which can be done in less than a minute without a single screw. The arrays accept 5" and 2" drives and offer a variety of RAID configurations to meet your needs. There are no dedicated SSD cache slots for an M.XNUMX drive, so you can use any of the existing drive bays as a cache drive if you're installing one or more SSDs. There's also a small power button on the front with status lights, but unfortunately there's no front USB port for quickly copying files to a USB drive.
Features
The F5-3455 runs on an Intel Celeron J8 processor with four GB of RAM pre-installed. For all who are interested, there is a free memory slot hidden at the bottom of the case, which can take another RAM module to bring the total to 5GB. But achieving this is an almost impossible task and requires disassembling the NAS by yourself. Clearly, TerraMaster really didn't think users would want to upgrade the RAM on this unit, making it more of an afterthought than an actual feature. By the time you have your drives installed, you can boot up the NAS and begin the setup process. However, it must be mentioned that you must make absolutely sure that the drives you are installing have not been used in a previous RAID array, otherwise the F4-5 is absolutely not going to work. We plugged a WD Red 5TB drive that was once a part of a RAID into a Synology NAS, and the FXNUMX-XNUMX refused to show up in the installer. When we removed the drive and turned on the NAS, it let us proceed with the setup process, but when we reconnected the drive in the formatting process it froze and the drive refused to work in the NAS at all. . Even when we put it in an external drive enclosure to format it, it no longer seemed to be a working drive in Windows. After moving to another new drive, setup completed much faster. It still takes a bit of time: you have to go to a site to download and also install the installer on your computer, which then scans your network for FXNUMX-XNUMX. Once detected, it opens a browser where you can actually begin the installation process. It's not the easiest experience to use, and we really hope TerraMaster looks to enhance this in future models. Once our NAS was set up, we were able to log in through the web portal and access the TerraMaster operating system. From there, you can configure your drives, assign users and shared folders, and also go to the App Store to download programs and ancillary features. There are some apps identifiable as Plex, such as multiple backup options for cloud services like Google Drive and Dropbox. You can also download apps like VitrualBox and Docker to run virtual machines from your NAS, but we strongly advise against doing this until you add more RAM to this box.
Performance
The F5-2 can be configured into multiple RAID options based on the number of drives used and your precise needs. The 1 5GbE ports can also be configured with a compatible switch or router to provide faster network speeds, and also offer failover support so the NAS is always up and running. Not surprisingly, the 5GbE port is a great answer for anyone with a convenient network card in their computer to use the F1080-4 as a virtually straightforward storage solution, letting you work with files right out of the box. on the NAS at high speeds, considerably faster. As a media server using Plex, the F5-2 quickly paced and organized our test media library. Streaming 1p content to a Samsung TV was pretty good, but when we tried to stream XNUMXk video, the content totally had to catch up when we tried to navigate the video. For file operations, the FXNUMX-XNUMX showed transfer speeds of around XNUMXMB/s for copying a folder of multiple file sizes from a computer over the Internet to the NAS. This increased slightly to XNUMXMB/s when it was a single XNUMXGB ISO file; our setup consisted of XNUMX WD Red XNUMXTB drives in a RAID XNUMX configuration.Should I get the TerraMaster F5-four hundred and twenty-two?
Buy it if...
You have a ten GbE network cardTransfer speeds when using 10GbE are ideal for anyone who works with large files or needs to quickly copy files over the network. You want an affordable entry-level NAS
The F5-four hundred twenty-two continues to be significantly less expensive than other manufacturers on the market, if all you are looking for is a simple network storage point.
Don't buy it if...
You want an SSD cacheYou'll have to sacrifice a drive bay in the F5-XNUMX if you want to install an SSD for caching purposes, which means one less free drive for storage. You are running virtual machines or other heavy applications
The F5-XNUMX has its drawbacks with out-of-the-box VMs, so just look at the most basic ones, unless you're also bothering to upgrade your RAM.