Asustor Nimbustor 4 (AS5304T) NAS Review - Asustor Introduction

Asustor Nimbustor 4 AS5304t NAS (2x 2.5 GigE) 
Much like Huey Lewis And The News - It's hip to be square

Multi GigE Ethernet is coming to town, and in an effort to re-style their NAS servers, ASUSTor has released their Nimbustor 4 (AS5304t) NAS server. This puppy is aimed at a new audience, the pro-consumers that stream. Realistically though, it might be one of the most interesting NAS units we have tested top date as it is fast, nimble and offers two 2.5 Gbps Ethernet jacks. The new Asustor AS5202T and AS5304T NAS are the first to include 2.5Gbe ports as standard, this is one of the most impressive Asustor NAS devices we have seen in a long time.

The new NAS units have seen a bit of an overhaul, like Huey Lewis And The News - Hip To Be Square once sang, it's hip to be square, and in that mindset Asutor remains their NAS to be square, however there have been aesthetic tweaks, and all dark rear and bottom side are new, also soft red elements surrounding red visual indicators, it's actually a really good looking NAS series now. But that's not really what it is about though, in the past we've already tested their NAS with 10 Gigabit Ethernet for the consumer market. Quite affordable, but it did not have the best processor. 

The series will is named as Nimbustor 2 for 2 bay, Nimbustor 4 for 4 bay and the model they submitted is the 4 bay, Nimbustor 4. This new model is aimed more specifically at a streaming consumer. The idea for this series is that digital data storage and streaming is becoming bigger. The vlog audience out there, for example, require speedy and large capacity storage for their live videos. ASUSTOR figured they would like to provide the solution which can meet today and future needs, and that in theory sums up the Nimbustor series. And make no mistake, this is a PROPER NAS, period. it has all the features you know and love from Asustor, but now even more. They have upgraded the hardware LAN ports towards 2.5GbE LAN ports (2 ethernet jacks) opposed to a single Gigabit jack. That 2.5 GigE jack is going to help you achieve much faster LAN speed and performance in a 300 MB/sec range (depending on your storage units or configuration of course). Asustor also gave this AS53 NAS series a proper processor, it is an Intel Celeron J4105  (Gemini Lake) quad-core CPU with a 1.5 GHz base and 2.5 GHz Turbo clock frequency. It has a 4K enabled iGPU with embedded graphics support (mostly used as a transcoding engine for NAS) and that means that both the native media applications from Asustor and Plex Media Server will support transcoding (Plex does require a premium subscription to activate that though).

So that offers plenty of performance whilst remaining energy efficient as well. You get 4GB of DDR4 (SO-DIMM) memory, however, you may drop in another 4GB through the extension port to gain 8GB in dual channel configuration. Asustor now also offer ADM 3.4. (the OS that manages this NAS) to support a more gaming style desktop GUI. A hip new feature included also is the support for the btrfs file system which allows for snapshots of the storage volumes for easy backups as well as a portainer app for Docker application, plex and roon server for multi-media applications. At the ASUSTOR Portal, they are also going to add in an app for video streaming to watch high quality of gaming competition video like Youtube and twitch soon (yes this NAS unit has HDMI 2.0a output). Included software with your purchase of any Asustor NAS, offers lots of first-party media handling applications, file management, backup tools, and system tools. For those of a more SOHO state of mind, there is also the support of the newer docker/container application for running smaller virtual environments, VirtualBox is supported for bigger VMs and has ClamAV Protection from intrusion, malware, viruses and more.

We test the 4-bay model, loaded with features and a plethora of software that will allow anything from a simple FTP server, to VM aware solutions as well as heaps of media functionality. These units, by the way, receive a nice 3 warranty as well, something you only get with premium NAS servers from other brands. 

While it does not have the spiciest processor on the globe, these four core cellies hav plenty enough to offer for performance. It is also an energy-friendly unit as well thanks to the new Gemini Lake architecture. As an example, the unit active with one SSD consumes roughly 7 Watts, and that's it.  Today's tested model NAS unit has four HDD bays (hot-swappable) that are RAID compatible. It offers 2x full duplex 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet jacks, it also comes with two USB 3.0/USB 3.1 Gen 1 / USB 3.2 Gen 1) connectors. Yeah this NAS might be a terrific low power option while providing a small server in features. Have a peek at the product and then we'll dive a little deeper into the review.