Thecus W4000+ NAS review - Final Words & Conclusion

Final words and conclusion

Thecus has a very interesting product at hand with the W4000+. First let me state that is was a great move to offer a + model with the 4GB of memory, we monitored a little and as always, Windows is a resource hog. The 2GB on the regular model might not cut it, and once Windows starts running out of memory, it's gonna swap and thus you'll see latency in some manner. For those on a 2GB model, it is easy to replace the SODIMM memory and very cheap top upgrade. Anyway, that's just a small tip of course. The W4000+ series really is intended for the SOHO user though, for the regular consumer Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 might be a step too complicated. No worries though, Thecus has excellent Linux driven boxes as well which are a little more user friendly. For the system admins and office box affcionado's, well for them Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 is pretty much brilliant for configurations, stability and upgradability. Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 is secure as a house.

Overall usage

This box that is highly configurable in terms of HDDs capability. You get full RAID and Virtual drive Pool functionality with 4 tray versions bringing some extra value into this NAS unit, it supports hot-spares as well. So if one drive fails, the hot spare could automatically kick in and migrate. For performance alone you really should not opt for RAID on a Gbps NAS unit anymore, however for redundancy RAID mirror could be something you value. The unit as tested today can take huge TB sized HDDs, so if you use four 6TB HDDs you are going to see a 24 TB NAS unit, with decent performance. And for security reason ALWAYS have the latest firmware installed. Backups ... it's something this device does so well. The ease and comfort of your precious data being stored outside the system backed up over the Ethernet is just fantastic. Again we see nice configurability here as well.

Performance

We reached okay transfer speeds over our Gigabit Ethernet connection and though Ethernet will always bring in some performance and lag issues over a network connection I must admit that performance was okay at best. Sire it's plenty fast for all your activities but we'd average out at 60 to 80 MB/sec in complex workloads with large files. With a processor like this we expected to see 100 MB/s+ performance really. For the GUI and OS side of things we can say that the NAS is responsive and fast enough. The usage of this processor also makes your applications responsive, that's also thanks to the 4GB of memory and the embedded SSD for the OS of course.  

Energy Efficieny

We tested this unit with an SSD so that we are certain that the storage unit can never be a bottleneck in terms of measuring storage performance. This SSD uses roughly 3.5 Watts. The traditional HDD these days uses roughly 5 Watts. So if you'd use one 8TB HDD for example, this unit would still hover in the 20~25 Watt range, an okay number TBH and you do need to realize that you will have your NAS active like 365 a year right ? In idle and low usage circumstances the NAS unit uses roughly 19 Watt. Under storage load 21 watts. We assume you will add more HDDs thus add another 5 Watts per unit (when the HDD is active). Inactive if your HDD is not used for say 30 minutes, it'll go into sleep mode and thus does not use any measurable power. Add to that extender power saving features that windows offers then we have to admit that this NAS unit is energy efficient. Especially considering the performance and server like applications it houses. Impressive results.

Final words and verdict

As stated, Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 might not be everybody's cup of tea, but if you aim this product to to the SOHO channel then that's where it makes the most sense. I mean if you purchase the software alone that'll cost you 399 USD. This entire NAS unit is in the 550 USD range, thus a Windows license and the NAS box. That's a pretty golden deal to be honest. The overall performance is okay, not shockingly good though, it is Gigabyte Ethernet compatible and at 575 EURO / 550 USD for the 4GB model it is priced fair. The Thecus W4000+ is definitely recommended for the SOHO side of the market, an incredibly fun and handy NAS with decent performance and an operating system that will serve you well. If you are in the market for a Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 based product then please do opt this 4 GB model, as the extra memory will come in very handy. However for the home users that want streaming media, a download box or a file-sharing solution for your PC, we do suggest you to steer away from a Windows based unit.

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