Thecus N5200 five-drive NAS

If the TellyRAID we saw yesterday is the NAS for TV nuts, we'd have to say this N5200 NAS from Thecus is the NAS for people with actual secure storage needs (lame) -- or who are just plain nuts. First, the N5200 houses five hard drives, which by our count means you could get about 3.75TB worth of 750GB drives in this thing. For networking there are four Gigabit Ethernet ports, which should hopefully keep up with most small business networks. The box runs on a Celeron M CPU to manage all the crazy storage and bandwidth, and supports USB RAID if you'd like to get all redundant on your flash drives. Thecus has added AFP and NFS network support -- along with the usual suspects -- and are even throwing in an admin utility for Macs. Overall, the device is quite feature full, and its RAID6 and RAID10 support make it a haven of redundancy. No word yet on price or availability.

[Scabies @ Jun 13th 2006 12:18PM]

"First, the n5200"

Looks like there are two models presented, but only one description. The second looks like it has four instead of five bays, so can we assume that everything else about it is 20% less cool
(considering it is only moderately cool to begin with, 80% "kinda cool" still outdoes my 160gb raid-0 "not cool at all")

[Joesh Juphland @ Jun 13th 2006 12:19PM]

This is right up my alley ... I store the ripped dvds and cds (and other large and non-critical media) at home in my closet, I keep my vital information on a thumb drive or in mobile phone storage, and I keep my photos, documents, archives and other "life or death" data on an rsync.net - style offsite storage site.

Never mind the fact that I do not, as yet, have any of these three items :)

[Jonathan Loor @ Jun 13th 2006 12:28PM]

Simply just wow. 5 drives is impressive, what is more impressive is RAID 6 and RAID 10! Personally I think RAID 6 rocks, can handle (2) simultaneous drive failures and still keep chugging along.

[Todd @ Jun 13th 2006 12:44PM]

3.75 TB does NOT meet my pr0n storage needs. Please make a larger capacity device available.

[Jeff @ Jun 13th 2006 1:16PM]

I would so buy this if it was reasonably priced, just for my own home use. The problem is I'm sure we're looking at a couple thou, without the drives. I mean this is obviously intended for small (or large) businesses. But think of the home applications. All that media at your fingertips. RAID-6, so no worries about losing your photo collection if your hard drive dies (yeah I know, back stuff up - but not many people do). Stick a print server in there and you'd have probably the perfect device.

You could do all this with a cheap computer right now, but then you need an OS, you need to know how to configure it, you're gonna end up with too much noise (unless you know what you're doing); it's just not an elegant solution. A device like this is an elegant solution.

[Ted @ Jun 13th 2006 2:02PM]

I just bought something similar for our company. A 1TB Buffalo Technology TeraStation NAS for $800. It has 4 SATA 250GB drives (Upgradable) and has a pretty good web based control panel. I've got it set at RAID5 right now (Can loose a hard drive and it keeps going) but it reduces the storage capacity to 750GB. They have a 1TB home version you can get for under $600 if you search nextag.com for TeraStation. The only differences between the home version and the PRO version is that the home version uses EIDE hardrives instead of SATA, and you have to take it apart to swap failed drives, where the PRO has front load bays.

I've only had it a week, but so far so good....

[Subliminal Fusion @ Jun 13th 2006 2:20PM]

Jeff - I'm with you. I've been trying to piece together a NAS to hold my music (over 1500 music CDs that I want to store in both lossless and lossy formats), and I've been trying to get Openfiler - http://www.openfiler.com/ up and running but have been having issues getting OpenLDAP configured so that I can actually set up users and access the box. There's talk of them integrating user management (probably through OpenLDAP), but until then it's not an easy plug and play solution for home users.

If this thing's $250 or so (highly unlikely, but within the realm of possibility), I'll probably abandon my current box and drop the hard drives in this.

[Chandler @ Jun 13th 2006 5:14PM]

This seems like a great solution. I have built several NAS systems before, particularly the Rebytes. Unfortunately, these aren't available anymore, but they were cheap and extremely reliable. I built a system that is essentially silent. I've tried the LaCie 1 TB 1 U rackmount and was disappointed, very loud and no RAID. Anyone know how much noise this thing makes?

[Nate @ Jun 13th 2006 5:19PM]

Did anyone ever think they should call these devices NADS instead of NAS. Network Attatched Disk Storage. "I stored the files on my NADS".

[Subliminal Fusion @ Jun 13th 2006 7:51PM]

Nevermind, it looks like their current generation products start at around $200 for a 2-bay device and their current 4-bay is more like $600-$800. I doubt their next gen products will be that much less .

[Rick F. @ Jun 13th 2006 8:46PM]

I'll stick with my current homebrew system consisting of a outdated (e.g. cheap!) Compaq Proliant 6400R with dual redundant power supplies, 4 hot swappable RAID array (w/battery backed cache) expandable to many more drives, quad processors (550Mhz Pentium II Xeons) and up to 4GB RAM -- all running Linux (FC3 currently) keeping a nice low cpu load.. I've had this machine running for almost 4 months without ANY powerdown or reboot (it would be longer but I needed to reconfigure my power cords).. It's running Exim, MySQL, Postgres, PHP, Apache, SSH, etc. The great thing is that IF one of my drives fails, I can plop in a new one and the raid system automagically rebuilds without any help.. I picked this machine up off of e*bay for $75 and it works GREAT!

[oracle @ Jun 13th 2006 10:06PM]

I want a 4 drive one, but I still think they're too expensive for what they are.

[Chris G @ Jul 16th 2006 10:39AM]

Rick F,

Your Proliant 6400R uses enough power directly from the socket, and indirectly (heat, etc. adding load to your AC) to buy one of these NAS boxes every 8-12 months. And I pity your sanity for having to listen to the unit.

[The2ndclory @ Jul 20th 2006 1:38PM]

Not too far a cry from th $1000 price tag but http://www.eagis.com has them for $669 + shipping.

[The2ndclory @ Jul 20th 2006 1:44PM]

Made a boo boo, its http://www.eaegis.com

[Tomasz Chmielewski @ Sep 26th 2006 11:45AM]

Anyone knows SSH password to Thecus n5200? I want to install Debian on this device, but I'm wondering how to hack this device.

I already instaled Debian on n4100 - but with its 600 MHz ARM CPU, it's a bit too slow for my needs. n4100 can only handle about 20 MB/s network traffic (via iSCSI); n5200 with its 800 MHz Celeron should be able to do about 40 MB/s or more.

[amadeus @ Jan 27th 2007 4:48PM]

How do you manage to install debian on you n4100? Thanx for your replay.

[Michael Charles @ Jul 3rd 2007 6:16PM]

Get in touch with http://www.mnmsystems.com, they have a work around they gave me for SSH access. Very helpful customer support and prices on their NAS are affordable.

[Vlad777 @ Oct 19th 2006 11:17PM]

I just bought Thecus N5200 and set it up with 5 Seagate 320G drives (that was the most economical price/performance setup as the 320G Segates were at $90 each)

The NAS works fine as RAID 5 and is reasonably fast - although I did not ran any performance speed tests.

I am however unhappy with the fact that there are no Media Server services on this NAS (I missed this detail when I made the decision to buy).

Now I only hope that I can get some advice on how to add this capability.

My system has been "evolving" for some time and I have accumulated different hardware over a couple of years.

I have:

1. D-Link DSM-320 Player Wired to LAN(with Server software running on a PC)

2. A second D-Link DSM-320 WIred to LAN (using same Server Software as above running on a PC)

3. Buffalo LinkStation HD-HG250LAN Gigabit NAS (which has PCast server on it)

4. Buffalo LinkTheater PC-PL3WG/DVD player wired to LAN Running directly off the Buffalo LinkStation above)

5. Thecus NAS N5200 Gigabit Storage with 5-320G drives installed

With these devices I have a problem to make a "unified� system for Media Sharing.

I would like to be able to play all my media files from the NAS without the use of computer.

Of course the Buffalo Player is using Buffalo Storage without much difficulty. BUT the same Buffalo player would not recognize "Thecus" N5200 NAS.

My two D-Link DSM-320 players are running off the PC Server Software, which is reading the files from the Buffalo Storage. I added Thecus NAS to the Server software list of Media, but I must have computer running to use it.

I also found a third party solution (Twonky Vision software) that appears to do what I am looking for (that is getting my N5200 NAS to be a server for all players on my system WITHOUT the use of computer based software).

But the N5200 is not listed as compatible device on TwonkyVision site.
(I did send the questions to TwonkyVision support and Thecus support as well as Buffalo).

The answer from Buffalo was that I could only run streaming to their player by using their PC software, because my "other" NAS does not have PCast running.

TwonkyVision response was that they had no support for Thecus N5200

I am still waiting for answer from Thecus (I sent two request so far). They apparently have the Media Server running on N2100 but not on N5200.

I hope to get a firmware update or a hack or a solution from Thecus - otherwise I will be forced to sell this thing and go for the ReadyNAS NV, which is apparently supported by TwonkyVision and is compliant with DLNA protocol.

I see a lot of people on this site saying that they plan to use the NAS as media storage - so I thought I would share the warning about streaming compatibility.
It would seem obvious that for home use, people who install such high capacity storage would definitely want to stream the media throughout the house, but Thecus did not include this functionality in their latest offering N5200.

If anyone on this board has any good suggestions, please let me know.

Thanks

[ml @ Aug 27th 2007 12:00AM]

Its strange that N5200's dont have DLNA sever capabilities. I think N1200, N2100 both have DLNA-s.

N5200 is a no go until it supports DLNA.

[andyman_sf @ Jan 11th 2007 4:52PM]

You want ssh you got it!
http://www.andyman.org/n5200/enable-ssh-1.00.05.bin.gz
Make sure your array is running ver 1.00.05.

Just flash with this firmware. You should be able to login as toor password is 123456

[Baz @ Jan 27th 2007 8:21PM]

Can someone please tell me how to change the front image on the Thecus N5200 NAS. Great machine, but I'd like my own front page on there. Regards Baz

[Pali @ Feb 11th 2008 11:08PM]

I am an IT professional and have worked with (i.e. purchased, configured, maintained) literally dozens of different RAID and fault-tolerant storage systems for almost 15 years.
At home I have about 200 GB of photos and video clips of my young kids that I consider “priceless” and was looking for a good, reasonably priced, fault-tolerant NAS solution for home use to safeguard my photos & videos.

The N5200 looked like it was just the solution. Multiple RAID levels, JBOD, hot-swappable drive bays, etc. I was especially attracted by the drive “power management” feature, which claimed to spin-down drives when not in use, thereby saving power and extending drive lifetime.

LOSING ALL MY DATA

Within days after configuring a RAID6 array with 5x500GB Western Digital drives, I was alerted by the N5200’s audible alarm. It seemed that one of the (brand new) drives had “failed”. I was surprised but not concerned, since a RAID6 array can lose up to two drives without losing data. I thought that perhaps the “failed” drive had not been properly seated into its drive bay, so I removed it and re-inserted it. This was the first time the N5200 showed me its unreliable nature. I have no idea how or why, but the mere act of removing and re-inserting that one drive caused the entire array to fail. I lost all the data on the array. Fortunately, I still had copies of my data on other systems.

After recovering from my shock, I re-initialized the array with all 5 of the original drives – it turned out the drive wasn’t bad after all. After this, the N5200 appeared to be stable for awhile, but I discovered that the drive power-management feature didn’t work. The drives never did spin down, even with days and weeks of inactivity. When I contacted Thecus support about this, they told me that there was a bug in the firmware, and that I should download and install the latest. I did, and power-management never worked.

ERRATIC, UNPREDICTABLE, AND UNRELIABLE

A few months later, I was again alerted by the audible alarm. It seems that one of my drives had “failed” again. This time I pulled the drive, and replaced it with a new one (it was still under warranty by WD). When I put the new drive in and “added” it to the degraded array, suddenly another drive “failed”. This was too much of a coincidence. I then replaced that drive as well. When I added it back to the array, the N5200 began a period of “spontaneous rebuilding” for a couple of weeks. It would add the drives back in, and then the array would suddenly start rebuilding itself again for no reason. Drives would “fail”, fall out of the array, and I would be unable to get them added again (even after testing the drives on other systems), unless I re-initialized the whole array (i.e. wiped the data).

THECUS SUPPORT NOT HELPFUL

I tried to work with Thecus support for many weeks. It seemed like they didn’t believe me when I described what was happening. I then tried to get Thecus to replace the unit, which they would not do.

So now I am using those very same 500GB disk drives in separate external drive enclosures (no RAID), which I have plugged into a couple different computers in my house, and I just have scheduled batch jobs that RoboCopy my photos around to several different drives every day. It’s not a sexy solution, but at least I have fault tolerance that I can trust!

THE N5200 IS A “TOY” NAS DEVICE

While it has all kinds of nifty features, the N5200 is not a safe place to put your data. The bottom line is that I could not trust my precious photo library to this device. I could have happily done without most of its features, if only it were reliable and fault tolerant. Unfortunately, in this department the N5200 failed miserably.

IF YOU VALUE YOUR DATA, DON’T TRUST THIS DEVICE TO PROTECT IT.

[Luis Zapata @ Mar 7th 2008 9:23AM]

I was deciding on the Thecus n5200 Pro or the QNAP TS-409 Pro. Both seem like a good option and I read over at Thecus' page and WD's that some WD (YS series) drives needed a special firmware which would prevent them from being dropped from a RAID configuration. I really don't know if after upgrading the fw, the drives work flawlessly; the fact is that some WD drives are marked as being unstable in the official compatibility chart of the n5200 PRO

I don't know if you have this WD YS series drives, but many people appear to have a very stable platform with the N5200 Pro. Now, I'm not taking any sides, I just want to know assuming a stable environment of the Thecus, which one has the best features not considering the 5 vs 4 bay config.

Here are the links to the Thecus PDF and the official WD suport page. Hope this helps

http://www.thecus.com/download/other/N5200_N5200PRO_HDD_list_2007-09-12.pdf
http://support.wdc.com/download/index.asp?cxml=n&pid=15&swid=57

Any advice would be great, thanks.