QNAP TS-253E-8G-US 2 Bay High-Performance Desktop NAS with Intel Celeron Quad-core Processor, 8 GB DDR4 RAM and Dual 2.5GbE (2.5G/1G/100M) Network Connectivity (Diskless)

*** HUGE NEWS - You can now run ZFS on the 453E, this is a TOTAL game changer. ZFS is enterprise level file protection. QNAP will also keep all the original licensing for things like camera's. This is a total win for anyone buying this NAS today. Update it to max memory and install hero zfs...*** Please note that newer TS-453E's have socketed memory so the maximum memory will be 16MB for newer units. ***Used for a few months now and very happy with it. It just does so much out of the box that it is a great value.UPDATE: After a year of constant use, it has been bullet proof really. Use it for document management, file serving, media, plex, and dockers. Memory has never been an issue and never going above 4 gigs, so I still have 4 to go.The OS has been updated constantly and is very secure now, don't believe the hype about security. It is tight as anything else now.Getting almost 500mb with slower nas drives in raid 10 (with qtier) and using multichannel smb.For the money, this is the best value still in NAS. It does everything so well and is very well made, the features and performance when you look at real world use and the app set is truly exceptional.Update #2: Going on 2 years of constant access and 24/7 run time with this beauty and it is just bullet proof still. I actually looked at getting a bigger QNAP NAS for the fun of it, and it just doesn't make sense. The value point of this box is just unbeatable. The faster M2.NVME speeds compared to all other competing NAS's in this segment is really nice when you setup QTier. Throughput is great with that and mulitchannel on a 2.5GB network. Playing much large plex files and never have any issues with anything. You have to spend some serious dollars to a better solution. As before constant updates of firmware and the app set. For those concerned about Malware. Any one who exposes anything to the world without owning a decent hardware security appliance/firewwall and using the proper recommendations from the manufacturer, and not review logs is asking for issues. The QNAP interface is fine, monthly Iog into the NAS check for updates, so I really don't care about the NAS interface compared to others. All the hype about the UI for a NAS just seems like hype to me given you never use it, performance on the network is where it is at. I still highly recommend this NAS it is just so good in this segment and is the absolute best value still. Even looked at M2.NVME only NAS's and they don't make as much sense, they don't provide any more performance at 2.5GBE MC and the price per TB doesn't work if you want large pools. Down the road they are the future, but for right now a NAS like this that uses M2.NMVE as a first line works great. Put in 2 4TB WD Red M2's and you get the best solution.Update #3:Had to update to larger and faster pro drives and it went perfectly. I followed the online video and swapped them one by one. All went perfectly. Took 6 hours per drive. Now performance for 2.5 multichannel is constantly giving maximum performance without any dips, very consistent. Pro drives do make a little noise, but not that noticeable. Went with 4 WD Red Pro drives and very happy. Have used WD reds since the beginning and never had one fail.Update #4:Big firmware update (Beta) with greatly increased detection of malware and overall speed increase. I subscribed to the bitdefender for enhanced malware protection that become available in the newest firmware. Still just a bullet proof as before, my favorite NAS and NAS Brand. Now that Synology dumped Prosumer and crazy lockdown to their way overpriced M2's and HDD's, just sick of them. QNAP has entirely taken the Prosumer market. Don't trust China sourced NASes like Ugreen, who knows what is in their kernals! Asustore is decent but the OS is not as capable as QTS. QTS also has QTier and bitdefender. Really impressive in this market. As I said before, this NAS performs perfectly at 5Mbit speeds via 2.5 GBE multichannel. Plays and decodes huge 4k, and just hums along.Update #5:The latest firmware is now released. Works great as mentioned above.2.5 years 24/7 and a perfect track record to date.Not much more to say.This device for the money is a great value still with the hardware and software and features that mark the distinction of the brand.Pros:+Simply the best value for the money.+Constant updates and improvements of software.+Mature platform with great features+Really Nice Intel Processor in very few NASes. Throughput is just as good as the AMD CPU competitors at this tier for the same network speeds.+Faster M2.NVME than competitors.+QTier works great and bespoke to QNAP. QTier provides both Cache and Pool in one solution and intelligently decides where data belongs.+Great media server, plays everything fast and perfect.+Perfect footprint size.+Extremely quiet, not box noise like some competition.+8 Gigs is plenty for everything I load on it with lots to spare.+ Copy button with Great USB speeds for backup. Hit the button and be done in minutes with a large pool.+Performance with 2.5 Multichannel, QTier and Pro drives get great performance.+ Bitdefender built into the security of the NAS.+Ability to use HERO QUTS ZFS. Major benefit that has never been seen at this level turn key nas. This is a big deal.Cons:- Key and lock feel cheap.- Be nice to have 16 GB, just in case.- Clicking an icon in QTS may take a few seconds to bring up the items selected.- Support is just decent not exceptional.- Wish QTier offered some control of where data lands and how long it stays there.

I have been a long time Synology customer. I have 3 of their NAS units (Two 2-Drive units, and One 4-Drive Unit)I recently purchase this QNAP NAS to compare with the Synology.I have had it about a month, and have been migrating my data over to it, and so far it has worked great.I have a large amount of data, Four 20TB drives, and it takes a while to copy things around.I have been able to add a 1TB SSD as cache to this NAS, as well as add an extra 32GB memory module, so now the CPU has a full 40MB of memory to work with.I will be adding some videos to my review, but for now, I am glad I tried another company's product and I think I will be saying with QNAP for now.

This QNAP works great as a media server, though can be very confusing with all the apps that can be downloaded. If I had to do it all over again, I would have opted for the 4-bay instead though. It’s actually cheaper when consider the price of drives.

I was skeptic about QNAP over a Synology. Once Synology made their OEM Branded drives mandatory I looked for other servers. I gave QNAP a try and I'm glad I did! It has been flawless.

It just works right out of the box, I really like the QNAP products, this is my second one to replace an older TS-251+.

Excellent product! Easy to setup. Never needed tech support. Everyone needs one of these

bought due to recommendation for home cloud and storage

The QNAP interface and UI is great. It works very well, but there is a malware problem that turned my NAS into unusable files. I had to reformat. I returned the QNAP and debating on Synology versus not having a NAS.