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Review Synology DiskStation DS216j NAS: User Review #1, As part of Synology x LYN giveaway

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TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 07:34 PM, updated 8y ago

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Back in April, together with the cooperation of Synology which one of the most well-known name in Network Attached Storage (NAS), we have organized a giveaway that we called "Review and Make It Yours" in which several of our forumers were given the opportunity to test and review the Synology DiskStation DS216j NAS.

The winners have since came back with their feedback on the consumer-oriented NAS. So, here it is, the first review which came from RViN. rclxms.gif

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Mr RViN himself with Synology DiskStation DS216j.

INTRO

So what exactly is a NAS? A network attached storage is basically a mini computer that serves as a shared storage unit on the network. Its usability can be expanded to get it to serve functions that are more diverse, typically as a file/application/media server on top of just being a storage or backup device.

Synology isn’t a stranger to those who know NAS, it’s been one of the major players in the NAS market for a while now. Today we’re gonna look at the Synology DiskStation DS216j. The ‘j’ in the model designates an entry level or budget oriented model meant for home and personal users. It does however come with Synology DiskStation Manager 6.0, the latest version of Synology’s NAS operating system.

UNBOXING

» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «


REVIEW CONTINUES BELOW

Quick Link To Other Parts of The Review
Part 2: Setting It Up
Part 3: OS and User Interface // Mobile Experience
Part 4: DS Photo // DS Video // DS File // DS Download
Part 5: Benchmarks
Part 6: Usage Scenarios
Part 7: Usage Scenarios (continued)
Part 8: Competition // Conclusion // Pro & Cons

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:23 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 07:40 PM

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SETTING IT UP

Once it’s plugged in and turned on, it’s time to set it up.
I followed the instructions in the quick start guide, which was to open up a browser and load http://find.synology.com, and the site found the DS216j immediately.

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The screen you're presented when you load up the find.synology.com page (note that it says 'Re-install' because this was after I factory reset the unit)

If for some reason the web interface fails to find your device, Synology does also provide a utility that you can download from its’ website that helps you connect to and run some basic configuration tasks on your NAS.

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Interface of the Synology Assistant

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Begin installation

Going back to the web interface, once you click install you’ll be presented with this screen. Selecting the ‘install now’ option will see the NAS connect to the internet and download the latest version of DSM that’s available.

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Finished? That was quick!

Once you select the install option, the device will format the disks (if it wasn’t formatted already I suppose) and then begin the download and install process. There’s a note that warns the process may take up to 10 minutes to complete, but the whole thing took about 4-5 minutes for me on a 30Mbps Unifi connection.

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Time to set up user accounts.

And then you just need to setup your device and user accounts. You’re given the option of using find.synology.com to access the disk station on the local network, in case you don’t want to be bothered with setting up a static IP and using that. Takes some of the hassle out for people who may not be tech savvy and wouldn’t care about IP settings.

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Update and Maintenance settings.

There’s an update schedule that can be setup to keep your disk station updated with the latest OS version and bug fixes, just like how Windows Update works. I think this is a very good feature to implement, as in case there are security loopholes with the OS, updates can be pushed out to patch affected devices. This is important as for non-tech savvy folks they might not consider the need to manually apply updates to fix issues such as what I mentioned as an example. To have a service that does all this automatically would go a long way to make sure that doesn’t happen.

But there’s also the option of manual installation available, for those who want better control.

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Synology’s ‘cloud’ or remote access setup.

Next you’re presented with the Quick Connect screen, which in other words is the remote access feature available to Synology’s disk stations.

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Logging in from the web.

Once you set-up QuickConnect, you’ll be given a URL that should make your disk station accessible from anywhere on the web. Enter the URL and you’ll be shown a login screen to enter the user credentials that were created before. Basically this takes away all the hassle from setting up DDNS and port forwarding on your local network. Quick Connect does all of that for you.

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Synology’s Recommended Packages (apps)

Basically that’s it for the base OS and services setup. Next up is installing ‘packages’, which are basically applications that extend/add functionality to your disk station apart from just being a regular old NAS. Synology presents a list of recommendations, and since this is a review let’s just install all of them. The install took longer than the download and install of DSM which was a little surprising. I guess the base OS itself is lean (which bodes well for update and maintenance). Saying that though it only took around 8 minutes.

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:18 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 07:45 PM

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OS AND USER INTERFACE

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DSM 6.0’s main interface.

Once the install is complete, you’re presented with a short guide that explains the basics of the interface, and then a help knowledgebase. Once that’s done with, you’re left with the main page of DSM 6.0 and your adventure with Synology’s NAS begins. As you can see, the desktop supports widgets which I thought is a nice touch as you can see some useful information at a glance.

The OS is pretty simple, its accessed through a browser and works flawlessly on my experience with both Chrome and Firefox, I did not test it with Microsoft Edge (not sure if I needed to, does anyone actually use Edge? tongue.gif).

It works surprisingly well over the web too, with its clean and lean interface. It’s far smoother to use as compared to maybe using VNC remotely on a more traditional OS.

For someone who’s used Windows or Ubuntu, it doesn’t take much to get used to in terms of the interface. The only difference for Windows users is that the equivalent of the Start button and taskbar are located at the top instead of the bottom.

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DSM's Main Menu

Once you click the ‘main menu’ you’re presented with a bunch of icons representing the currently installed applications on the device. Every open application appears in the ‘task bar’ area at the top next to the ‘main menu’. Multi-tasking is as simple as switching between the apps by clicking on the respective icon in the task bar. Minimizing/Maximizing applications is also an option, so its pretty much what you would expect from any desktop OS.

Personally I quite like it, it’s easy to use and intuitive, I didn’t have to spend any time being frustrated I couldn’t find some option or something hidden somewhere. The only thing I kept doing at first was clicking the browser’s ‘back’ button when I wanted to go back to a previous menu or to the desktop, but that’s nothing I can blame the OS for.

The package store has quite a few packages available for download that further extend the disk station’s features, most are free however there are some that are not. There is also a ‘manual install’ option available, which is basically ‘sideloading’, in case you want to install something that you can’t find in the package centre I suppose.

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Synology’s offerings in the Package Centre (what could be called an ‘app store’)

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And these are the third party offerings that are currently available.

As you can see in the 3rd party package offerings, many programming/scripting language (Python, Ruby, Perl, for example) support packages are available. I can foresee that people can get very creative in running some scripts as scheduled tasks to run maintenance/cleanup/download or even to sort out their media library.

Some of what’s available is to make setting up web servers a possibility (you’ll notice PHP and Tomcat there, as well as things like WordPress and Joomla).

There’s a lot of varied stuff on offer in Synology’s first party offerings as well, if you’re interested in setting up a proxy server to load content cached on your disk station as a priority, you can. If you want to setup your disk station as a VPN server, you can do that too. DNS server? Sure. iTunes server (I didn’t even know that was a thing, but I happen to stay away from the Apple ecosystem so pardon my ignorance)? Oh yes. Heck you can even set your disk station up as a RADIUS server (I suppose there’s some corporate networks that might find that useful). Git and SVN support is available as well, so you can have your own internal version control setup simplified for those small enterprises.

Obviously, for a home user, the vast majority of these options will not be used and I’m sure many of you read the past couple of paragraphs and wondered what the hell I was talking about for half of it. But Synology has a wide target market for their DSM 6.0 OS based devices, and it’s evident here. Its also nice that there aren’t any restrictions placed on which packages you can install, so if you’re feeling extra geeky you can try setting up whatever you want.

MOBILE EXPERIENCE

Another facet of the OS/interface has to be the mobile experience. In this day and age with this kind of device and its’ cloud capabilities, we also have to assess the accessibility and ease of use from a mobile device perspective.

It’s great that you can access your NAS from the web remotely on a PC, but it’s even better if you can do so as reliably and as efficiently from a smartphone as well, so let’s take a look and see how the mobile experience is like.

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(L - R) The mobile menu // The resource monitor on mobile.

The DS216j (or any other DSM6.0-based Synology DiskStation NAS) is quite easily accessible from a mobile device, you can just do what you do on a desktop, that is open a browser and enter the QuickConnect URL you were provided upon which you’ll be presented with the mobile version of DSM. The mobile page is more streamlined and limited, in the sense that you’re presented with some menus where you can edit the settings of the DS and also check up on the status. However there is the option of switching to the desktop mode (which will turn the interface into what we see on a PC browser).

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(L - R) Services // Full Desktop Mode

The full desktop mode is a little finicky on a phone, but I can see it being useful on a tablet which has a much larger screen size. I tested the interface on both Firefox for Android and Chrome, and the latter worked better – there were some issues with the interface looking funny and buttons going missing on Firefox for Android. The full desktop mode was problematic on both in the sense that often my taps weren’t registered, but I think this might be due to the browser not sure where exactly I was tapping. Unfortunately I don’t have a tablet on hand for me to test this out.

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Synology's first party apps on the Google Play Store

In any case, the functionality of the disk station is extended on the mobile space by use of apps, and Synology covers the basics here with their app offerings.

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:22 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 07:51 PM

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DS PHOTO

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DS Photo and Photo Backup Settings

This is the Synology’s app that takes care of photos stored on your DS. Its best feature is the auto-backup feature, where like in Google Photos, it will automatically backup the photos on your device onto your disk station. The benefit of DS Photo vs. Google Photos is that you know exactly where your photos end up, that is on your own disk station. You can have multiple family members or friends upload to the same disk station either into different albums/folders or into the same one. It’s a great way to create a repository of backed up photos in a very simple fashion, and it will always be available to all who have the connection details to that disk station to view on the go.

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DS Photo Map Mode View

Also I quite liked the ‘map mode’ view, which is a nice way to sort out your collection apart from the normal timeline view.


DS VIDEO

Similar to DS Photo, this is the video app. Not much to say here, it allows the streaming of video files stored on your DS to either the mobile device, or other connected devices on your network (ie smart tvs or chromecast).

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DS Video


DS FILE

This is the app built like a file manager to access files stored on your DS. You can actually browse your photos/videos/music and play them from this app itself. It was actually faster than the other two specific apps I mentioned above this for these purposes, but you miss out on some features. Primarily though I guess you would use this for uploading/downloading files you keep on your DS.

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DS File's photo and music file browsing


DS DOWNLOAD
This app is for managing the DSM’s download manager (appropriately called Download Station). It allows for remote access and management of the Download Station, very useful if you need to start/stop downloads on the go.

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DS Download, the app for managing the Download Station

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:13 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 07:55 PM

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BENCHMARKS

I had attempted to run Intel’s NAS PT tool, however with its problems with running on 64-bit systems and incompatibility with Windows 10 (and insistence on using 2GB system RAM otherwise the test would be rendered inaccurate – the smallest stick of RAM I have is 8Gb), I had to improvise.

To be noted is that there is a Gigabit Ethernet connection from my PC connected to an 8 port Gigabit switch which is connected to a NAS. The setup used on the DS216j is the aforementioned WD Red 1TB NAS HDD. For reference, I am copying over files from my Samsung 850 Evo SSD, to hopefully avoid any HDD associated bottlenecks.

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Figure 1: Synology advertises write speeds of almost 100MB/s - http://www.synology.com/en-global/products/DS216j

In my experience, the peak write speeds are certainly in line with that. However, sustained speeds tend to fall off a little, averaging at around 60-80MB/s, depending on the types of files being transferred (fewer big files = higher speeds, many small files = lower).

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Figure 2: Peak Speeds are almost in line with Synology's claims

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Figure 3: LAN Speed Test works by writing a file to a network location, and reading it back. It can be used to test both HDD and Network speed. The results presented here are in Megabits, to convert to MegaBytes, divide the value by 8. Write speed is reported at ~75MB/s, Read speed is ~100MB/s.

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Figure 4: Another real world test, 407 jpg photos ranging in size from 6-12MBs each

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Figure 5: On the opposite end, single 22.3GB file

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:14 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 08:12 PM

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USAGE SCENARIOS

As part of Lowyat.NET x Synology’s giveaway, contestants were asked to describe some scenarios we would use the DS216j. So, here are some scenarios that I went through with DS216j:

1. Torrent Box

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DSM has a Download Station package that acts as its all-in-one download manager, supporting FTP/HTTP/BitTorrent/eMule/Xunlei-Lixian (I’m not even sure what that last one is). The wide range of protocol support is a good thing.

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Also very nice is its feature for supporting RSS Feeds, which is great for those who use RSS to automate their download schedules. As mentioned in the Mobile Experience section of the review, the Download Station supports remote access and control on mobile, and on a desktop you’ll be able to manage it remotely as well.

Download Station does not support ‘labels’ on torrents, which I thought might be an issue, however it does support separating download locations for each RSS Feed. So you could setup your TV Show RSS feed to download to the TV Show location and so on.

Also for people like me who are OCD about having their files named neatly, while there isn’t a auto renaming app in the Package Centre (the Video Station does scan and organise your library well by getting the movie/tv show info, it doesn’t do any re-naming of the files), I did some searching and found that there is a version of FileBot available for DSM, which requires you to sideload it.

Basically as a torrent/download box, I don’t see any area where the DS216j or any DSM device is lacking too much, except for the Download Station missing the ability to run a script once a torrent completes or finished its seeding quota. Therefore any scripts you have will probably have to be run as a scheduled task, which isn’t very efficient.

2. VPN Server

Another usage scenario that I wanted to test was to use the DS216j as a VPN server, particularly because I have family who are located around the world these days, and it would be nice if they would be able to log back into our home network securely and be able to retrieve private documents that we wouldn’t otherwise want to upload to the cloud. Or be able to access other such services on the local network remotely.

I’ve fiddled around with OpenVPN before, and frankly it was a bit of a pain to set up, and on the other side getting a non-tech savvy relative to help troubleshoot the setup was a little frustrating.

So how does the DS216j compare? Well spoiler alert, it did swimmingly. The setup itself on the DS216j was a breeze. All I needed to do was tick one checkbox, go into my router settings and make sure the appropriate port was forwarded, and voila, VPN access works.

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Enabling VPN, just ticking one checkbox

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Next you just connect on a client device

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With the VPN enabled and configured on my smartphone, I was able to access my local file system even on the mobile network (the key in the notification bar signifies a VPN connection, and I am on LTE)

One thing to note however is that I do have Dynamic DNS set up on my router, which if you do not currently have is one extra step that you’ll have to do in order to make your VPN server accessible on a static address.

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DDNS configuration and support in DSM

DSM also has its own DDNS support, so if you’re unsure on how to set it on your router, or if you’re using a router that does not support your preferred DDNS provider, you can set it up on the DS216J as it seems to support pretty much everything.

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DSM can help check if your router is forwarding your ports correctly

Oh, and DSM can also check and update your router’s port forwarding settings in case you don’t want to do it manually. I expect this may be helpful in many cases.

3. Media Server

This is something I guess that would be most interesting to most. DSM has Plex media server available through their Package Centre, or you could use Synology’s own Video Station application. The DS216j supports streaming through to Chromecast as well as DLNA, so you can be served video on any DLNA enabled device.

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Streaming media through the Video Station

Streaming 4K video to my computer and phone wasn’t a problem, although for some reason trying to stream it to my TV through DLNA resulted in a ‘unsupported file format’ error, which is extra strange considering the media plays fine if copied over onto a USB drive and plugged into the TV.

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4k Video being streamed through WMP over DLNA

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This, over to my smartphone

Streaming it through DLNA on my PC through the VideoStation app or Windows Media Player works at 4K, and also to my smartphone, so I suspected it might be an issue with my TV.

According to the specs on the Synology page, it should transmit the original file to the TV, which is what I want since the TV is capable of playing the same file through USB.

Searching for more information on Google, I finally came to this: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/39-networkin...le-problem.html

Seems like LG’s WebOS 2.0 still doesn’t support 4k over DLNA, which is something everyone here should consider if they’re looking to buy an LG TV and plan to use DLNA to stream 4k content to it.

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:16 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 11:08 PM

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USAGE SCENARIOS (Continued)

4. File Server (FTP)

This is going to be the shortest section on here, since I think the FTP functionality is pretty straightforward. It’s very simple to setup, just tick a checkbox (or a few, if you want a secure connection) and voila, FTP is setup. Works as expected.

Didn’t pay much attention to this as personally I’d have set up the VPN and handled file sharing that way, though I guess aside from that I could setup a separate public FTP for sharing files or apps with colleagues or myself when I’m on overseas work trips.

5. Productivity Tools

I noticed that the DSM Package Centre included some productivity tools, so I thought I should check them out to see if they’re useful.

The first application is simply called SpreadSheet. If you’re familiar with Google Sheets, then you’ll know what this is all about. Basically you can set up SpreadSheets like you would do in Microsoft Excel, however using Synology’s SpreadSheets application gives you the benefit of working on a sheet collaboratively with multiple people all at the same time. There’s also revision history on each spreadsheet so you can keep track of who edited what, and when.

Basically you get everything that you get with Google Sheets, but you keep everything off of Googles servers. Also there’s encryption support so you can encrypt files that contain sensitive information.

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SpreadSheet and sharing your documents

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Multiple users editing in real time

The second productivity application that’s provided is Note Station, which is similar to Google’s Keep. You can basically store lists, notes, and clippings. The last feature works in conjunction with a browser plugin called ‘Synology Web Clipper’. If you’ve ever used one of Samsung’s Galaxy Note phones I think you should know how this works, basically you can take clippings of bits and pieces of web pages or images and add notes to them. Note Station also supports importing of notes from Evernote, and you can export it to or share it with other Disk Station users.

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The Web Clipper plugin on Chrome

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What a clipped note would look like

6. Mail Server and Mail Station

There were some other things I didn’t actually plan to try but seeing them available I thought why not, for instance setting up a mail server. From looking at the Mail Server package on the Package centre, the setup would have been simple enough so I thought I should go ahead. There is also a client available that creates a web access feature for your mail server, which would be useful for those who are on the go since it works with other email providers’ accounts as well.

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The Package Centre page for the Mail Server

Considering that DDNS is supported (and I’ve set it up), I just set the domain to my DDNS, and forwarded port 25 and I was ready to test.

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You've got mail!

That’s it basically, mail server was up and running. This would definitely be very useful for small business owners (heck or even people who want to show off their own little private domain emails).

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Your inbox in the Mail Station

The Mail Station package is just as simple too, all you need to do is login and you have access to your inbox.

This post has been edited by chapree: Dec 6 2016, 12:17 AM
TSchapree
post Dec 5 2016, 11:53 PM

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COMPETITION

As I mentioned in my contest entry, the main area of comparison I would look at was my current HTPC/MediaServer/TorrentBox setup that consists of an Intel i3 NUC and an external HDD enclosure. Back in the day I went for this setup mainly because the NAS options back then were too complicated to setup, and too limited in certain functions that I needed.

For instance, for my torrents I needed RSS support, and also support for running custom scripts that would rename and move my completed downloads into the correct locations within my network. There was no option for this, unless I went with a full desktop OS. With DSM6.0 and its support for many different scripting languages though, this isn’t an issue.

The downside to that would be that I would have to setup everything I wanted myself, and that can become complicated and cumbersome. The upside however is that with a full desktop OS, you can do whatever you want on it that you could do on any PC. Although at the moment the only thing my HTPC can do that the NAS can’t is playing games through Steam’s in home streaming.

4k over DLNA is also an issue, but that sounds to me like LG’s limitation, not Synology’s. With Plex being supported, media streaming on the DS216j should be familiar to most. Synology’s own Video Station application seems well made as well, and works with multiple devices at the same time.

So at the end of the day, if you don’t need the extra power from a full featured desktop, you may be able to save some hassle and some cash and go with the DS216j. Over time its lower power consumption will save you a bit more as well.

CONCLUSION

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All in all, the introduction to DSM6.0 and the DS216j was a great learning experience for me. Having not used a NAS other than one I setup myself before, it’s nice to see where consumer level devices are right now.

I hope in exploring the device and its OS and features together with me gave you a better idea of its capabilities and whether it’s suitable for whatever use cases you might have in potentially getting a NAS or some other solution.

Pros:
• Very easy to setup. Some features like QuickConnect make setting up things like dynamic DNS redundant for the most part.
• DSM is smooth and very usable even remotely. Interface is intuitive and easy to learn.
• Synology’s mobile apps (at least on Android) are also very usable and stable.
• There’s tonnes of features that are supported, both for home/multimedia and office use.
• Security seems to be taken seriously as SSL is available as an option everywhere.

Cons:
• Only 2 bays, which can be limiting to some. Also it means there’s no possibility of RAID 5 or RAID 0+1.
• There were a couple of times when the processor seemed to be choking, when I had uploaded some media and it was indexing and I tried to stream as well as copy over some more stuff onto the drive. However this shouldn’t occur too often in everyday use.
• Torrent client could use some features, for instance support of labels and running scripts at completion.


We would like to thank Synology for providing the review unit and also to RViN for his excellent Synology DiskStation DS216j in-depth review! rclxms.gif

jpaul
post Dec 6 2016, 11:13 AM

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Does it come with any App that can help me backup my phone pictures/videos to the NAS?

Something like google drive.
TSchapree
post Dec 6 2016, 02:05 PM

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QUOTE(jpaul @ Dec 6 2016, 11:13 AM)
Does it come with any App that can help me backup my phone pictures/videos to the NAS?

Something like google drive.
*
I would say the DS Photo app should be able to do that for pictures, as stated in the part 4 of the review:

Part 4: DS Photo // DS Video // DS File // DS Download


loonsave
post Dec 6 2016, 02:35 PM

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Mind to share the mail server setting?
TSchapree
post Dec 6 2016, 03:30 PM

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QUOTE(loonsave @ Dec 6 2016, 02:35 PM)
Mind to share the mail server setting?
*
Calling for RViN hmm.gif
RViN
post Dec 6 2016, 07:56 PM

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QUOTE(loonsave @ Dec 6 2016, 02:35 PM)
Mind to share the mail server setting?
*
There's nothing much to set.

For SMTP then you need to make sure port 25 is forwarded correctly on your network.

I have a DDNS setup, so my email address was routed to my DDNS domain and I didn't need to setup any MX record.

There are a lot more details on the configuration options available in the Synology knowledge base, if you want to check what is possible:
https://www.synology.com/en-global/knowledg...S_a_mail_server
loonsave
post Dec 7 2016, 08:57 AM

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QUOTE(RViN @ Dec 6 2016, 07:56 PM)
There's nothing much to set.

For SMTP then you need to make sure port 25 is forwarded correctly on your network.

I have a DDNS setup, so my email address was routed to my DDNS domain and I didn't need to setup any MX record.

There are a lot more details on the configuration options available in the Synology knowledge base, if you want to check what is possible:
https://www.synology.com/en-global/knowledg...S_a_mail_server
*
How about the SMTP server? TM usually block SMTP unless use their SMTP relay. And most of the time email will be in spam folder if the mail server using dynamic IP.

Mind to enlighten why no MX record required? I thought MX record is a must for a mail server?
RViN
post Dec 7 2016, 11:00 AM

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QUOTE(loonsave @ Dec 7 2016, 08:57 AM)
How about the SMTP server? TM usually block SMTP unless use their SMTP relay. And most of the time email will be in spam folder if the mail server using dynamic IP.

Mind to enlighten why no MX record required? I thought MX record is a must for a mail server?
*
I was using a DDNS. From what I understand MX records are only required if the domain of the email address is different from the domain where the mail server sits, in my case it was the same so it wasn't needed (as there was no need for any 'forwarding' to be done from the domain to the mail server). This will not be the case for everyone however.

Hmmm I didn't setup any SMTP relay and I only tested sending/receiving to/from an Outlook.com address and it worked. I didn't do a comprehensive test of it because running a mail server wasn't one of my usecases, I just thought I'd show that it was possible for anyone who would want to.

In any case, if you want more information, there's a link in my previous reply you can check out.

subrok007
post Dec 11 2016, 08:40 AM

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RVin how much did you bought?

This post has been edited by subrok007: Dec 11 2016, 08:40 AM
lephonghau
post Dec 11 2016, 12:31 PM

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RViN
post Dec 14 2016, 03:07 PM

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QUOTE(subrok007 @ Dec 11 2016, 08:40 AM)
RVin how much did you bought?
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Refer to the first post tongue.gif

 

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