DS119j: Synology’s $99.99 Home NAS

[Julio Urquidi]

Synology’s 1-bay desktop DS119j is designed for home users looking for their first NAS for centralized file storage, backup or home entertainment.

The NAS is powered by a Marvell A3720 dual-core 800MHz CPU with 256 MB DDR3L RAM. Like other Synology NASes it runs Synology’s DiskStation Manager OS, which extends the NAS’ functionality by adding surveillance camera, file backup, and security support. Power consumption is only 10 W, dropping to 5 W in automatic hibernation mode.

DS119j ports include a single GbE port and two USB 2.0 ports, while the single drive bay supports 3.5” or 2.5” SATA formats (drives are not included). ext4 format is used on the internal drive and ext4, ext3, FAT, NTFS, HFS+ and exFAT3 file systems are supported on USB external drive.

The Synology DS119j NAS is available now through Amazon and CDW.

 

[RMerlin]

256 MB RAM and 800 MHz CPU? I doubt this thing will break any speed records... The OS itself will probably fill up most of the RAM, leaving pretty much nothing for buffers.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Considering it's a single bay "NAS" it's strange they didn't add a USB 3.0 port, as the SoC supports it. They only used two out of three possible high-speed interfaces on the SoC.

 

[thiggins]

Throughput: It doesn't take much to hit the gigabit limit for large media file transfers. I expect this will come close enough.

USB2: Yes. That is odd, especially since the only other Synology single bay (DS118) costs almost 2X!

 

[RMerlin]

Considering it's a single bay "NAS" it's strange they didn't add a USB 3.0 port, as the SoC supports it. They only used two out of three possible high-speed interfaces on the SoC.

My guess is, the primary goal was to hit the magical 99$ target price, so they had to cut down on some fairly significant features, like an USB port (which would probably add a few dollars to the design).

Throughput: It doesn't take much to hit the gigabit limit for large media file transfers.

Samba can get quite CPU intensive, especially with SMB 2.x. That 800 MHz dual core CPU worries me there.

 

[thiggins]

My guess is, the primary goal was to hit the magical 99$ target price, so they had to cut down on some fairly significant features, like an USB port (which would probably add a few dollars to the design).

It has two USB 2.0 ports

 

[RMerlin]

It has two USB 2.0 ports

Missed that. In that case, I suspect that it's a CPU power issue, might not be powerful enough to handle USB overhead + Samba CPU usage at speed higher than USB 2.0. Look at how those low-end routers can barely hit 20 MB/s in the past for example.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Missed that. In that case, I suspect that it's a CPU power issue, might not be powerful enough to handle USB overhead + Samba CPU usage at speed higher than USB 2.0. Look at how those low-end routers can barely hit 20 MB/s in the past for example.

That's not it, unless the Synology OS is that much heavier than Ubuntu - http://espressobin.net/forums/topic/performance-tests/
Doesn't look like the USB 3.0 performance is that great though.
Admittedly this NAS has half the RAM of the Espressobin board.

Yes, USB 3.0 would cost slightly more than USB 2.0 to implement, but it just seems cheap not to include it.

 

[loft]

Man, that NAS is made as cheap as possible. A sort of best bang for the buck (at least from the sales department's point of view).

Just imagine that if you'd buy an SBC (like a RaspberryPi), add a case and a power brick and you'd probably not be anywhere near the performance of this NAS.

Not to mention that the target user for this product probably wants an easy to setup device with just enough speed to watch 1-2 1080p streams from A Samba share.

PS: In a year or so, this would probably be clearing the shelfs at close to half the price.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Just imagine that if you'd buy an SBC (like a RaspberryPi), add a case and a power brick and you'd probably not be anywhere near the performance of this NAS.

Indeed, the RPi is terrible for storage use, as it only has a single USB lane from the SoC that's shared between all the interfaces. If you're smart, you wouldn't touch it for "NAS" applications.

 

[Threska49]

Man, that NAS is made as cheap as possible. A sort of best bang for the buck (at least from the sales department's point of view).

Just imagine that if you'd buy an SBC (like a RaspberryPi), add a case and a power brick and you'd probably not be anywhere near the performance of this NAS.

Not to mention that the target user for this product probably wants an easy to setup device with just enough speed to watch 1-2 1080p streams from A Samba share.

PS: In a year or so, this would probably be clearing the shelfs at close to half the price.

Fine with me. That's how I got all my Pogoplugs. Grab a bunch of cheap SSDs, this "NAS", and have some fun.

 

[adamjb]

Both Amazon and CDW have the DS119j for closer to $119.99. Where was the $99.99 price reported?

 

[thiggins]

It was in the email blast from Synology. I will check with them.

 

[CaptainSTX]

It was in the email blast from Synology. I will check with them.

FYI I was able to purchase this unit from Amazon on Oct 5. It will be fufilled by Synology. Price $99.99.

 

[thiggins]

Product is back in stock @ Amazon for $99.99, shipped from Synology. It looks like they are the only vendor selling @ that price.

Synology says "the price sometimes goes up due to low stock".

 

[adamjb]

Thanks @thiggins. I also see that Amazon is now selling directly for $99.99 with Prime shipping, although they are temporarily out of stock.

 

[sfx2000]

The NAS is powered by a Marvell A3720 dual-core 800MHz CPU with 256 MB DDR3L RAM. Like other Synology NASes it runs Synology’s DiskStation Manager OS

Contrary to some of the popular assumptions - the Armada 3720 is a good match for this application - and Synology's DSM is optimized for it.

3720 has native support for SATA, not thru a glue chip, and it's reasonably fast... same goes with Marvell's Gigabit Ethernet port - it's a very good NIC, and the driver support in Linux is first rate - I'm a bit surprised they didn't break out a USB3 port, as the chip has more than enough horsepower to push Gbe, Sata, and USB3 at the same time. Even at 800MHz...

(this is a system on chip I'm very familiar with... I've done a project based on it)

For a single disk NAS - $99USD is a very good deal - good HW, and DSM is as good as QNAP's QTS...

 

[sfx2000]

Man, that NAS is made as cheap as possible. A sort of best bang for the buck (at least from the sales department's point of view).

Just imagine that if you'd buy an SBC (like a RaspberryPi), add a case and a power brick and you'd probably not be anywhere near the performance of this NAS.

Not to mention that the target user for this product probably wants an easy to setup device with just enough speed to watch 1-2 1080p streams from A Samba share.

PS: In a year or so, this would probably be clearing the shelfs at close to half the price.

Not even close to a fair fight with most hobby SBC's - they'll lose in a head-to-head battle, and the NAS has DSM...

Like I mentioned above, the 3720 is a different class of chip compared to the low end AllWinner, RealTek, Amlogic, Broadcom SBC chips you find on hobby SBC's...

The closest SBC that would compare to this NAS is the GlobalScale EspressoBin - which is based on the same chip (and has more options, but it's a bit more work to bring up than most FruityPi type boards)