Thecus N5550 5-Bay Home NAS Review

Thecus N5550 NAS Storage Server

The Thecus N5550 5-bay NAS (shown above), looks very much like the N5500 that came out in 2009, but don’t let the looks fool you. With front with the door closed, the N5550 and N5500 look almost identical, with the only exception being the logo on the front of the unit. Once you open the door and start looking around, you’ll begin seeing that the new N5550 has hard a major hardware update. On thh front panel you’ll see that there is now a SuperSpeed USB 3.0 port and on the back of the NAS you’ll find audio and HDMI ports. Thecus didn’t stop there though as this unit is powered by an Intel Atom platform (Cedarview) with 2GB of DDR3 memory and an updated operating system. The best part is that the MSRP of the Thecus N5550 is $599.99 and the street price is just $439.00 shipped. The Thecus N5500 had an MSRP of $869 when it came out just three years ago! With all the hardware and software beefed up and the price slashed in half, this should be an interesting product to review!

The Thecus N550 is aimed at home and small business users that are looking for an affordable storage solution for their network. The Intel Atom D2700 processor and 2GB of memory make it one of the most powerful units on the market and one of the lowest priced. Having features like USB 3.0, HDMI video output and 2GB of memory really help the Thecus N5550 stand out from the crowd.

You can find the hardware and software features out below and we’ll jump straight to unboxing the NAS on the next page!

Thecus N5550 Hardware Platform

Item	Spec
Processor	Intel Atom D2700 Processor
System Memory	2GB DDR3
LAN Interface	RJ-45×2: 10/100/1000 BASE-TX Auto MDI/MDI-X WOL supported
USB Interface	USB 2.0 host port x4 (back x4) USB 3.0 host port x1 (front x1)
LCM Module	LCM display 4 buttons (ENTER, ESC, UP, DOWN)
SATA DOM	1GB
HDMI Output	HDMI port (back x1)
VGA Output	VGA port (back x1)
Audio	MIC input, Line input, Audio output
Disk Interface	5 x SATA for internal 1 x eSATA for external
Power Supply	200W Power Supply
USB UPS	Supported
Thermal/Fan control	Thermal sensor on processor temperature System FAN speed controlled by temperature
System Clock	Battery-backed up system clock
Power Management	Auto power on after shutdown due to power loss
Buzzer	Adjustable frequency alarm
Buttons	Power button LCM button
Environment	Temperature: 5°C to 40°C Humidity: 0 ~ 80 % R.H. (Non-condensing)
Chassis	Tower Metal Chassis
Dimensions (HxWxD)	230 x 190 x 240 (mm)
Certificates	CE/FCC/C-Tick/VCCI/BSMI RoHS WEEE VMware, Citrix

Thecus N5550 Software Functions

RAID
RAID Modes	RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 10 and JBOD
Auto-rebuild	Supported
Hot-swap	Supported
Hot Spare	Supported
Online RAID Migration	Supported
Online RAID Expansion	Supported
RAID Volume Encryption	AES256bit
Disk
Power Management	Available spin-down on idle setting
Bad Block Scanning	Supported
SMART Info	Supported
SMART Test	Supported
Disk Roaming	Supports volume-based roaming to other Thecus NAS
Network
Configuration	Fixed IP address, dynamic IP address
Transport Protocols	TCP/IP/AppleTalk
File Protocols	SMB/CIFS, HTTP/HTTPS, FTP, NFS v4, AFP
Link Aggregation	Load balance, Failover, 802.3ad, Balance-XOR, Balance-TLB, Balance-ALB
TCP/IP	IPV6 & IPV4
DDNS	Supported
SSH	Supported
UPnP	Supported
UPnP Port forwarding	Supported
System status
System Monitor	Monitoring CPU, memory, temperature, fan, network utilization and protocols access user count
Syslog Management	Send syslog to assigned location Act as syslog server to receive log info from other systems
Data Access
Client OS Support	Windows 8/7/Vista/2003/XP/2000 UNIX/Linux Mac OS X
FTP	Built-in FTP server with bandwidth control
Secure FTP	Built-in secure FTP server with bandwidth control
TFTP	Users can download and upload files with TFTP programs
Download Manager	BT download (via Transmission module) NZB download (via NZB module)
Printer Server (IPP)	Supports USB printers Supports a wide range of IPP printers Client can manage print tasks (list/delete) via web user interface
Data Backup
Client Incremental Data Backup	Acronis True Image (OEM version)
Client System Disaster Recovery	Acronis True Image (OEM version)
Client Side Backup Software	Thecus Backup Utility (Windows/Mac OS X)
Data Burn	Create files to ISO image and burn to optical disc Create files to ISO image Read ISO image from optical disc and write to NAS
Mac OS X Time Machine	Supported
Data Guard	Remote Backup/Local Backup
Block Level Access
iSCSI Target/Initiator	Supports Microsoft/Mac OS X/Linux initiators and Thecus NAS targets
iSCSI Thin Provisioning	Supported
MPIO	Supported
MCS	Supported
Clustering	Supported
SCSI3 Persistent Group Reservation	Supported
Power Management
Scheduled Power On/Off	Supported
Volume Management
Multiple RAID	Supported
Multiple File System Selectable	EXT3/EXT4/XFS
Multimedia Support
iTunes Server	Supports AAC, MP3 w/ID3 tag and WAV
Piczza!™ Photo Server (via module)	Supports GIF, JPG (JPEG), BMP and PNG Supports EXIF display Supports slide shows
Media Server	Supports uPnP AV streaming protocol (via Twonkymedia module)
User Authentication
Local User	Supports built-in user accounts
Local Group	Supports built-in user groups
Windows ADS	Supported
LDAP	Supported
Access Guard	Supports Black & White list/IP Filter
Cloud Backup
DropBox	Supported (via module)
ElephantDriver	Supported (via module)
Amazon S3	Supported
File System
Type	Journaling File System
Language Support	Unicode Support
Authorization (ACL)	“Read”, “write”, or “deny” privileges to individual users or groups in folders and sub-folders
User Quota	Supported
Administration
User Interface	Web-based user interface supports English, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, Korean, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Portuguese, Turkish and Czech.
Utility Program	MS Windows Setup Wizard Supports Windows 8/7/Vista/2003/XP/2000 Mac OS X Setup Wizard
Email Notifications	Sends system messages via email to the system administrator
SNMP Trap	System information trap out
Mobile Applications (iOS/Android)
Thecus Dashboard	Mobile monitoring and administration (via module)
T-OnTheGo™ (iOS)	Upload, download and stream multimedia
Data Security
Virus Scan	Supports McAfee (via module)
Capacity Expansion
Stackable	Can extend for 5 additional iSCSI volumes from other Thecus NAS
Others
Recycle Bin	Supported
Web Disk	Supported (via module)
Web Server	Supported (via module)
ISO Mount	Supported
IP Cam Surveillance	Supports up to 5 IP cameras (via module)
Auto Module Installation	Thecus’ module server automatically provides the latest modules and updates through the user interface.
Local Display	X-Window via HDMI output