TERRAMASTER F4-424 NAS Storage 4Bay - N95 Quad-Core CPU, 8GB DDR5 RAM, 2.5GbE Port x 2, Network Attached Storage with High Performance (Diskless)

My previous RAID was a PC running Windows 10 and using Storage Spaces to create a JBOD pool. The hardware from 2012 was too "old" to upgrade to Windows 11 so my choice was to purchase new hardware with a new version of Windows or a dedicated NAS. The Terramaster F4-424 NAS with the 4 core CPU has been a different type of challenge by having to learn how to make it do what I needed and to be prepared when disk replacement is necessary. I did upgrade it to TOS6 and setup the storage pool with TRAID. I started with a couple of regular 1 TB desktop drives and a 2TB WD Red drive. Things I learned is that it installs the running software to the hard drive (System Disk). I thought it would stay on the onboard USB boot disk. If you remove the hard drive with the (System Disk) then the NAS won't boot. In my short tests you can install a new drive and then re-install TOS and your storage pool data should still be there. I chose to spend another $40 to add a 256GB NVMe to put the (System Disk) on in hopes that it will never die. With the NVMe I can remove or add drives at will and just need to repair the RAID to keep it working (they must always be larger than the smallest in the pool). I am now running with a 1TB WD blue hard drive and (2) 2TB WD red drives.My needs for a NAS is keeping photos, videos, documents, and downloads from the last 30 years. I created a shared folder in my RAID volume to keep it all in and setup my Windows PC with a mapped network drive to access the data. I am not interested in Plex server and do not understand dockers or other Linux things. I just want a place to keep my 1 Terabyte of data safe. I plugged my APC UPS into the USB port and setup TOS to have the NAS shut down when the APC battery gets low if the power is out. I have an external Western Digital Elements USB drive plugged in that the Terramaster USB Copy app will do a scheduled daily backup to each day. I can even share that USB drive and map a network drive to access it with my Windows computers.Access speeds appear to be a little better than what my old storage PC had. I have my computers setup to run a batch file using xcopy each day to copy files/changed files to the NAS.Now the bad, on my old Windows storage PC I used a Lacie 2 big Quadra external USB RAID drive. The Terramaster does not like this drive. I can plug it in, see it, access it but if I reboot the NAS with it then it won't be there after it restarts and I lose the APC UPS connection. Something messes up the USB ports with the Lacie plugged in. That kills my second layer of redundancy that I still need to figure out. I had the ethernet port of the Terramaster plugged into my secondary Netgear R6300 router that is used as an access point/network switch. I have the Terramaster setup with static IP. The Terramaster did not like the Netgear router. I had slow access speeds and unreliable connection to the NAS. I changed out to a Linksys EA7200 in bridge mode and that problem seems to have been resolved.Initially I had thought of adding a VPN to the Terramaster so the external family can use the space for storage as well, but I will have to learn how to secure it before opening it up to the Internet.The summary, this has been running good for 3 weeks now. I wanted something that would not need constant OS updates or cost me more money for hardware/software upgrades for the next 10 years. I don't need a project to tinker with, I just need it to WORK as expected. Time will tell if I can get a decade out of this hardware before it fails.

This thing is absolutely awesome! I started with wanted to build a local Plex server, but that's turned into other home server projects (e.g. Immich for image backup) and running a Home Assistant server, it's worked so well for everything I throw at it. It's addicting to play with. The integrated Intel graphics seems to work well for Plex transcoding, from my experience (even from 4k files, etc). I swapped the OS to Unraid like another reviewer mentioned, I do recommend this, Unraid works very well and a quick Google search will give you clear directions how to do this (it was easy). I upgraded RAM & added NVME drives too (easy). The 10G ethernet is a nice touch, and works well with a USB-based UPS battery backup (I chose an APC UPS).My use case unfortunately didn't allow for a large custom server build (I was looking at Fractal cases to build from scratch), or server rack type cases - I just don't have the room. If you're space constrained like me, this form factor is perfect. Even if not, the small size + easy hard drive installation is appealing over custom builds.THANK YOU TERRAMASTER for making this, I think you're filling a void Synology seems to be leaving behind (moving from Intel to AMD processors)

This thing is awesome at a great price. Does everything I needed it to do. Especially Plex.My only gripe is that it's just trying to be Synology which means they arent doing anything to innovate. They're just riding coat tails. But considering the current state of Synology, imitating is good enough for me to jump ship.

Did WAY more homework than i should when choosing the F4-424. Got it in and set it up. Took a full 20 hours for the 8tbx2 Hdd's to sync. All is good! Moved and added 3tb of data.Now for Port bonding - Couldn't figure out how to enable port bonding as it said it could. Theres no manual included which is find cause evrything is online now right? Umm NOPE! had to contact support via chat to find the answer. After an hour, they had ZERO idea how to navigate there own product! A day later and hours of scrolling, found a forum post that explained it. OK that's done.M.2 for Cache - 500gb x 2 - Yea good luck with that! All these YT'ers videos show how easy it is to install, but yet not one shows that you have to go into the "TOS" program to set them up... Just try to search online how this is done... After more days of scrolling you'll find ONE POST from Terra Master that says "its not possible at this time for TOS 5.1.x" Only TOS 6.x supports this.. but there is no TOS 6!TOS 5.1? - The GUI is TOS 5.1.x but every single support doc says 6.x?? ok so there is a new update.. Umm, No, no there is not. All this talk about 6.x but yet no information on 6.xPower Off - Needed to power off for a moment. Turned it back on and NOT DETECTED. You can NOT power it off and keep Port Bonding... Have to unplug one port, find IP then connect, and THEN plug 2nd port back in..Adding HDD's - Its now time to add 2 more 8tbx2 for a vol 2 and set them up for use on the network. O.M.G... The short, still not happening.. will NOT provide an IP - The switch and or router showes ZERO proof its connected to anything. Go to search how to fix and find that all the "Help" is in Chinese websites with no "Translate to English" to be found. $1200 NAS and I'm using a translator app via my cell phone camera to search web pages...The BEEPS - Yes, theres an error somewhere, but with no manual (just a quick set up guide), no English support web sites just social media forums, (Most in Chinese) that take days to scroll through to find a post that is kinda close to your issue...There is no reason spending $500 plus $700 of HDD's and need to do this much foot work. Why I cant do a quick search for a FAQ, get support or connect a $1200 brick to a network...Do yourself a favor, just try search what issues a typical NAS might have, (like what do the beeps mean?) then attempt to search Terra Masters pages to find an answer.... You will quickly see why choosing another brand is a better option...Im so upset that im writing this, I really wanted to LOVE this brand. But just feel the amount of work that ive done for what should be a SIMPLE insert HDD's plug it in and go had been 7 days of finding answers to small problems that should be super easy to find.