Page 8 - Conclusion
Although the QNAP TS-251B is from the company's economy home/SOHO lineup, some important features have trickled down from the SMB TS-253B: The new chassis design and a PCI Express expansion card slot. The OLED screen has not, but I think that would be asking too much, haha. I was a big fan of the TS-253B's look, given its sleek appearance can sit under my TV all day without looking out of place. The attractive exterior gives up little to the way of practicality too; you will still get removable hot swap hard drive trays as part of the package. It was not until recently that ASUSTOR figured out how to do the same with the AS4002T. Furthermore, even though the TS-251B uses the same scratch and fingerprint happy plastic as the TS-253B, its white and silver color scheme allows them to be significantly less apparent. QNAP's QTS 4.3 continues to be a hit with the TS-251B, combined with the reasonably fast Intel Celeron J3355 system-on-a-chip, this NAS is a media hub and feature-filled network appliance that does way more than just storage. Its power consumption is still a few watts higher than I would have liked, and I wish there is an HDMI 2.0 and optical audio out port rather than just HDMI 1.4b. But for $340 for the 4GB RAM model at press time ($300 for the 2GB RAM model, both user upgradeable), I am not complaining. Compared to the $260 ASUSTOR AS4002T with 2GB of RAM, you get more processing power and HDMI output with the QNAP at the expense of a 10GbE network adapter. The AS3202T packs more processing power and lower power consumption than the TS-251B, but it has a non-expandable 2GB RAM design and no hot swap HDD bays. This makes it all a tough choice in a competitive market; all I have to say is the QNAP TS-251B is quite well-rounded in hardware and in features.
QNAP provided this product to APH Networks for the purpose of evaluation.
APH Review Focus Summary:
8/10 means Definitely a very good product with drawbacks that are not likely going to matter to the end user.
7/10 means Great product with many advantages and certain insignificant drawbacks; but should be considered before purchasing.
-- Final APH Numeric Rating is 7.5/10
Please note that the APH Numeric Rating system is based off our proprietary guidelines in the Review Focus, and should not be compared to other sites.
The QNAP TS-251B is a well-rounded network attached storage system for home and SOHO users alike.
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Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. A Closer Look - Hardware (External)
3. A Closer Look - Hardware (Internal)
4. Configuration and User Interface, Part I
5. Configuration and User Interface, Part II
6. Configuration and User Interface, Part III
7. Performance and Power Consumption
8. Conclusion
