A small, powerful storage server and streaming device

We tested the Synology DiskStation DS224+, a compact, power-efficient, quad-core NAS for storing, sharing, streaming, and protecting data.

The Synology DiskStation DS224+ is a small, quiet tabletop NAS with room for two drives (your choice of SSDs or HDDs), a quad-core Intel Celeron J4125 processor, and 2GB of permanently installed RAM. You can expand the memory to 6GB by installing a 4GB SO-DIMM memory stick in a free slot.

characteristics

The DS224+ has a quad-core Intel Celeron processor. This appears to be the biggest difference with the very similar dual-core DS220+ NAS that we tested previously.

Powerful processor results According to Synology In 62% more responses per second for web applications, 52% faster file indexing, and 28% faster image indexing.

The DS224+ has two USB 3.2 Gen 1 (=USB 3.0) ports. The pane on the front allows you to quickly copy data to the device from the camera or an external storage device. You can configure the physical push button “C” available for this purpose in Administration.

On the back there are two additional Gigabit Ethernet connections and a port for an external power supply.

If there is a problem, you can easily replace the large, silent rear fan yourself with a backup available from Synology.

Within thirty days of purchase, you can extend the standard two-year warranty to four years via a mandatory Synology account.

Assignment

There’s no LCD screen on this NAS server, but there are five status LEDs that contain information on the status of the power, both LAN ports and two disk slots.

The DS224+ installs easily in a local network using a web browser and Synology Web Assistant, with the Synology DS Finder mobile apps for iOS and Android or with Synology Assistant software for Windows, Mac OS

Processor-based booting begins with the installation of the DSM operating system and then the device is rebooted. Then create an administrator account and name the NAS. Then, you can optionally activate QuickConnect for simple and secure online access. The NAS is ready for use after about ten minutes.

Wizards help you set up volume and choose preferred applications and settings.

Synology DiskStation DS224+ NAS (© Synology; License: Synology)

Programming

Synology DSM 7, a NAS operating system, works with desktop computers, supports multitasking, and has a web interface that works seamlessly with mobile browsers on all screens, from smartphones to desktops.

There are several applications you can choose from in Synology Package Center to expand functionality.

Synology has many of its own multimedia applications that work well on all platforms and with wide functionality.

The advanced photo app Moments, similar to QNAP’s QuMagie, deserves a special mention: it automatically creates a certain order in a large, messy photo collection. Optionally, albums can be created independently for each person, subject or location photographed using style and facial recognition. This works surprisingly well and you can improve the result further by manually making the necessary corrections and additions.

For example, Synology Moments automatically arranges photos by location (© Jozef Schildermans; License: CC BY-SA)

performance

Depending on the application type, throughput (measured using Intel NASPT) ranges from 27MB/s for copying folders to the NAS to 709MB/s for video recording.

Files are copied to the NAS at 803MB/s. Streaming four HD videos at the same time is no problem for a NAS; Even under these conditions, the throughput speed does not drop below 116 MB/s.

The NAS itself has a very quiet noise level of 22 dB(A) and an average power consumption of 15 watts (without drives). In sleep mode, consumption drops to 4.41 watts.

This is excellent performance for a NAS unit of this size.

Conclusion
The Synology DiskStation DS224+ NAS is compact, quiet, performs slightly better than the dual-core model (DS220+) and offers many more options.

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Updated 12 years ago.