Comments on: [REVIEW] ASUSTOR AS-604T 4-bay NAS

By: fawcett

fawcett — Sat, 26 Jan 2013 06:19:00 +0000

@niall, I also visit their forum too and I think the asustor ppl are quite active there and are willing to help. yeah there are some updates but it also shows they are eager to fix any of these, otherwise they can just publish the update on a regular basis and put all the fixes in one update, right? i have been using NAS for many years and I also have synology and qnap, and i personally think asustor’s customer support quality is probably the best among all these. as for bugs, my qnap cannot perform firmware upgrade since 1 year ago therefore i am still using the old software (3.6.1) and suffering a lot bugs, their engineer logged into my nas and couldn’t find the problem, then no reply from them at all since that. this is why I go for asustor.

By: currillbo

currillbo — Sat, 26 Jan 2013 04:15:00 +0000

I bought one AS-604T and upgrade to 3GB memory, the current firmware of 1.0.7. The speed is super fast on 85-110MB mark. And the software and user interface just correspond with the familiar iOS. Aidownload is really something. No hassle for download.. just type whatever you want in iPhone5 or in ADM. Then use iPhone as remote control to play directly to Denon Amp 7.1 channel (digital audio haha…) + Sony 55″ LED TV. Much easier than my assembled Asus i7 DIY HTPC. One thing that I like the most is that: I downloaded the Remote in iPhone and then pair with the iTune server in Asustor, then I can listen to all the thousands of music in my Denon Amp 7.1 channel all day long. No more the meager USB speaker…

By: Niall

Niall — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 09:07:00 +0000

At this moment Asustor has fixed some errors, you should take a look at there forums, but it seems we are beta testing this machine. And yes your review is good if you just look to hardware and download speed. But there is more that comes with this machine not to point but as reviewer you could test it since its a big part of this machine. Two firmware updates, a patch for PS3 streaming problem and still some problems. Just a friendly reply.

By: Ike

Ike — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 22:58:00 +0000

Well… “as a reviewer” i get my replies always within 12h, but then again I mail private contacts, not general support. So I can’t really vouch for customer feedback. I haven’t tested with more ram as the streaming to my PS3 (slim) was ok (not that I ever really use that feature, I just plug the HDMI in a notebook so I get proper subtitle support) However, I did like the AiDownload feature and the App-remote (which they updated cuz I mailed it froze quite often on my iPhone 4S) but now it’s fairly stable.

By: Niall

Niall — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 17:18:00 +0000

I have tested the Asustor 604, and yes it has good things but also bad things that i dont see in the review. Just add 2gb Adata ram and the machine becomes unstable high cpu bij process ECD. Boxee fine but with the 2gb ram 100% cpu hard reste data lost!. And so many other things with 2gb of extra ram. And if there is no ram it wont stream AVCHD true PS3 my old NV+ does. So looking to hardware good as long you dont add 2gb ram, looking to software most addon are just bad in doing a good job. And for the support you need time answers are on a long way.

Niall

By: Ike

Ike — Sat, 22 Dec 2012 22:01:00 +0000

choice depends mainly on usage. If its only you i’d recommend a 1 ethernet port model (on the back), if you want both multi user combined with a lot of streaming options to TV/Playstation/Audio system etc then I’d advise going for a 2 port model (and connect one to a wired network for your computers, connect the other to a wireless router for media to stream from). Theory is simple: ethernet ports are like speed lanes, each one can pump about 120MB per second, the more ports you have, the more traffic you can push through. (relative to the max speed of the hard disks and CPU inside the NAS of course )

By: tokjdm

tokjdm — Sat, 22 Dec 2012 01:30:00 +0000

Thanks for your detailed reply. I am considering setting up a NAS at home and this review has been helpful.
I am not sure the HDMI output is that interesting though: I would not put the NAS next to my TV and HDMI through ethernet does not seem to work.

By: Ike

Ike — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 19:02:00 +0000

Thanks for your comment! Well its difficult to compare them on any other
level than energy efficiency. The DS413 is more of a very efficient
home/SOHO unit, where the Asustor is taking their energy efficiency but
doesn’t settle there. In essence this unit has more hardware DNA from
QNAP, the Synology genes would solely reflect on how the ADM was
constructed. Personally for me this unit is taking the best of both
competitors and throws in the fancy feature of on-the-fly video
rendering over HDMI (Boxee). From a price perspective Asustor is “all
premium”, Synology’s in general is low price for a good
performance/reliable unit. That said, I like a bit of competition,
because lately for every QNAP you found an almost identical Synology or
Buffalo and reversed.

By: currill

currill — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 06:21:00 +0000

The build quality and the Apple like user easy interface looks really intriguing!

By: Ike LEUS

Ike LEUS — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 13:43:36 +0000

Thanks for your comment! Well its difficult to compare them on any other level than energy efficiency. The DS413 is more of a very efficient home/SOHO unit, where the Asustor is taking their energy efficiency but doesn’t settle there. In essence this unit has more hardware DNA from QNAP, the Synology genes would solely reflect on how the ADM was constructed. Personally for me this unit is taking the best of both competitors and throws in the fancy feature of on-the-fly video rendering over HDMI (Boxee). From a price perspective Asustor is “all premium”, Synology’s in general is low price for a good performance/reliable unit. That said, I like a bit of competition, because lately for every QNAP you found an almost identical Synology or Buffalo and reversed.