The box of tricks
Modern-day NAS solutions come armed with a profuse number of functions, making it near impossible to examine every conceivable usage scenario. We'll attempt to cover the pertinent points in this review, but users wanting a complete feature breakdown - right down to the number of languages supported by the N4200's web-based admin panel - can find a comprehensive specification at the official Thecus product page.
Out the box, the N4200 resembles most other four-bay NAS alternatives. Measuring around 170mm x 200mm x 245mm, and weighing in at around 7.6kg sans drives, it's almost identical in size to some of the rivals on the marketplace.
At first glance, it's one of the Thecus's best-looking units to date, thanks to its sleek lines and unique dual displays.
Whether there's any real need for dual displays is subject to end-user interpretation, however, and we reckon it's a case of style over substance.
The left-side display, housed vertically, is in place to show critical system information, including HDD, WAN, LAN and USB activity, whilst the top-most display is a lush 2.8in OLED panel, allowing users to interrogate and reconfigure the system with granular detail.
It's a smart-looking combination, but whilst the OLED display is easy on the eye, it provides limited functionality. It can be used to change basis system settings - such as IP addresses and alarm mute - and carry out basic functions such as copying data from USB drives, but little else. What's useful is that it comes password protected to prevent unwanted hands from making changes, but there's certainly room for improvement. We'd like to see further functionality made available via the OLED display - particularly the ability to create a RAID array during initial setup - and, if we're being really picky, the four associated buttons feel cheap and unintuitive.
The front door panel - made of a plastic that isn't indicative of the £540 asking price - reveals access to the four hot-swappable drive bays. The fact that each bay supports both 3.5in and 2.5in SATA II drives is a welcome addition - a 2.5in array will allow users to configure a quieter, lower-power server - but none of the bays are tool free, making the task of swapping drives slightly more laborious than it need be.
Once your drives are in, you're met with plenty of configuration options. The Thecus N4200 supports RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 10 and JBOD, as well as multiple RAID volumes, with the option of Ext3, XFS or ZFS filing systems. All the features you'd expect to see on a high-end NAS are also rolled in - including auto-rebuild, hot-swap, RAID migration and volume encryption, as well as iSCSI targets.
External connectivity options are plentiful, too. Dual USB ports are available to the front of the N4200, and a further four USB ports and two eSATA ports can be found to the rear - these can be used for easy storage expansion, or for the connectivity of external devices such as printers.
