Synology DiskStation DS116 1-Bay Value NAS Review

A closer look

Now that we have learned a lot about what features the DS116 has, it is time to take a closer look at the actual unit itself. Starting with the exterior, we get a simple but beautiful black NAS. The surface is soft coated which makes it pleasant to hold and there are LEDs on the front for all things except USB. Status, LAN, and Disk activity are located at the top while the power button has a built-in LED too for the actual power state.

The soft coating does trap dust and finger residue a bit different than a blank coating will, as seen here, but it is easily cleaned again. So that’s nothing to worry about for the clean freaks. Both sides have the Synology logo edged into the chassis which doubles as ventilation area. A clever combination of design and functionality.

The DS116 is a classic 2-piece enclosure as we’ve seen them before. The two parts are held together by two screws in the back and can be slid apart once they’re removed. Slide in the hard drive and screw it in and you’re ready to power up your brand new NAS.

Before we power it up, we’ll take a deeper look at it internally – while I already have it open. Moving a bit closer up to the drive mounts, we see that there aren’t any rubber grommets or protections on the bottom nor the sides. This was to be expected with this being a value model and it’s nothing that will create an issue in any way. With only one drive running in the NAS and NAS hard disk drives being vibration optimized, it isn’t really needed anyway.

The PCB isn’t large at all, in fact, it’s pretty small. Less hardware means fewer things that have to be powered and thereby a more economical NAS. A perfect fit for a device like the DS116

Turning the PCB over, we see the CPU cooled by a passive cooling block. This is plenty for a system like this and the case does have a little fan.

The 1GB RAM is onboard, so there aren’t any upgrade abilities here.

The SATA connector is soldered directly onto the motherboard, making the entire system a one-piece. Well, except for the power button that has its own little PCB due to the LED functions.

Everything is more or less handled by the CPU, but there’s also a Marvel Alaska 88E1514 Gigabit Ethernet controller located in this NAS. We can also spot some of the EMI pads protecting the setup and connecting everything to the chassis.

There are only solid capacitors used everywhere inside the NAS, which is something that’s a pleasure to see at any given time. They’ll last longer and thereby give you a better value for your money by granting the NAS a longer lifetime.

The small fan is from Y.S TECH FD126015LL which is a normal square 60x60x15mm fan powered by 12V and 0.12A.