Synology DiskStation DS715 2-Bay Value NAS Review

Bohs Hansen / 9 years ago

Final Thoughts

Pricing

The Synology DS715 isn’t the cheapest on the block, but the price is justified by the features and performance that we’ve seen. You can find the DS715 at Amazon for $469.99 or £356.63 at the time of writing. If you’re located in germany you can find a good deal via Geizhals where it starts at €383.91.

Overview

Whether you’re a small to medium business or a prosumer that wants a great NAS, you won’t be disappointed in the Synology DiskStation DS715 2-bay NAS. The DS715 is a complete new line from Synology and it a worthy first unit.

The small form factor and tiny footprint that is allowed by this being a 2-bay unit gives you the ability to place it whereever you want, you won’t have any trouble finding a spot for it. The black design will make it fit well with other PC systems and monitors that mostly are black these days.

The two LAN ports allow for fail over and link aggregation and you can connect extra storage through the USB 3.0 and eSATA ports. With help of the DX513 expansion unit, sold separately, you can even expand the NAS up to a total of seven drive bays and easy 56TB raw storage.

With Synology’s DSM operating system we know that we’ll find every function we want, from business features over backup, to cloud systems and domain logins. If it isn’t a default function, then you’ll most likely find it in the app center. It isn’t without a reason that the DSM system won as many awards as it has.

We saw a great performance throughout all our benchmarks, and that includes the encrypted benchmark. While the encryption did have some impact on the performance, it wasn’t much. This isn’t a feature that you need to worry about turning on, the DS715’s quad-core CPU handles this with ease.

The only downside on this NAS will be limited to very few people, those who wish to upgrade the RAM. They’ll have to pick a different model. Otherwise, this is a great system.

Pros:

Quad-Core CPU with floating point and hardware encryption
Dual LAN
USB 3.0 and eSATA
Business ready including High-Availability Server
Great performance

Cons:

No front USB port
Can’t upgrade RAM
Price, for some

“The new Synology DS715 brings business features, a powerful CPU, and expandability to the market at an affordable price. A great unit for most situations.”