Appreciate these follow-up reviews. Sick and tired of reviewers who don't spend any time with the product and just want to rush a video out to get the ad revenue quickly.
Indeed. I'm constantly annoyed when a "review" is nothing more than holding the unit up to the camera and reading off what the website says about it. Robby does a good job diving into products.
So basically it's FANTASTIC value for money as a NAS, but owners want... more. Well, they should have paid somebody else for "more". I seriously considered this NAS, but I do want to run VMs and containers on the same box, so I'm going to build my own - but I really appreciated Unifi offered a clean, simple and very affordable solution to network storage.
I am planning on just adding a seperate kubernetes cluster next to the nas for container workload. Better suited anyway, and you're not filling the cpu with 'other' workload
I’d buy one if they had them in stock. Guess people disliked them so much they bought them all. 😂 And I have a QNap and a Home Built TruNAS server. The UniFi NAS would have been exactly what I needed from the very beginning.
WOOOOOOOOOAH. You humble me and genuinely made my Sunday night, with you donation buddy. I'm not gonna say this channel is a money spinner...it's about data storage and networking, it's hardly sex, drugs and rock n roll - but me and Ed here love what it has become and donations like yours really help validate that. Thank you so much and I hope you have a fantastic week
I've had mine for about 1 month. We are a small 5 user company and had been using a Lenovo P320 PC with a couple of big hard drives for file sharing. I have been looking at NAS systems for a couple of years. As I have a complete Ubiquiti network solution at work and home I was happy that the UNAS would suits my needs. And it does exactly. I have 3 identical drives in a raid 5 format which is great and it does file sharing exactly as I need for our business. A perfect solution at a great price. I don't need it to do anything more. Brilliant device and I'm very pleased with it. I already have an NVR for running our cameras, so don't need this to run protect. And happy for these two systems to be completely separate.
@@aR_HellSoldier I do have offsite backup, which is something I have always done for the last 20 years. Never once though ever had a failure that I needed the backup for recovery. So I don't understand your comment "genuinely hope you have an offsite backup". Are you suggesting there is an inherent problem with the UNAS Pro?
I've been on the fence about the UNAS Pro and a larger picture with a Dream Machine SE and some cameras. My finger has been hovering over the buy button for days now, but this morning, the UNAS Pro was actually back in stock. I bought the lot. I think it is the right move, we shall see. Good timing for you to post this video :) Now I just need to pick out some drives.
Same here! I was checking daily, and yesterday it came back in stock, so I purchased it. However, when I checked again later, it was already out of stock.
Thanks for being bloody brilliant Pat. Really appreciate support. You could have just watched and trusted the ads keep things going, but you took the extra step and supported us. Thanks for being a top man!
I love mine. Right now I mainly use it as a backup to my Synology DS920. I don't need a device to run dozens of 3rd party apps like the Synology. My only complaint about it is that it is lacking in the area of backups. I wish there was a built in solution to do a NAS to NAS backup from Synology or even PCs.
@@W9HJBill there is a work-around. First I created a new share using control panel -> shared folder -> create Next I created a new hyperbackup task with the backup destination in the new shared folder. This creates a backup folder in the new share. At the end of creating the hyperbackup task, select to NOT start the backup now. Next I go the new share in the file station and rename the newly created .hbk folder to some temporary name. Now using file station -> tools -> mount remote folder, I mount the CIFS/Samba drive in the new share with the original name of hte .hbk folder we just renamed, and move all the contents of the temorary folder to the new mount. Now hyperbackup does not notice any change as the destination of the backup task still exists and all the files are there, but they are now on the remote drive. You can now start the backup.
At least soon (it’s in early access) you can automatically backup Protect footage to the UNAS, sorta like Archive Vault on Synology. But would be amazing if could also run Protect, maybe that will come in a UNAS Pro Max Enterprise Etherlight version
This is a great video! Nuanced, informative and exactly the right time, tech depth for me. Great that you gathered the Reddit replies and added them to your view on the product. Your calm an pleasant way of presenting is the icing on this review cake. This is how a review should be! Maybe I'm too praising but I'm sure you can ask someone in the pub to make some funny cynical negative puns. As a NAS I almost went to buy it. Most features dont bother me for a basic local 2 user "network storage" its only the unreliability in copying files that is unacceptable as a main storage.
I feel like some of these issues are unreasonable expectations. Ubiquiti is not positioning this product for server/general computing. Unifi devices are designer for simplicity and not being overly complicated. Some of these complaints just don't really apply to this kind of device. This isn't a general purpose server with spare compute for ancillary tasks (containers etc...).
My initial thought on why Ubiquiti doesn’t let you run Protect on the UNAS-Pro is because then the argument would be: why can’t I use my NVR-Pro or NVR as a NAS? Then Ubiquiti would have to support all sorts of situations. It might happen one day, but I think those of us that bought the UNAS-Pro are beta testing it before they’re ready to open it up to the NVR crowd. Oh, that and they want to sell more devices is also another obvious reason.
I really don’t get the desire for containers. Intel mini PCs are such an insanely good value for running apps, and the NAS being dedicated to storage only feels like a better separation of concerns.
Appreciate your video, you alway help in with my final choice lol. Because I fully understand what the Unas is and is not I am okay with its short-coming so to speak. I dont own one yet (since its always sold out) but I am looking forward to getting one. I have the Qnap Nasbook with 5 8TB m.2 drive and the Unas would serve as mostly cold storage in my case and workflow.
I wish I had purchased on the opening day, but I didn't and missed out. Mine has only been here a week and I'm very happy as it does exactly what I need - storage. I'm using raid 5 and copied data from three smaller desktop NAS drives with zero errors and 100% confidence my data is solid after spot checks. The device is built solidly and because it used existing and proven hardware I don't have concerns on the physical box. The software is and was my main concern but it looks like Unifi is sorting that out. Could there be additional features, absolutely! But I feel this is an excellent solution for the price and would buy it again. I do agree with you on some of the should be there as a default items you listed in the video and feel they are totally realistic for a NAS at this level. I know some people want more, but as a guy who works with this stuff all day for a living, I don't expect a server, apps or whatnot in a rackmount case at this price point. ...and the football / soccer screen display bits were funny. I'm not a sports guy but we could probably have a long dueling rant on that topic.
A NAS that cannot guarantee that files copied over from another computer are all included and without errors is just a waste of money, even though it only costs 499 USD.
Had a bit of an issue with mine. Got it all set up and copied all my files across. Then the NAS started saying in the dashboard there was no drives installed. Network shares still worked fine etc. restarted it to try get the drives to show up... Made it worse now it genuinely thinks there are no drives installed. Have contacted Ubiquiti support and they are looking into the logs but not great so far
Back to you get what you pay for. Mixed media storage pools, tiering ISCSI support and beefier hardware for virtualization and apps would inevitably drive COST and complexity. Not really a complaint to make on this product. It’s like complaining over missing crystal champagne fluits in your Honda Civic. You should not expect these features on a system at this price point. Storage pools really doesn’t make much sense in an SMB setup for storage without ISCSI. Sure, more backup destinations like iDrive and OneDrive would be great and might be coming, but the logical separation of access to shared folders is enough for SMBs to separate documents from users in my opinion. Totally agree on the user folder backups though.
Q./ Can you install TrueNAS or UnRAID on this? Do the lack of RAM expandability make this impractical? Is the BIOS locked or the process of installation is difficult? Thanks for the video, very deep and clear. Love your awesome reviews!
Its their NVR repurposed for a NAS. Version 2 could be a big jump with memory and an nvme slot for cache. The cpu is scraping the barrel for cost so a containers are a no go. Saturating the 10gbps connection as it is won’t happen. I would get one although I have a Synology and use it for the Synology type features. Unifi doesn’t do roadmaps so there’s no reason to wait around for some feature.
a system with no capacity for nvme to do caching or a faster tier, along with missing iSCSI makes this a fart in the wind. I'll wait for the Pro max or ProHD version or the v2 refresh.
that is how I've made my diy nas , 4 x 4 tb SSDs in a raid 5 and a 12 tb hard drive mirror , but saying that with synology you do the same with a SSD and HD mix and write to SSDs the HD will wake up too .
The only thing that I would like to see is the ability to modify a backup set after configuring it, from what I’ve been able to find there is no way to modify the backup set
I would like to see it add Active Backup for Google. Also a 1U version would be nice at the $300 price point similar to the 1U NVR at the $300 price point.
I noticed drives run hotter in these even in idle versus synology etc, I saw 52C at idle versus 30C for synology in the same room, would love to hear you experience
I didn't spot any major difference, but that was when I was comparing to a Synology RS820 ⁸ bay rack. Are you comparing to a rack or DS? Cheers for sharing
Raid 6 is not actually available yet. You can get to the option if connected directly, not through the normal unifi consoles access, but it doesn't work. UI-Team said it scheduled to be released (*Currently*) on Unifi OS 4.2
Can you make more than one storage pool yet, that's a big negative imo even at this point. I do like it though and as this could be implemented as a SW update. I dont care about containerisation on nas i dont think they are the bestvproduct for the job i use a mini pc running xcp-ng and a VM with docker/docker swarm for this .
I like TrueNAS better than Unraid for DIY and it is free 🙂. QNAP is the power efficient Turn-key solution IMO - and my 24/7 NAS. Power is VERY expensive where I live 😞
My QNAP TS-432XU-RP from 2020 just died 😢 and I'm looking for a replacement. I already have a complete Unifi stack. I'm just looking at simply a backup setup to my home desktops. Does this device come with anything like QSYC, if not what might you suggest for supporting backup from Windows PC'S to this device?
Go Synology. Unifi is garbage outside networking. I have eight Synology servers running for the last 8 or so years, and I have no reason to replace them or upgrade them because they're working so well. Once in a while I swap a drive
I use Synology Backup for Business from desktop to local server. Local server backs up to Backup server every night. Tailscale network supports using Hyper Backup to two off-site DS423+. I ended up splitting the off-site backups into three smaller jobs. It runs faster a seems more stable. It was a fair initial outlay but a lot less expensive than cloud storage.
I've been following the stock stuff over on FB and I'm kinda blown away by the stock issues.. reached out to them about it. Might make a follow up on this very subject if it's seems justifiable and/or explained well enough
@ Yeah it’s tough down here 😅, there is a single online retailer which imports them, then sells at an increased price $1375 AUD, which is about $870 USD. I’ve got about 15 other sites that I check in on (selling for ~$630 USD), none of which have ETAs yet.
I can live with the lack of Protection - they haver the dedicated NVR for that - why cannibalise your own sales but the lack of iSCSI was a deal breaker for me.
I just purchased the UNAS and will be deploying it sometime in the next few weeks. Your follow up will certainly keep my expectation grounded in reality. All my appliances run outside the NAS, so some of your concerns won't be relevant, but the large file migration issues you've touched on have certainly given me pause. Many thanks for your exceptional work!
Appreciate the follow up! Been considering one, mainly because of 10GBE and the low price. Just pure storage is fine, can always use other boxes for containers and stuff. But that user having problems with transmission error is truly horrifying. A dedicated storage box that might corrupt files (and also missing several files). No thanks. Just no.
for a pure NAS i agree iSCSI is essential, i don't think containers are essential on something designed as a pure NAS, and same for the backup options. I am sure this is disappointing to many, i would argue wait until they release a more powerful unit or buy something else - they designed this (rightly or wrongly) as dedicated network attached storage (NAS) not a general purpose server branded as a NAS.
With Protect still not having automatic backups to the UNAS (I shouldn't ever have to manually select footage to backup, ever), there is no value for me with this product over a synology. Sure the price is nice, but basic nas functions are still broken called out in this video and this product is not ready for prime time. I'm not even concerned about docker containers, I like a NAS to just be a NAS, but basic NAS software is 1/2 baked on this unit.
i had contact with ubiquity about a problem with .exe files. its still has no support for opening .exe files on my pc. so when i have .exe files in my smb folder, i cant open them on my pc becuase of admin rights. they dont know if this is a feature that will be added later in a update. they know the problem. lets hope they add it later.
The price is pretty good, but for me anything less reliable than raid6 or raid-z2 is unacceptable. The performance is also lacking. I would easily pay 3 or 4 times the price for an 8 or 8+ bay nas with such features if ubiquiti ever release one. Oh, haven't watched to the end, turns out raid 6 has been implemented, that is a step in the right direction for sure!
Without proper raid6, it's a hard nope. The system could easily run the more sophisticated raid levels because it's Linux just like any other nas. I can ignore cache nvram, or expanded system ram for fs virtual buffer caches, and many other features... But raid6 is a huge selling point.
@@nascomparesthe term soccer predated the term football though, in Britain where the sport originated, that's what they called it. And then everyone else got lazy and started saying oh look there's a foot and a ball duh. I digress though, I'm about to go outside and play Puck stick on the ice
Ideas for future models... A 2.5" version with at least 16 drive bays for an SSD based NAS. Also a hybrid version with both 2.5" and 3.5" bays... A NVME version too??
Soooo... "football" was originally (still is) called "Association Football" and it was from the association portion where "soccer" was derived. Ironically, in England. Where it was called soccer first.
The UNAS Pro is not exactly out of stock, look at the UNAS Pro as it's always in stock. It seems that Ubiquiti is putting the NAS on the back burner until either they figure out and fix all its issues or decide to discontinue it altogether. I think the latter is where they will end up, unfortunately. 90-95% of the issues are in fact software-related and their dev team is not versed as well in NAS software as it is in other dev software Ubiquiti uses. With that being said, I see no reason why the NAS software couldn't be used on the 4-bay NAS or even on other equipment as it is at the heart *nix based.
Looking forward to your review at the end of 2025. I think you will find that a lot of the things you have mentioned will be addressed by then. I personally do not think that Containers will ever come to the UNAS Pro because of the debacle that occurred with the UDM Pro and Ubiquiti's move from Containers to Bare Metal for the OS. This was due largely because of all of the Support Calls they received from users trying to add containers to the UDM Pro and "screwing things up". But I could certainly see things like Active Backup for Business, iSCSI support, multiple pools, and such coming later this year. Right now I am sure they are focused on getting what they have to be very stable and get the current issues (like large file transfers) addressed. Once that is done, then I can see them adding more functionally. Just look at how much the Network application has improved, as well as new features added, now that the UDM Pro and the UDM SE are now both using Bare Metal (a consistent OS, instead of having to maintain two completely different OS systems). I would also point out the expanded lines of hardware in the "Campus"/Enterprise arena where they are making a serious push into the "true" Enterprise space. To be able to compete there, they will need a NAS that can meet business solutions, not necessarily Home Lab users. Therefore, they will make decisions on software updates that will benefit businesses, both large and small.
Hmm. So a LOT of the complaints you seem to have gathered are feature requests that were clearly defined as not included when purchased. So i would not quantify them as valid complaints. I mean, look at the product page, clearly see what feature sets are included or not and purchase based on that, it is disingenuous to buy a product that does not list, for example, the inclusion of a USB port, and then complain that it is not available.
The price on that thing is tempted to get for a backup NAS, but my eye is on an HL15. I'm guessing in a year or so they'll come out with a UNAS Pro Max anyway 🤣
Not having docker containers is a deal breaker for me. I would have bought this device yesterday if unifi had docker support. It would be great to have Plex, emby or jellyfin. A photo app for your own photo library would be nice
I am reviewing this solution as a possible replacement for a Synology NAS with the addition of a NUC or something similar from where I can run some docker containers. But looking at the multitude of problems which people are reporting and basic NAS functionality missing, to me this product just seems to be a skunkworks project, something that was put togheter very fast with some bit of hardware and software that they had at hand, this is not by any means a mature product or one which underwent a serious development process. Ubiquiti is probably dipping its toes in the NAS water to see how it goes, learn from the experience and decide if this could be a new line of business for them or if geting in the NAS world would be too much of a hassle which is not really worth it. UBT is making some great networking stuff but I would probably not want to by and early addopter aka. guinea pig even though the NAS has a really tempting price.
This is almost perfect. No fancy app crap is exactly what I need. However ISCSI and backup is a must and caching and/or tiering via NVME drives. Maybe a UNAS pro max later this year ?
I think the issue is, Software RAID, isn't enough in 2025 to exist as a product when similar functionality is coming at the same price points, with 10Gbe and 6 drives (some with M.2 hardware), running on Ryzen R1600 or Celeron N95/N100 CPUs, and some potentially with intel/AMD Copilot NPUs. There's also the secondhand NAS market, but 2U racks are a whole other principle. Universal power+PSU, 10Gbe NIC, but no SSD/2.5" or M.2 cache, or even a M.2 Coral AI Accelerator to add in for Unifi Protect to use, eh. Not being able to run a reliable folder sync on NFS/SMB is kind of trashy. I sort of understand why, it's a prelude to a better product that requires testing. But, it's an expensive beta-test to participate in, at your own expense. Much like the EV charger or the audio amp, or the door security, or the phones, etc. There are lots of potential Unifi products that need a home. But, you really want to think it through as a first design product, that it has to do what it's labelled for. They made 2009 Thecus NAS units back in the day with better software/hardware, and those would need to be rebooted after 2 weeks at times because the SMB would crash due to 2GB RAM. I get why 'personal' drives can't (encryption, likely) but that's dysfunctional as noted. Non-Tech people won't know why their data is gone, or how to manage their own snapshots unless they use Time Machine (sic), and only if it's configured and regularly kicks in. They can run container/VMs to process tasks and run updates, sync states to get identical setups, etc. Including NVR Camera software, rsync, and various prosumer tasks. I don't expect it to be a Synology clone, but it's a strange product as is.
Was very interested and intended to buy, until my Dream Machine SE completely died out of the blue. It did everything I expected for a little over a year and then paperweighted itself. Non recoverable, no parts to be had, no repair service and tech support sent basically a one-liner that said "Hardware failure". I couldn't read the logs, only they could, so I have no idea where to look. What I did see during my research is that there are a bunch of these failures, but you can't find anything out on the ubiquiti site as to whether they are aware of the problem or changed something to fix it, etc. Not going to get into that eco because of it. The stuff ain't cheap. They call it enterprise quality, and so I guess if it dies they think of me as an enterprise and I'll just get another one because I have enterprise money. Also, I don't look at it as a fluke either because a ton have died in the exact same way, even down to the same message on the screen. No, doubt somebody will jump in and say this isn't what I should be posting about on this video because it's not about the UNAS. That's my point. I never got that far, even though I intended too.
NFS speeds are horribly slow, unusable. less than a gigabit in linux. Windows 11 also only gets 1 gigabit speeds. Linux over SMB and Windows 10 gets 5/6 gigabit transfers with spinning drives.
i have a case with Unifi for that #4495891. No progress thou since 14 of January. NFS speed and latency are terrible (lab with both ESXi and xcp-ng). Was hoping to replace my Syn 920+ with this but now im sceptical.
The performance sucks in many ways. When I copy thousands of small files over to Unas it's ridiculously slow. I have screen shots showing that to copy over 100GB of small files can take days....!!!! Yes, I have proof. And my rack is all 10gbe connected. But I assume they will get it to be much better eventually as they are new to the whole NAS game.
Their products are never in stock. Why would I buy anything from them when they’re never in stock? This is a serious question. Looks like a Casio F-91W on your wrist. That’s all the watch that most people need. I say this while owning enough watches that I could wear a different one every day for a year and never repeat.
If you’re reading this right now, 12:49pm eastern time 1/24/25 they are actually in stock in the Unifi store! But to your point, it’s a total roll of the dice as to what’s available at what hour of the day.
Not really surprised by the lack of iSCSI. Do you also want Multi-Pathing iSCSI ? There is not enough performance in this appliance. To me it's a non issue. You get what you buy with the CPU/RAM and single 10G interface.
Hmm. So a LOT of the complaints you seem to have gathered are feature requests that were clearly defined as not included when purchased. So i would not quantify them as valid complaints. I mean, look at the product page, clearly see what feature sets are included or not and purchase based on that, it is disingenuous to buy a product that does not list, for example, the inclusion of a USB port, and then complain that it is not available.
Appreciate these follow-up reviews. Sick and tired of reviewers who don't spend any time with the product and just want to rush a video out to get the ad revenue quickly.
Thank you, genuinely, for the kind words man. Have an awesome weekend
Indeed. I'm constantly annoyed when a "review" is nothing more than holding the unit up to the camera and reading off what the website says about it. Robby does a good job diving into products.
So basically it's FANTASTIC value for money as a NAS, but owners want... more. Well, they should have paid somebody else for "more".
I seriously considered this NAS, but I do want to run VMs and containers on the same box, so I'm going to build my own - but I really appreciated Unifi offered a clean, simple and very affordable solution to network storage.
You sir, are bang on the banana. Exactly that, yes
I am planning on just adding a seperate kubernetes cluster next to the nas for container workload. Better suited anyway, and you're not filling the cpu with 'other' workload
I’d buy one if they had them in stock. Guess people disliked them so much they bought them all. 😂 And I have a QNap and a Home Built TruNAS server. The UniFi NAS would have been exactly what I needed from the very beginning.
@ stock is pretty okay in the EU store tbh
Can't afford a sub, but your work certainly deserves it. Thank you!
WOOOOOOOOOAH. You humble me and genuinely made my Sunday night, with you donation buddy. I'm not gonna say this channel is a money spinner...it's about data storage and networking, it's hardly sex, drugs and rock n roll - but me and Ed here love what it has become and donations like yours really help validate that. Thank you so much and I hope you have a fantastic week
I've had mine for about 1 month. We are a small 5 user company and had been using a Lenovo P320 PC with a couple of big hard drives for file sharing. I have been looking at NAS systems for a couple of years. As I have a complete Ubiquiti network solution at work and home I was happy that the UNAS would suits my needs. And it does exactly. I have 3 identical drives in a raid 5 format which is great and it does file sharing exactly as I need for our business. A perfect solution at a great price. I don't need it to do anything more. Brilliant device and I'm very pleased with it. I already have an NVR for running our cameras, so don't need this to run protect. And happy for these two systems to be completely separate.
When you say big drives, do you mean over 1TB? In Raid 5?
I genuinely hope you have an offsite backup.
@@aR_HellSoldier I do have offsite backup, which is something I have always done for the last 20 years. Never once though ever had a failure that I needed the backup for recovery. So I don't understand your comment "genuinely hope you have an offsite backup". Are you suggesting there is an inherent problem with the UNAS Pro?
I've been on the fence about the UNAS Pro and a larger picture with a Dream Machine SE and some cameras. My finger has been hovering over the buy button for days now, but this morning, the UNAS Pro was actually back in stock. I bought the lot. I think it is the right move, we shall see. Good timing for you to post this video :) Now I just need to pick out some drives.
Same here! I was checking daily, and yesterday it came back in stock, so I purchased it. However, when I checked again later, it was already out of stock.
Exactly in your shoes, impressed so far from the hardware quality 😊
I don't have the unas but I'm extremely happy with my dream machine se setup including unifi protect.
Thanks!
Thanks for being bloody brilliant Pat. Really appreciate support. You could have just watched and trusted the ads keep things going, but you took the extra step and supported us. Thanks for being a top man!
The best investigative review or detailed follow-up you have made. I've re-subscribed... not that I remember unsubscribing.
I love mine. Right now I mainly use it as a backup to my Synology DS920. I don't need a device to run dozens of 3rd party apps like the Synology. My only complaint about it is that it is lacking in the area of backups. I wish there was a built in solution to do a NAS to NAS backup from Synology or even PCs.
you can backup from NAS to NAS, it is what I do with a QNAP.
How do you backup from Synology til UNAS?
@ That's what I've been trying to figure out. There is a back handed way from UNAS to Synology but the other way around doesn't seem to work.
@@W9HJBill there is a work-around.
First I created a new share using control panel -> shared folder -> create
Next I created a new hyperbackup task with the backup destination in the new shared folder. This creates a backup folder in the new share. At the end of creating the hyperbackup task, select to NOT start the backup now.
Next I go the new share in the file station and rename the newly created .hbk folder to some temporary name.
Now using file station -> tools -> mount remote folder, I mount the CIFS/Samba drive in the new share with the original name of hte .hbk folder we just renamed, and move all the contents of the temorary folder to the new mount.
Now hyperbackup does not notice any change as the destination of the backup task still exists and all the files are there, but they are now on the remote drive. You can now start the backup.
Some of these issues are important to note and not something easily found in an initial review. Thanks for the recap!
At least soon (it’s in early access) you can automatically backup Protect footage to the UNAS, sorta like Archive Vault on Synology. But would be amazing if could also run Protect, maybe that will come in a UNAS Pro Max Enterprise Etherlight version
This is a great video! Nuanced, informative and exactly the right time, tech depth for me. Great that you gathered the Reddit replies and added them to your view on the product. Your calm an pleasant way of presenting is the icing on this review cake. This is how a review should be!
Maybe I'm too praising but I'm sure you can ask someone in the pub to make some funny cynical negative puns.
As a NAS I almost went to buy it. Most features dont bother me for a basic local 2 user "network storage" its only the unreliability in copying files that is unacceptable as a main storage.
I feel like some of these issues are unreasonable expectations. Ubiquiti is not positioning this product for server/general computing. Unifi devices are designer for simplicity and not being overly complicated. Some of these complaints just don't really apply to this kind of device. This isn't a general purpose server with spare compute for ancillary tasks (containers etc...).
I’m still waiting and hoping they make a 4bay version like the UNVR at that same $299 price
That is 100% inevitable
As long as it keeps 10Gb SFP+, and adds USB for backup, I'd be all over that.
4 bay. 1U with 10G SFP. Would rock.
5:04 I will call it soccer if I want to, and you can't stop me. LOL
Look.... don't make me come over there!
Lol
Still unable to get hold of the unifi nas in my region
My initial thought on why Ubiquiti doesn’t let you run Protect on the UNAS-Pro is because then the argument would be: why can’t I use my NVR-Pro or NVR as a NAS? Then Ubiquiti would have to support all sorts of situations. It might happen one day, but I think those of us that bought the UNAS-Pro are beta testing it before they’re ready to open it up to the NVR crowd. Oh, that and they want to sell more devices is also another obvious reason.
Agree, if you want Protect but the NVR. If you want file storage buy the NAS. They're the same price & form factor.
I really don’t get the desire for containers. Intel mini PCs are such an insanely good value for running apps, and the NAS being dedicated to storage only feels like a better separation of concerns.
Agreed! I prefer my containers on a low-cost low-TDP mini PC backed up to separate dedicated NAS.
@@weholmes5315 ditto
thanks for the update! i'll wait for next year's soccer playoffs and decide
Appreciate your video, you alway help in with my final choice lol. Because I fully understand what the Unas is and is not I am okay with its short-coming so to speak. I dont own one yet (since its always sold out) but I am looking forward to getting one. I have the Qnap Nasbook with 5 8TB m.2 drive and the Unas would serve as mostly cold storage in my case and workflow.
I wish I had purchased on the opening day, but I didn't and missed out. Mine has only been here a week and I'm very happy as it does exactly what I need - storage. I'm using raid 5 and copied data from three smaller desktop NAS drives with zero errors and 100% confidence my data is solid after spot checks. The device is built solidly and because it used existing and proven hardware I don't have concerns on the physical box. The software is and was my main concern but it looks like Unifi is sorting that out.
Could there be additional features, absolutely! But I feel this is an excellent solution for the price and would buy it again. I do agree with you on some of the should be there as a default items you listed in the video and feel they are totally realistic for a NAS at this level. I know some people want more, but as a guy who works with this stuff all day for a living, I don't expect a server, apps or whatnot in a rackmount case at this price point.
...and the football / soccer screen display bits were funny. I'm not a sports guy but we could probably have a long dueling rant on that topic.
A NAS that cannot guarantee that files copied over from another computer are all included and without errors is just a waste of money, even though it only costs 499 USD.
Does it have any resiliency to recover from ransomware?
Had a bit of an issue with mine. Got it all set up and copied all my files across. Then the NAS started saying in the dashboard there was no drives installed. Network shares still worked fine etc. restarted it to try get the drives to show up... Made it worse now it genuinely thinks there are no drives installed. Have contacted Ubiquiti support and they are looking into the logs but not great so far
Back to you get what you pay for. Mixed media storage pools, tiering ISCSI support and beefier hardware for virtualization and apps would inevitably drive COST and complexity. Not really a complaint to make on this product. It’s like complaining over missing crystal champagne fluits in your Honda Civic. You should not expect these features on a system at this price point. Storage pools really doesn’t make much sense in an SMB setup for storage without ISCSI. Sure, more backup destinations like iDrive and OneDrive would be great and might be coming, but the logical separation of access to shared folders is enough for SMBs to separate documents from users in my opinion.
Totally agree on the user folder backups though.
Are there any rumours about updates/future products that support docker/virtual machines?
I don’t understand the LUN criticism. If you want to create LUNS, get a SAN. This is marketed as a NAS, so I would only expect NFS and SMB sharing.
Q./ Can you install TrueNAS or UnRAID on this? Do the lack of RAM expandability make this impractical? Is the BIOS locked or the process of installation is difficult? Thanks for the video, very deep and clear. Love your awesome reviews!
Its their NVR repurposed for a NAS. Version 2 could be a big jump with memory and an nvme slot for cache. The cpu is scraping the barrel for cost so a containers are a no go. Saturating the 10gbps connection as it is won’t happen.
I would get one although I have a Synology and use it for the Synology type features. Unifi doesn’t do roadmaps so there’s no reason to wait around for some feature.
Thanks. The only reason I am passing this up is because no m.2 caching.
Software in Unifi is never finished. They do deserve credit for constantly iterating, but I understand why some do not prefer that.
a system with no capacity for nvme to do caching or a faster tier, along with missing iSCSI makes this a fart in the wind. I'll wait for the Pro max or ProHD version or the v2 refresh.
that is how I've made my diy nas , 4 x 4 tb SSDs in a raid 5 and a 12 tb hard drive mirror , but saying that with synology you do the same with a SSD and HD mix and write to SSDs the HD will wake up too .
I’d like updates on unifi NAS as they come please.
The only thing that I would like to see is the ability to modify a backup set after configuring it, from what I’ve been able to find there is no way to modify the backup set
I would like to see it add Active Backup for Google. Also a 1U version would be nice at the $300 price point similar to the 1U NVR at the $300 price point.
I noticed drives run hotter in these even in idle versus synology etc, I saw 52C at idle versus 30C for synology in the same room, would love to hear you experience
I didn't spot any major difference, but that was when I was comparing to a Synology RS820 ⁸ bay rack. Are you comparing to a rack or DS? Cheers for sharing
@ comparing to ds2419, idle temps very high even in online reviews, fan speed was auto and system idle, even the system temp was over 64C
Mine idle around 32’c
@@yintheyang18 yeah that’s good, maybe there is an idle fan speed issue
Raid 6 is not actually available yet. You can get to the option if connected directly, not through the normal unifi consoles access, but it doesn't work. UI-Team said it scheduled to be released (*Currently*) on Unifi OS 4.2
Can you make more than one storage pool yet, that's a big negative imo even at this point. I do like it though and as this could be implemented as a SW update. I dont care about containerisation on nas i dont think they are the bestvproduct for the job i use a mini pc running xcp-ng and a VM with docker/docker swarm for this .
I will never go for any NAS without ZFS in the future -> this means TrueNAS and/or QNAP QuTS Hero for me, as it is at the moment.🙂
unraid ?
I like TrueNAS better than Unraid for DIY and it is free 🙂. QNAP is the power efficient Turn-key solution IMO - and my 24/7 NAS. Power is VERY expensive where I live 😞
My QNAP TS-432XU-RP from 2020 just died 😢 and I'm looking for a replacement. I already have a complete Unifi stack. I'm just looking at simply a backup setup to my home desktops. Does this device come with anything like QSYC, if not what might you suggest for supporting backup from Windows PC'S to this device?
Go Synology. Unifi is garbage outside networking. I have eight Synology servers running for the last 8 or so years, and I have no reason to replace them or upgrade them because they're working so well. Once in a while I swap a drive
I use Synology Backup for Business from desktop to local server. Local server backs up to Backup server every night. Tailscale network supports using Hyper Backup to two off-site DS423+. I ended up splitting the off-site backups into three smaller jobs. It runs faster a seems more stable.
It was a fair initial outlay but a lot less expensive than cloud storage.
It is really depressing seeing a '3 month update', I still haven't been able to buy one in Australia yet :(
I've been following the stock stuff over on FB and I'm kinda blown away by the stock issues.. reached out to them about it. Might make a follow up on this very subject if it's seems justifiable and/or explained well enough
@ Yeah it’s tough down here 😅, there is a single online retailer which imports them, then sells at an increased price $1375 AUD, which is about $870 USD. I’ve got about 15 other sites that I check in on (selling for ~$630 USD), none of which have ETAs yet.
I can live with the lack of Protection - they haver the dedicated NVR for that - why cannibalise your own sales but the lack of iSCSI was a deal breaker for me.
I just purchased the UNAS and will be deploying it sometime in the next few weeks. Your follow up will certainly keep my expectation grounded in reality. All my appliances run outside the NAS, so some of your concerns won't be relevant, but the large file migration issues you've touched on have certainly given me pause. Many thanks for your exceptional work!
Appreciate the follow up!
Been considering one, mainly because of 10GBE and the low price.
Just pure storage is fine, can always use other boxes for containers and stuff.
But that user having problems with transmission error is truly horrifying. A dedicated storage box that might corrupt files (and also missing several files). No thanks. Just no.
In case you didn't get the email reminder (and requested done) the UNAS is available for purchase as of this a.m.
Cheers for sharing bud!
for a pure NAS i agree iSCSI is essential, i don't think containers are essential on something designed as a pure NAS, and same for the backup options. I am sure this is disappointing to many, i would argue wait until they release a more powerful unit or buy something else - they designed this (rightly or wrongly) as dedicated network attached storage (NAS) not a general purpose server branded as a NAS.
With Protect still not having automatic backups to the UNAS (I shouldn't ever have to manually select footage to backup, ever), there is no value for me with this product over a synology. Sure the price is nice, but basic nas functions are still broken called out in this video and this product is not ready for prime time. I'm not even concerned about docker containers, I like a NAS to just be a NAS, but basic NAS software is 1/2 baked on this unit.
Synology actually has customer support too.
i had contact with ubiquity about a problem with .exe files. its still has no support for opening .exe files on my pc. so when i have .exe files in my smb folder, i cant open them on my pc becuase of admin rights. they dont know if this is a feature that will be added later in a update. they know the problem. lets hope they add it later.
The price is pretty good, but for me anything less reliable than raid6 or raid-z2 is unacceptable. The performance is also lacking. I would easily pay 3 or 4 times the price for an 8 or 8+ bay nas with such features if ubiquiti ever release one.
Oh, haven't watched to the end, turns out raid 6 has been implemented, that is a step in the right direction for sure!
As with a lot of tech, is it a case of never jump in on version 1.0?
I'll wait for version 2 you guys keep beta testing for me
Without proper raid6, it's a hard nope. The system could easily run the more sophisticated raid levels because it's Linux just like any other nas. I can ignore cache nvram, or expanded system ram for fs virtual buffer caches, and many other features... But raid6 is a huge selling point.
Is it a confirmed improvement that football is not soccer?
I'd need to check if that's the ca.... ITS BLOODY FOOTBALL, ITS KICKED WITH THE FOOT, IT'S A BIG ROUND BALL, FOOTBALL, FOOTBALL, FOOTBALL!
@@nascomparesthe term soccer predated the term football though, in Britain where the sport originated, that's what they called it. And then everyone else got lazy and started saying oh look there's a foot and a ball duh. I digress though, I'm about to go outside and play Puck stick on the ice
Ideas for future models... A 2.5" version with at least 16 drive bays for an SSD based NAS. Also a hybrid version with both 2.5" and 3.5" bays... A NVME version too??
For 500 USD, a pure storage NAS is a bit pricey, I would still prefer a low power machine with TrueNAS over this
Soooo... "football" was originally (still is) called "Association Football" and it was from the association portion where "soccer" was derived.
Ironically, in England. Where it was called soccer first.
It's like you WANT to ruin my Friday night.... Thank you....
The UNAS Pro is not exactly out of stock, look at the UNAS Pro as it's always in stock. It seems that Ubiquiti is putting the NAS on the back burner until either they figure out and fix all its issues or decide to discontinue it altogether. I think the latter is where they will end up, unfortunately. 90-95% of the issues are in fact software-related and their dev team is not versed as well in NAS software as it is in other dev software Ubiquiti uses. With that being said, I see no reason why the NAS software couldn't be used on the 4-bay NAS or even on other equipment as it is at the heart *nix based.
Looking forward to your review at the end of 2025. I think you will find that a lot of the things you have mentioned will be addressed by then. I personally do not think that Containers will ever come to the UNAS Pro because of the debacle that occurred with the UDM Pro and Ubiquiti's move from Containers to Bare Metal for the OS. This was due largely because of all of the Support Calls they received from users trying to add containers to the UDM Pro and "screwing things up". But I could certainly see things like Active Backup for Business, iSCSI support, multiple pools, and such coming later this year. Right now I am sure they are focused on getting what they have to be very stable and get the current issues (like large file transfers) addressed. Once that is done, then I can see them adding more functionally. Just look at how much the Network application has improved, as well as new features added, now that the UDM Pro and the UDM SE are now both using Bare Metal (a consistent OS, instead of having to maintain two completely different OS systems). I would also point out the expanded lines of hardware in the "Campus"/Enterprise arena where they are making a serious push into the "true" Enterprise space. To be able to compete there, they will need a NAS that can meet business solutions, not necessarily Home Lab users. Therefore, they will make decisions on software updates that will benefit businesses, both large and small.
Hmm. So a LOT of the complaints you seem to have gathered are feature requests that were clearly defined as not included when purchased. So i would not quantify them as valid complaints. I mean, look at the product page, clearly see what feature sets are included or not and purchase based on that, it is disingenuous to buy a product that does not list, for example, the inclusion of a USB port, and then complain that it is not available.
The price on that thing is tempted to get for a backup NAS, but my eye is on an HL15. I'm guessing in a year or so they'll come out with a UNAS Pro Max anyway 🤣
Not to spoil anything, but there's some BANGER 45Drives videos coming....
@nascompares You have my attention.
Not having docker containers is a deal breaker for me. I would have bought this device yesterday if unifi had docker support. It would be great to have Plex, emby or jellyfin. A photo app for your own photo library would be nice
I am reviewing this solution as a possible replacement for a Synology NAS with the addition of a NUC or something similar from where I can run some docker containers. But looking at the multitude of problems which people are reporting and basic NAS functionality missing, to me this product just seems to be a skunkworks project, something that was put togheter very fast with some bit of hardware and software that they had at hand, this is not by any means a mature product or one which underwent a serious development process. Ubiquiti is probably dipping its toes in the NAS water to see how it goes, learn from the experience and decide if this could be a new line of business for them or if geting in the NAS world would be too much of a hassle which is not really worth it.
UBT is making some great networking stuff but I would probably not want to by and early addopter aka. guinea pig even though the NAS has a really tempting price.
:-( No Plex , No slot for a GPU .. no deal.
Amerikanska football is not about feet it is mesurd in yards som it can be named yardball
This is almost perfect. No fancy app crap is exactly what I need. However ISCSI and backup is a must and caching and/or tiering via NVME drives. Maybe a UNAS pro max later this year ?
"No seriously, stop calling it soccer..." 🤣
THIS
I think the issue is, Software RAID, isn't enough in 2025 to exist as a product when similar functionality is coming at the same price points, with 10Gbe and 6 drives (some with M.2 hardware), running on Ryzen R1600 or Celeron N95/N100 CPUs, and some potentially with intel/AMD Copilot NPUs.
There's also the secondhand NAS market, but 2U racks are a whole other principle. Universal power+PSU, 10Gbe NIC, but no SSD/2.5" or M.2 cache, or even a M.2 Coral AI Accelerator to add in for Unifi Protect to use, eh.
Not being able to run a reliable folder sync on NFS/SMB is kind of trashy. I sort of understand why, it's a prelude to a better product that requires testing. But, it's an expensive beta-test to participate in, at your own expense. Much like the EV charger or the audio amp, or the door security, or the phones, etc. There are lots of potential Unifi products that need a home.
But, you really want to think it through as a first design product, that it has to do what it's labelled for. They made 2009 Thecus NAS units back in the day with better software/hardware, and those would need to be rebooted after 2 weeks at times because the SMB would crash due to 2GB RAM. I get why 'personal' drives can't (encryption, likely) but that's dysfunctional as noted. Non-Tech people won't know why their data is gone, or how to manage their own snapshots unless they use Time Machine (sic), and only if it's configured and regularly kicks in.
They can run container/VMs to process tasks and run updates, sync states to get identical setups, etc. Including NVR Camera software, rsync, and various prosumer tasks. I don't expect it to be a Synology clone, but it's a strange product as is.
Cheers for sharing your thoughts on this man, genuinely appreciated
Personally i prefer a NAS to just be a NAS.
nice soccer box
You son of a..
Was very interested and intended to buy, until my Dream Machine SE completely died out of the blue. It did everything I expected for a little over a year and then paperweighted itself. Non recoverable, no parts to be had, no repair service and tech support sent basically a one-liner that said "Hardware failure". I couldn't read the logs, only they could, so I have no idea where to look. What I did see during my research is that there are a bunch of these failures, but you can't find anything out on the ubiquiti site as to whether they are aware of the problem or changed something to fix it, etc. Not going to get into that eco because of it. The stuff ain't cheap. They call it enterprise quality, and so I guess if it dies they think of me as an enterprise and I'll just get another one because I have enterprise money. Also, I don't look at it as a fluke either because a ton have died in the exact same way, even down to the same message on the screen. No, doubt somebody will jump in and say this isn't what I should be posting about on this video because it's not about the UNAS. That's my point. I never got that far, even though I intended too.
NFS speeds are horribly slow, unusable. less than a gigabit in linux. Windows 11 also only gets 1 gigabit speeds. Linux over SMB and Windows 10 gets 5/6 gigabit transfers with spinning drives.
i have a case with Unifi for that #4495891. No progress thou since 14 of January. NFS speed and latency are terrible (lab with both ESXi and xcp-ng). Was hoping to replace my Syn 920+ with this but now im sceptical.
This is a soccer ball 👉⚽
I know you are, but what am I...
Sir, it's soccer! 😏
...and...the rebuttal.
It is not.
The performance sucks in many ways. When I copy thousands of small files over to Unas it's ridiculously slow. I have screen shots showing that to copy over 100GB of small files can take days....!!!! Yes, I have proof. And my rack is all 10gbe connected. But I assume they will get it to be much better eventually as they are new to the whole NAS game.
And they are still out of stock.
soccer is kinda mid, but so is football
I am both passive and livid right now
Soccer! Soccer! Soccer! Suckit! Soccer! Soccer! Soccer! Soccer!
la la la la not listening la la la la...
Their products are never in stock. Why would I buy anything from them when they’re never in stock? This is a serious question.
Looks like a Casio F-91W on your wrist. That’s all the watch that most people need. I say this while owning enough watches that I could wear a different one every day for a year and never repeat.
Better reason not to buy from them is their customer support is piss poor if not existent
If I could have clicked 'like' harder on this comment, it would have cracked my screen! Both parts of your comment!
If you’re reading this right now, 12:49pm eastern time 1/24/25 they are actually in stock in the Unifi store! But to your point, it’s a total roll of the dice as to what’s available at what hour of the day.
@NASCompares with the RAID 6 Update also came NFS support!
Yeah, I should have included this too tbh - absolutely 'my bad' and I hold my hands up. Cheers for keeping me on the straight and narrow
Not really surprised by the lack of iSCSI. Do you also want Multi-Pathing iSCSI ?
There is not enough performance in this appliance. To me it's a non issue.
You get what you buy with the CPU/RAM and single 10G interface.
Hmm. So a LOT of the complaints you seem to have gathered are feature requests that were clearly defined as not included when purchased. So i would not quantify them as valid complaints. I mean, look at the product page, clearly see what feature sets are included or not and purchase based on that, it is disingenuous to buy a product that does not list, for example, the inclusion of a USB port, and then complain that it is not available.
And they are still out of stock.
In EU store there is availability at moment