A Closer Look at the N4810
We’ve learned what the Thecus N4810 can do on the first page and now it is time to get a little bit closer acquainted with the NAS’ features and functions.
The included power supply can deliver up to 19 Volts at 4.47 Ampere. That equals out to about 85 Watts power capability. More than enough for this power efficient NAS.
The removable drive bays support both 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch drives. They even feature a tool-less installation for 3.5-inch drives on the sides of the tray. And that’s in addition to the screw holes on the bottom of the tray.
The IO panel on the rear side features all the connections. The LAN ports and market with a sticker rather than just imprints, and that’s a really nice feature. It makes it a lot easier to read which is which when you set it up. Next up is the SPDIF port for digital audio followed by two USB 3.0 Type-A ports and one USB 3.0 Type-C port.
HDMI is seen quite often on NAS devices these days and it is a lovely feature. Thecus went one up on that and also added a DisplayPort to the N4810. Nothing stands in the way of your 4K 60Hz viewing experience with these two connection options,
The front has several note worthy features where the first one to spot is the display at the top. It can provide a lot of information and also allows for some changes to be done directly from the display.
There’s a front USB 3.0 port further down, but no one-touch copy button. We also see the sturdy drive locks in this shot.
Removing the cover is easy, there are just three screws on the back of the NAS and once opened, we spot a hidden feature right away.
There is an extra SATA connection at the top of the unit and it appears to be fully connected to the system via the same backplane as the rest of the drives. This could be used for a SSD for caching purposes or just another 2.5-inch drive.
The front display and LEDs connect through various USB-based connectors.
The main reason that you’ll want to open up the NAS will be to upgrade the memory. There are 4GB pre-installed, but that doesn’t mean that adding another 4GB wouldn’t be nice. The pre-installed memory is in a single module which makes it run in a single-channel mode – something that has an impact on the performance. On the other hand, it makes the upgrade cheaper. You only need to get one new module instead of two.
Thecus also added the BIOS battery right here, allowing for easy replacement and it shows that Thecus built this unit to last many years before it will be retired for something newer.
Normal users won’t need to take anything further apart, but I do. The bridge PCB for the storage drives is quite nice and well secured in the chassis.
Each connector’s power is stabilised by two capacitors.
The PCB has a classic NAS design with a passive cooled CPU and all connectors distributed on the front and rear of it.
Moving in a little closer on the motherboard, we see a Micron memory chip right next to the motherboard.
There are two Marvell 88SE9170 PCIe 2.0 to 6Gbps SATA I/O Host Controller.
There also are two Intel i210AT network controllers
And there is a Realtek ALC262 4 channel DAC controller.
Was there any testing or investigating into what the 2.5 hard drive connector in the top of the unit can be used for?
I bought one of this for half price on the chance the 5th drive connector was usable: and it is! You can use it as a boot drive or a cache drive or for a parity check drive. You can also flash the in-built MMC drive with a different OS. If you buy one I strongly suggest doing so, as the OS from Thecus is an ancient bug-ridden under-developed barely-supported mess. No, really, the version in the box is Fedora 12, and there’s an upgrade to effectively Fedora 16. I recommend using OpenMediaVault instead.
Thanks for the confirmation that the 5th SATA part indeed is fully working.
Is it possible to use the display and the buttons with an alternative linux distibution like debian? Is it possible too, to control the fan (with fancontrol package)?
Thx
John,
I’m on my 3rd thecus NAS. The first was a W5810(windows storage server) which I could not get to work correctly; got an RMA then resold. the second was/is the N4810; same as before, it did not work correctly, got an RMA, but was not able to secure a reasonable (?) resale price. So, I’m keeping it.
Regarding the 5th drive, I was not able to access a connected drive installed in my initial N4810. Tech USA told me that that drive was not powered by the backplane since the 2 on-board SATA chips only supported two HDs each (only 4 of the 5 slots on the backplane -the ones directly accessable from the front bays). their info was that the 5th could be used only if powered by a separate Sata controller that connects to the DOM (MMC drive?).
So, my question(s) to you:
– how are you powering that drive (I guess as your new boot)
– where is the DOM (under the HD cage?) and is that the alternative power source for the 5th drive, and
– if you flash the DOM for another OS, is there any other way to power the 5th drive or force it to be read by the system?
Sorry to be so long, but still looking to see how best to use this machine. I agree with you in respect to it being under-developed.
Is it possible to use the display and the buttons with an alternative linux distibution like debian? Is it possible too, to control the fan (with fancontrol package)?
Thx
Hello,
I have the same questions to John like Thomas.
I am very interested in this NAS and would like to use the 5th SATA connector for a system SSD to boot a debian or ubuntu server linux.