Tag Archives: storage solutions

Flashstor 6 Gen2 Review: NAS Boxes Hide, This One Belongs on Your Desk

Posted on by

PROS:


  • Distinctive, futuristic aesthetic and compact design

  • Powerful specs and fast data transfer speeds

  • Quiet operation even with two fans

  • Six M.2 slots with possible HDD expansion

CONS:


  • Only fits M.2 2280 size

  • Premium pricing

RATINGS:

AESTHETICS
ERGONOMICS
PERFORMANCE
SUSTAINABILITY / REPAIRABILITY
VALUE FOR MONEY

EDITOR'S QUOTE:

The Flashstor 6 Gen2 delivers a powerful and modern NAS solution that doesn't need to be hidden away behind a monitor.
award-icon

Network storage boxes rarely earn a second glance, usually parked out of sight because nobody wants a black box cluttering the desk. The Flashstor 6 Gen2 changes that expectation on sight. ASUSTOR’s second-generation all-flash NAS wears an angled, faceted shell that reads more like a compact game console than a file server, all while housing six NVMe bays and 10GbE networking underneath its sculpted plastic body.

This is the follow-up to ASUSTOR’s original Flashstor 6, and the internals show a genuine generational jump. An AMD Ryzen Embedded processor, DDR5 memory, and PCIe Gen4 support replace the older, more modest hardware inside. Built with creatives, home lab tinkerers, and small studios in mind, the FS6806X invites judgment on more than raw speed, asking to be evaluated on how it looks and feels in daily use.

Designer: ASUSTOR

Aesthetics

The shell makes the boldest first impression. Rather than the usual squared-off box, ASUSTOR shaped the Flashstor 6 Gen2 with a slanted, almost parallelogram-like profile that leans to the side at an angle. That single geometric choice gives the whole unit a sense of motion even while sitting still on a shelf, setting it apart from nearly every other storage enclosure on the market today.

Look closer, and the finish adds even more character. One side of the enclosure wears a brushed metal effect, while the other carries a powder-coated texture, and the contrast between the two reads as a deliberate styling choice rather than an accident. Both finishes sit on a plastic shell rather than actual metal, so the material change is really just a clever coating trick.

A set of lines and grooves wraps from the front panel around to one side, and that detail carries most of the futuristic feel the design is going for. It breaks up what could have been a plain surface without resorting to loud branding or extra vents. Combined with the angled face and lighting, the overall impression lands closer to a gaming console than anything typically found on a NAS shelf.

Ergonomics

Size-wise, the Flashstor 6 Gen2 measures about 7.6 x 12.1 x 1.9 inches and weighs roughly 3.1 lbs, closer to a thick external drive than a typical NAS tower. Because every bay holds an SSD instead of a spinning disk, there’s no vibration and barely any audible hum, which makes it far easier to justify keeping the unit somewhere visible instead of banished to a closet or a rack in another room.

Getting inside isn’t as effortless as the sleek shell suggests. Reaching the M.2 slots means removing four screws on the bottom panel, though ASUSTOR doesn’t include a screwdriver in the box, so keep one handy. Once that panel is off, though, the slots themselves use a simple latch system, no tools needed to seat or remove an SSD. Getting to the RAM means removing even more screws, so that part takes a bit longer.

Connectivity tells a similar story of tradeoffs. Up front, there’s a single USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 port for quick backups or grabbing files off an external drive. Everything else, including both USB4 Type-C ports, sits on the rear panel alongside the 10GbE jack, which means anyone who frequently swaps cables will be reaching around the back a lot. It’s a small inconvenience that trades off for a cleaner, less cluttered front face.

Performance

Underneath the shell sits an AMD Ryzen Embedded V3C14, a quad-core, eight-thread chip built on a 6-nanometer process with speeds reaching 3.8GHz, well ahead of the entry-level chips found in cheaper NAS boxes. It ships with 8GB of DDR5-4800 memory, expandable to 64GB across two SO-DIMM slots, and the platform supports ECC modules for anyone who upgrades, a detail that speaks to how seriously ASUSTOR treated the internals.

All six bays are built for M.2 NVMe drives running up to PCIe Gen4 x4, so there’s no bottleneck between the interface and the drive itself. Worth noting, the slots only fit the 2280 form factor, so shorter 2230, 2242, or 2260 drives can’t be mounted. Once populated, drives can be arranged into RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, or 10, formatted in either EXT4 or Btrfs.

That storage speed only matters if the network keeps pace, and the single 10GbE port earns its place here. Our own testing came close to ASUSTOR’s advertised figures, nearing 1,180 MB/s of sequential read/write in RAID 5 over that connection. The two USB4 Type-C ports add another route, offering up to 40Gbps per port for direct, network-free transfers.

One other significant upgrade from the Flashstor 6 gen2’s predecessor is the addition of a second cooling fan under the CPU. Given the higher processing power, that upgraded thermal management is very much warranted. But even with two fans, the NAS runs quiet, barely a murmur, adding to the appeal of putting the box somewhere visible yet unheard.

Software runs through ASUSTOR Data Master or ADM, the company’s operating system, with access to an app store covering everything from Docker containers to backup tools and media servers. If you ever decide to repurpose the NAS into a security hub someday, a handful of free surveillance camera channels will make that easier. The ADM also lets you control the speed of the fans, in case you prefer to sacrifice a bit of quiet for more aggressive cooling. And when six bays start to feel limiting, expansion units push the drive count up to 18, letting the platform grow past its footprint.

Sustainability

Going all-flash brings a few sustainability perks that are easy to miss at first glance. There are no spinning platters to wear down over years of use, less heat generated during typical workloads, and lower power draw than a comparable hard-drive NAS running the same hours. Support for ECC memory adds another layer of protection, catching data corruption before it becomes a bigger problem down the line.

The shell itself is plastic rather than metal, and it does flex a bit under pressure, a reminder of where costs were trimmed to keep the price reasonable. That’s not a huge deal-breaker, though it’s probably time for manufacturers to be more conscious of the materials they use, especially with storage solutions like NAS becoming more common even in personal use.

Value

The Flashstor 6 Gen2 sits in premium territory once six NVMe drives get factored into the total cost, and it doesn’t pretend otherwise. At roughly $1,040.99 for the box alone, this isn’t a budget pick for someone who just wants basic file backup. The cost reflects the Ryzen platform, expandable memory, PCIe Gen4 support, USB4 ports, and 10GbE networking, all wrapped in a shell that looks intentional rather than purely utilitarian.

What makes that cost easier to accept is how consistently current every component feels. The processor, memory, storage interface, and networking are all genuinely up to date rather than propped up by one flashy spec while everything else lags behind. That balance means the storage never waits on the processor, and the network never becomes the bottleneck holding back six fast drives working together.

The people who get the most out of this are already running 10GbE networks, working with large creative files, or tinkering with containers and light virtualization. Anyone still on a 1GbE home setup with modest storage needs would leave a lot of this hardware idle, and a simpler hard-drive NAS would likely serve them better per terabyte spent. Matching the buyer to the platform matters here.

Verdict

Taken as a whole, the Flashstor 6 Gen2 pulls off something a lot of NAS makers don’t even attempt: hardware that’s current, wrapped in a shell that looks like someone in the design department actually cared. The rear-heavy port layout and screw-bound drive access take some getting used to, and the plastic build has a bit of give to it, but neither issue undercuts what ASUSTOR built here.

Creators, home lab tinkerers, and anyone assembling a fast, quiet storage setup will find hardware that keeps pace with its own ambitions in the FS6806X. It asks for a commitment of both budget and desk space, but in return it hands back a machine that doesn’t need to be hidden away behind a monitor. Few storage boxes manage to earn a place in plain sight quite like this one does.

The post Flashstor 6 Gen2 Review: NAS Boxes Hide, This One Belongs on Your Desk first appeared on Yanko Design.

Wall-mounted drawers offer storage that leaves your floor clear and free

Posted on by

Storage containers are inescapable facts of life, especially in this day and age where we collect so many material possessions. These vessels can range from plastic boxes to wooden furniture like shelves and cabinets, all of which trade floor space for that storage capacity. Unfortunately, floor space is also becoming a luxury these days, and we can’t simply expand the area in proportion to our growing storage needs. We need to be smarter about the way we use storage and what we use for storage, and no, stacking them up to the ceiling isn’t a viable solution nor a safe one. These drawers, in contrast, do offer a better alternative by taking advantage of the free space that we have found on our walls.

Designers: Camille Paillard and Romain Voulet

Storage boxes are a common sight in many households. They’re simple, convenient, and often stackable. They also take up precious floor space, and stacking them so high can become a safety hazard if left unchecked. Ideally, we’d “Marie Kondo” our excess possessions, but we’ll always still end up with stuff we can’t simply throw out. We obviously need more storage, but we also don’t have more floor space to use. What we do have, however, is plenty of free wall space that isn’t even taken up by decorations.

The KGT Wall Units evolved from metal storage boxes that could be individually stacked just like any conventional storage box. As the name implies, these boxes are mounted on a wall rather than lying on the floor. In this manner, they actually behave more like drawers rather than boxes, but the function and purpose are the same: to hide your possessions from view.

Of course, these can’t be stacked like normal boxes because they have to be screwed to a wall for stability. In fact, each unit has a fixed number of drawers, either one, three, or six in a vertical arrangement. There is one other variant where the drawers line up side-by-side, creating a long horizontal row instead. Of course, there’s no limitation on how you combine those units and how many you use. You could even have a whole stack of three six-unit drawers for a total of 18, or 18 individual drawers, presuming you have enough vertical clearance.

More than just their practical utility, however, these wall-mounted drawers add aesthetic value to a space, something ordinary stacked boxes don’t often provide. The gaps between each drawer bring some negative space that visually balances the unit, and the top of each unit becomes yet another space to utilize for things you want people to see. With a powder-coated finish, these seemingly floating drawers provide more than just smart storage but also visual interest to your space, all without cluttering your floor even further.

The post Wall-mounted drawers offer storage that leaves your floor clear and free first appeared on Yanko Design.