Galaxy 3500MGB-RAID Pro Network Storage

Pros: Good idea for a NAS

Cons: I have returned 2 of these units - defective. If you research, there are issues with this product. Just got my 3rd and it is a "OPEN BOX". Unit is used and not even in the correct product box. I buy from Newegg to supply my own business. This experience has cost me a customer, and I now have a "used" unit I paid for anticipating a new working unit. My custormer paid for a new unit. Hopefully, one that works. After my second bad experience with this unit, I simply asked NewEgg for a credit instead of a replacement. However, they never even answered. Based on the evidence, NewEgg should not even be selling this unit until the maker works out the issues.

Overall Review: I have been a good NewEgg customer for years. I've bought quiet a bit of hardware from NewEgg recently with mostly positive experiences; however, this one really bothers me. I'm sure my comments will not be posted (at least here).

Pros: This NAS device is a pretty sweet device and definitely worth the cost. The box itself is very sturdy and easy to assemble. Most of the features are pretty straightforward and the manual does a fair job of explaining them. This NAS is probably best for medium to advanced computer users but not for basic computer users that need something they can just plug in and use. Once it's set up it's pretty easy for anyone to use. Also, for the Linux savvy, the box IS hackable. Go to en.nas-4220.org which is a wiki site for the European version of the NAS. Telnet can be enabled by going to http://ip-of-the-box/cgi/telnet/telnet.cgi

Cons: It is a little bit loud, especially when the fan comes on, but most of the sound is from the HDDs. If noise is a concern for you, get quiet drives and perhaps a quiet fan to replace the stock one. I noticed that sometimes when turning the box off/on again, it would reset from a Static IP to DHCP. If you restart your box and can't access it from the static IP, use the tool included on the CD to quickly find it again. Also, it appears that for Samba shares to work, the "guest-user" account must be enabled.

Overall Review: Samba limits the xfer rates so it can only get 6-11MB/s transfer speeds. Use an FTP client instead to get about 11MB/s upload and 25MB/s download speeds (on all Gigabit network). With 54G wireless you will not get more than about 4MB/s max up or down. The very first time I turned on the NAS, the green OS light did not come on and it did not start up. Turning it off and on again solved the problem and no problems since. I set up port forwarding and dynamic DNS on my router so that I can FTP into it externally. Works like a charm. To the post below, for UPnP to work you must install UPnP support in Windows first, then it will show up as a UPnP device on your computer. Google search "Install upnp" for this, you should find instructions on Microsoft's site.

Pros: I filled this up with two Seagate Barracuda ES.2 ST3500320NS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drives also purchased from Newegg. The drives initialized into mirrored configuration very quickly and the setup on this box was great. I love the built-in user/group capabilities. It is working very well so far.

Cons: The only thing that bugged me was that when it first powered up, nothing happened. I shut it off, and powered it up again and it's worked fine ever since. Another reviewer mentioned this as well, so it didn't surprise me, but it still bugs me a little.

Overall Review: Why does it have a DHCP server built in? It's not a router. Not a problem obviously, since it can be disabled, but it's a little weird.

Pros: Extremely easy set-up and well made. It took less than 1 hour to unpack, install drives and create the admin rules to use the NAS on my 6 computer home network. Approx another 2 hours is needed to format and create a RAID 1 array using 2, Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 1TB drives. The box is quiet with the Barracuda drives. Box fan is temp controlled. The OS allows for an iTunes music share which is automatically discovered by all iTunes clients on my network. This is a nice addition. I haven't tried the BTorrent client.

Cons: No major cons yet. One surprise is that the drive interface is SATA I (1.5mbs) so SATA II drives will not perform to their max potential. The web interface is functional but does not give a lot of choices regarding permissions (only read-only and writeable are available). There is no information provided about the embedded linux operating system used to manage the device. I am sure there info somewhere about how to telenet into the OS but I haven't located it.

Overall Review: I am happy. I was thinking of setting up Windows Home Server but decided that was a layer of problems I didn't need so I bought this device to create a more secure storage for my network. I would prefer RAID 5 but can only afford RAID 1. My total cost is $426 (box + 2 drives) which is less than all other solutions I looked at. I have exercised the drive a lot in testing data reliability and have not experienced any files errors. My network is not fully Gigabit so I can't comment of max throughput, but I am satisfied for now.

Pros: I first reviewed this back in March when I first got it. As a recap, this is a pretty decent NAS for the price. After upgrading to the newest firmware, the 3500MGB Raid Pro seems to be operating MUCH more smoothly. Several features in the web administration pages are working better (or at all) compared to before. Response is faster, and transfers seem to be going faster. FTP transfer problems have disappeared completely. Xfers are now fast and free of problems. Bittorrent also seems to work better, although still lacking in features. Overall they seem to have made a lot of good improvements and I have not had any major problems to date with it on 24/7 for 5 months even with the old firmware for the majority of that time.

Cons: The firmware the drive shipped with was pretty buggy. File transfers with FileZilla would fail regularly, even though the destination file and source matched exactly after the transfer. In addition, the xfers would slow down over time to about 4-7MB/s total throughput. Also, some of the web interface features didn't work correctly. Other than that I had no major problems, no drive failures, etc. Read my previous review for other notes about installation and such.

Overall Review: After using the MGB Raid Pro for several months, I recently upgraded to the new firmware available (v2.6.3.20080530) on the Galaxy website. Mine originally shipped with the v2.6.0-n(2007/08/22) firmware, which was a little buggy. When you upgrade the firmware, BE PATIENT! Click ONCE when you submit the new firmware then wait. It took a minute or two for the "Upgrade Status" page to appear, and then it took probably 1/2 hr to 1 hr to perform the actual upgrade so make sure your PC is free when you do it, and noone needs to access the NAS. No problems with the actual upgrade, though. I highly suggest upgrading to the new firmware immediately if you buy a new unit with an old F/W version, or if you bought it a while ago like I did.

Pros: Fantastic price. Fantastic product. Fantastic options! Using it with a single drive. Formatting in Ext2 (Ext3 is actually an option, even though the specs don't say it) takes only a few minutes. Streams HD video with no hiccups at all. Mapping shares is simple. Onboard bittorrent server! Print server works fine (only print functions though, so if your printer has a scanner or other goodies, they won't work).

Cons: As with all consumer NAS boxes, they are really slow when considering the pipe they have. Using the Gigabit ethernet port, I'm only getting around 16-17MBps (yes, mega*bytes*, not bits), so it is only marginally faster than a regular 100Mbps port. No Real Time Clock, so every time you unplug the device you have to (well, you don't, but I like to) reset the time. The device is so new that the only reviews that I can find are on Neweggs own product page.

Overall Review: I'm making this review early because there seems to be literally no documentation on this box anywhere but on the reviews on Newegg and wanted to help out others who were looking for a NAS like this. Reviews will show that the speed I quoted above in the 'Cons' section is still in the high range for consumer NAS products. Especially ones at these prices. I've had no heat issues, but probably because I only have one drive in it so far. Don't be dumb and put two 10,000RPM raptors in a tight box like this!

Pros: Easy to set up, install drives and initialize over the network. Great value for the price. Raid configuration/drive format was simple. Network printer share was easy and a nice value add since it eliminated the need for a network printer or network USB hub. The basic setup was so easy you won't need the very high level (i.e. no details) user guide or the manufacturers limited web site assistance.

Cons: The User Guide and manufacturer's website support could be expanded for better support. The User Guide does not adequately describe or provide any hints on the network share process. That's tough on people at my skill level and fortunately my guru is excellent and patient. The Installation cd was cracked before receipt. I was able to install from the IP address. I'll still contact customer service for replacement if it includes any worthwhile software. Initially, I can't get the front USB port to recognize an additional USB hard drive. It will take time to research. I'm not sure that the enclosure support both printer and USB drive shares.

Overall Review: This is my first day with the device so I'm only evaluating the set up. I purchased this device with two (2) WD 1TB "Black" drives to provide mirrored NAS. I recently lost all backup data stored on a one-year old 500MB USB drive. While researching that drive failure I noticed what seems like high failure rates across all manufacturers on the big USB drives. I am looking for greater reliability... We'll see if this solution is any better. IMPORTANT: Make sure you upgrade the firmware before starting up. My device was delivered in 12/2008 with a firmware version from 3/2008 and the latest update is 5/2008. There are more than a dozen fixes in the 5/2008 release. Also, I could not access the drive shares until I rebooted the device after the initial setup.

Pros: With the firmware upgrade, this is a very reliable and solid NAS. My box is has been running in RAID 1 with my two 320GB drives without a reboot since I did the FW upgrade in the middle of August. The FW upgrade also cleaned up its web-based UI in a few ways. This was exactly the polish this product needed to become a stellar NAS.

Cons: Still runs hot, has not pushed a full gigbit out for me yet (~40Mbps is the usual max rate; my SATA drives are 3.0Gbps and setup as RAID 1).

Overall Review: This is an update/re-review. All of the comments that I made in my last review are still valid if you don't update the firmware! With this FW upgrade I would recommend this item to anyone who wants to have granular control over their NAS, from the size of their HDDs to how it should be accessed over their network.