Synology 25GbE NIC debuts alongside new M.2 SSDs - 9to5Toys

Synology is now expanding its collection of in-house NAS accessories with a pair of new solid-state drives as well as two NICs. Geared towards retrofitting its higher-end lineup of existing NAS to be better equipped for handling larger storage pools and faster transfers, the latest releases from Synology arrive with a focus on power users and enterprise deployments, but also give us a look at what to expect down the line from future consumer-grade machines. Head below for all of the details on the Synology 25GbE NIC and other new unveils.

Synology debuts new 25GbE NIC, SSDs, more

Synology showcased some of its first solid-state drives back in the summer of 2020, but is now back to expand upon the current lineup with yet another pair of drives. The latest pair of offerings arrive as the SNV3400 and SNV3500 drive series, with the two M.2 NVMe SSDs designed specifically for Synology NAS.

While these aren’t going to replace all of the drives in your storage pool, but the new Synology SSD will help speed up many workflows by being used with caching. Most of the brand’s NAS support the feature, but these SSDs arrive with increased performance to match the higher-end models that they’ll likely be placed in. Some notable specs here include added data protection, as well as a 988 TBW overall workload, so they won’t be failing due to high volume reads and writes.

Alongside its new SSDs, Synology has also taken the wraps off a pair of new network interface cards for its higher-end machines. First up, we have a dual-port card deemed the E10G21-F2, which arrives with a pair of 10GbE-enabled SFP+ ports. There’s also the even higher-end E25G21-F2, which steps up to dual SFP28 ports and support for 25GbE.

Both of the cards allow for drastically improving the throughput of your Synology NAS and are going to be ideal for uses where multiple workstations are attempting to connect to the same machine. Given that they trade off typical RJ-45 Ethernet for the higher-bandwidth SPF connectivity, these won’t fit into many homelabs, nor would the average user be able to fully take advantage of this kind of throughput on a NAS.

The new 10 and 25GbE Synology NIC come backed by a five-year warranty and are compatible with a wide range of the brand’s NAS. While most of the supported offerings are in the FlashStation and RackStation lineups, there are quite a few of Synology’s standard DiskStation models that will be able to take advantage of the NICS, like the new DS1821+.

9to5Toys’ Take:

Given that one of my complaints from some of the more recent Synology NAS I’ve reviewed is the reliance on standard 1Gb Ethernet ports, I am thrilled to see more capable NICs roll out. Even though these are going to likely remain as upgrades that more enterprise-focused use cases will rely on, the introduction into that market will likely trickle down into the consumer space.

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