HomeContributionsSynology vs. Drobo: Battle of the Desktop NAS Devices

Synology vs. Drobo: Battle of the Desktop NAS Devices

-

Most people love to take photos, among which some are professional photographers, while most of them are avid hobbyists. However, the biggest problem they face is where to store their pictures. 

The best option is to go with NAS servers. However, the real confusion starts from here. There are two best NAS; Synology and Drobo. How can you choose the one that best fits your needs?

Which one is best for data protection? Which one is easier when it comes to data recovery? Drobo RAID data recovery or Synology data recovery? Therefore, continue reading the article to solve your confusion.

Synology vs. Drobo: Which One is Best

Let's have a look at their features to decide which one is best:

  • Capacity and Storage: 

When it comes to capacity, both NAS servers, Synology and Drobo offer a wide range of models with varying capacity and bays. Sinology starts from 2-bay units and goes up to 24-bays SAS units. At the same time, Drobo offers 4, 8 or 12-bay models only. 

Although Synology offers a wide range of products and has a large capacity for storage, architectural Drobo has lead. The biggest reason for this is, Drobo offers a line of directly-attached RAID products, including tiny SSD, iSCSI SAN storage solutions, portable SSD RAID device etc. 

  • Quality and Performance:

When it comes to these NAS desktop designs, Drobo has a better fit and finish. In contrast to Synology desktops, they are more robust with a solid casing around metal skin. Whereas Synology only has metal skin with some thin plastic separating the drives. 

When it comes to these desktops' benchmark performance, Synology shows Synology is almost 10 percent faster than Drobo. Therefore the clear winner when it comes to benchmark performance is Synology. 

  • Cloud Connectivity:

This is one of the important factors to consider when deciding which NAS desktop to choose from. As for cloud connectivity, both show the same level of remote access to files. However, Synology offers more in-depth connectivity. The basic reason behind this is the presence of backup and sync to cloud storage like Google, Amazon Cloud Drive, and AWS etc. 

On the other hand, Drobo doesn't provide access to these popular cloud services. Drobo has its own cloud access program. 

  • Visible Status Indicators:

One of the main features of Drobo is its ability to drive status into case design. Each drive has a large LED oval where green color shows everything is good, while the red color indicates a problem. So, users can easily understand there is a problem drive across the room. 

Sinology also has LED indicators, but they are small in size, and so, they are not visible. While Drobo comes with an array of small LEDs on the drive bottom. Once its capacity fills up, these LEDs will light up. On the contrary, Synology has no indicator like this. 

Comparison Chart: Synology vs. Drobo

Synology  Drobo 
Launch  2015 2016
Class Small Business, Medium Business  Small Office, Home Office 
Weight  4.17kg 3.9kg 
RAID JBOD
RAID0
RAID1
RAID10
RAID5
RAID6
Synology Hybrid RAID
BeyondRAID
SSD Support Yes  Yes 
Wireless Network Yes, with USB dongle  No 
P2P Support Bit Torrent No 
Cloud Backup Google Drive

Dropbox

OneDrive

Box 

No 
USB Ports 4 x USB 3.0 No 
RAM 2 GB  1GB

Final Words 

Synology is the clear winner with more amazing features. However, which one you chose depends on your demand and requirements at that time.

Last Updated on February 14, 2022 8:23 pm CET by Markus Kasanmascheff

Recent News