Expert’s Rating
Pros
Cons
Our Verdict
We ca n’t think of a more various , large - capacity NAS box than the 10Gbe ZimaCube Pro . And it supports Thunderbolt ethernet for even faster performance . But it ’s a tad pricey and we ran into some bug with the NVMe in RAID .
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The ZimaCube Pro’s drive bays and 4-slot M.2 adapter are revealed.
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If you ’re looking for a dainty wallflower of a warehousing boxwood , vamoose this review . If you ’re looking for a large - capacity internet - attached warehousing ( NAS ) corner to provide long ton of storehouse space as well as run entanglement apps , take on .
The ZimaCube is a cube - forge ( duh ! ) , 6 - Laurus nobilis waiter / storage inclosure that can function both over 10Gbe and Thunderbolt 4 port via an ethernet bridge . The handsome corner measures approximately 8.75 - inches deep , by 8.75 inch magniloquent , by 9.5 - inches wide – no , it ’s not a unadulterated cube . Cubular ? Cubist ? All six SATA drive bays are 3.5 - inch , trapping six non - locking , easily - remotion trays .
The ZimaCube Pro’s drive bays and 4-slot M.2 adapter are revealed.
Note that the 3.5 - inch trays do n’t use quick - modification , pop - out rails , you must practice the provide screw to install drives . small-scale , finer - threaded screws are also offer for SATA SSDs .
There is what seems to be a seventh bay to the rightfield . Technically it is and is bear on to in the ZimaCube documentations as the seventh bay . However , it use a dissimilar connection that mates with the bring home the bacon single 4 - slot PCIe M.2 / NVMe transcriber circuit board . Said adapter is held in place by a captive thumb shag for easy removal .
The bay are covered by a magnetically attached look home . straightaway above it are two eccentric - A 3.0 USB ports ( 5Gbps ) , a 5Gbps Type - C port , 3.5 mm stereo headphone jack , and a quick transcript push button that immediately copy information from attached ovolo private road and the comparable .
The ZimaCube Pro’s 4-slot M.2 NVMe adapter tray populated with four different 2TB NVMe SSDs.
The back of the box is base to a individual 10Gbps ethernet interface , matching 2.5Gbps ethernet port , two character - A 2.0 USB ports , two Type - C Thunderbolt 4 ports ( without the identifying logo ) , as well as both DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.0 ports for sequester display . To the left of the Thunderbolt 4 port are the exponent jack and a pinhole reset clit .
As you might venture , a server running a 10 - burden I5 , with up to six HDDs and four NVMe SSDs like the ZimaCube ship with beefy force reinforcement : 19 - volts and 11.58 amps to be specific . That should handle any drives you throw in the ZimaCube easy .
IceWhale did n’t cater any pedagogy on how to chatter the interior of the unit . The lack of mealy documentation was my least favorite thing about the ZimaCube Pro . Consequently , I simply started transfer bolt . Fortunately , my first four choices ( IceWhale “ thoughtfully ” uses hexangular types ) at the top of the social unit take into account me up to pop the top to see the two half - height PCIe slot . you’re able to add just about anything Linux has a number one wood for .
The back of the ZimaCube Pro with its port array and power jack.
I was also able to view the populated M.2 time slot . There ’s another underneath , but it ’s quite difficult to introduce an SSD into . So difficult to both see and access that I expect the company if that was indeed what it was before proceeding .
ZimaCube Pro: Price
The ZimaCube Pro is $ 1,099 with the 16 GB of DRAM that we prove , and $ 1,249 with 64 GB of memory . That ’s a fairly reasonable upgrade price ( unlike a certain famous ship’s company that charges far more than advance component are worth ) . If you ’re going to run virtual machines or Docker apps , go for the 64 GB .
On the other script , if you ’re simply pass for lots of storage via NAS , you might be able to get out with the $ 699 non - Pro version of the ZimaCube with a slower Intel N100 CPU , only 8 GB of memory , and no Thunderbolt ethernet . It ’s also 2.5Gbe only , so ask performance to top out at around 250MBps .
ZimaCube Pro: Ease of set up
IceWhale provides autilitythat makes finding and get to the ZimaCube a piece of cake , though it involves some guess work . Again , the want of granular corroboration meant no mention to a default username and watchword . I recommend installing the public utility and have it start the World Wide Web interface , then comply the prompts to make a new username and password with which to lumber on .
After you ’re full log on via the entanglement interface , you’re able to define any RAID arrays or individual volume you want using the storage utility . It shape well in my deal - on but sometimes required a reboot before array deletion would register . Most users wo n’t make as many change as I did during examination .
Beyond that , reach the ZimaCube locally is just like mounting any other internet resource , whether via 10Gbe or Thunderbolt ethernet span . Create share folders via the web interface using the Files app , turn up the ZimaCube in web locations , log on , and open said shared folders .
The interior of the ZimaCube Pro. We love the beefy CPU fan. It’s difficult to see the M.2 slot, but it’s just below and to the left of said fan.
ZimaCube Pro: Network-attached storage interface
NAS box seat , at least those with showing port , can be used as the figurer they in reality are , if you bond a keyboard and monitor . However , as mentioned , they are typically configure and engage remotely via an hypertext mark-up language interface and accessed using a web internet browser . It ’s much like using Teamviewer , RustDesk , etc . to control another calculator remotely . The image of the Zima interface below is from my web internet browser .
Modern NAS is capable of much more than their original design of simply serving up files . IceWhale follow out a rather turgid raiment of browser app - based apps that cover a full spectrum of utility . They ’re all available from an app store , though I missed a search use to browse them by role .
Media host include Plex , Emby , Swingmusic , and Jellyfin . There ’s the Handbrake video encoder and Calibre - Web for meter reading ebooks . Bittorrent / download clients let in Transmission , qBittorrent , and Gospeed . Backup is represented by Duplicati , and Resilio Sync .
The main page of the ZimaCube Pro’s HTML interface.
I ’ve only refer the better - bed applications programme ; there are others . I was most enticed by the ZVM app which allows you to lead practical political machine and comes with a demo of Windows 10 you may draw .
Docker is nicely integrated into the system of rules with an alternative in the app store to add containerized program , though there ’s not a lot of hand - holding in the process . As with much of the ZimaCube , a fairly high geek IQ or a ardor for learning Linux and Linux apps is helpful . Linux ? Yup . Nearly every NAS package out there these day is running a version of Linux , which as you may or may not know , is near as app - rich these days as the pay contender and in some areas such as Docker , superior .
ZimaCube Pro: Performance
Given its 10Gbe and Thunderbolt 4 support , and the power to combine drive in RAID the ZimaCube Pro is dissolute , though not as fast as you might think when you first hear “ Thunderbolt . ” That ’s because , as mentioned , the ZimaCube Pro connects via a Thunderbolt connection using an ethernet bridge circuit and internet transport protocols ( SMB in this example ) . The fastest we see over Thunderbolt ethernet was about 2GBps recitation .
For media , I tested the ZimaCube Pro with two fast ( 290MBps consecutive transfers ) 24 TB voiceless drives in a striped RAID 0 , four SATA SSDs striped in RAID 0 , as well as four 2 TB NVMe SSDs strip in RAID 0 using the adaptor bill of fare . Both over the 10Gbe port , as well as the Thunderbolt embrasure on a Mac Studio M1 Max . The result , while all comparatively fast , were occasionally baffle , and I run into an “ proceeds . ”
The puzzler was the two HDDs logging well over 800MBps over both Thunderbolt and 10Gbe , significantly faster than the roughly 600MBps they ’re natively adequate to of . manifestly there ’s some caching going . Overall , it made it somewhat hard to directly compare the ZimaCube ’s answer with other DAS or NAS boxes .
The ZimaCube Pro’s VM app starts up with Windows 10 installing itself. This comes pre-loaded.
This “ topic ” was that at various times , under tension of the AmorphousDiskMark ( 64GiB ) testing , the NVMe RAID 0 raiment would go belly up with one of the drives vanish from the raiment .
ZimaCube Pro manoeuvre to one NVMe SSD as damage , but rebooting remove the error and the array would again be useable for use . I even modify the driveway that go away and the error repeated itself . In normal copy operations , I did n’t see any error . Only under the benchmark tension .
try out on an individual basis , there was also no job with any of the four SSDs . The military issue is still under probe by IceWhale at the clip of this writing . Note also , that there ’s no real reasonableness to hunt down all four NVMe SSDs in RAID 0 as there ’s no style to use the speed over ethernet .
Below you ’ll see the good outcome I got from each regalia on each bus topology . As AmorphousDiskMark too accent the ZimaCube ’s NVMe , I swap to Atto for this article .
Atto shows truehearted speeds than Disk Speed Test and AmorphousDiskMark , but for the most part , I ran it using the far smaller 256MiB ( Mebibyte ) data typeset on a yoke of test . Note that when I tried the 32GiB ( Gibibyte ) data point set ( the 2nd icon below ) on the NVMe RAID 0 array , it did not cause the same erroneousness as AmorphousDiskMark , However , both register and spell speeds started bouncing all over the map . Again , caching .
All the Atto tests are over Thunderbolt 4 ethernet . First up are the SATA RAID 0 results which turn out much as expected .
Again , you’re able to below that upping the information set to 32GiB delivered extremely miscellaneous results .
With the NVMe RAID 0 array , results were wildly inconsistent even using the much smaller 256MiB data hardening . There ’s no way writes should be this much faster ( from 512Kib to 24MiB)than reads without hive up involved .
The HDD RAID 0 regalia results were very reproducible , but far faster than they have any right to be . As say , even mix the total throughput should n’t exceed 600MBps . Again , though not confirmed by IceWhale this is probably lay away .
Next is Disk Speed tryout for the NVMe RAID 0 array over 10Gbe ( allow for ) and Thunderbolt 4 ethernet ( right wing ) . moderately darn close and these consequence make sense .
Next up are SATA SSDs which do on equation with the NVMe fit in to BlackMagicDesign ’s Disk Speed Text . This is four of them in RAID 0 . observe that ethernet is a major limiting factor in prospicient transferral .
Below are the RAID 0 HDD resolution which again , make zero sensory faculty unless the ZimaCube Pro is using some form of stash . usually , a duplicate HDD array such as this is open of 580MBps maximum .
I sound like a broken phonograph recording , but it ’s likely some sort of lay away or software wizardry skewed the results . That said , it ’s hard to complain about anything that ’s faster than you require . So I wo n’t .
The introductory story is this : You ’ll get between 600MBps and 1000MBps using its 10Gbe port wine , depending on medium , and anywhere from 800MBps to 1.9GBps ( read ) using the Thunderbolt 4 port as an ethernet bridge will be the average .
Should you buy the ZimaCube Pro?
If you ’re wait for loyal , capacious NAS with the possibility of a faster unmediated Thunderbolt connexion , then the ZimaCube is an attractive solution . peculiarly for virtual computing and media streaming . Overall , despite the return ( again , there ’s really no need for NVMe RAID 0 over ethernet ) , I enjoyed both looking at the ZimaCube ’s handsome countenance and using it . Note that IceWhale also do one of our favorite modular construct - it - yourself NAS solution which you’re able to witness reviewed on sister publicationTechHive .
ZimaCube Pro with four NVMe SSDs in RAID 0. 10Gbe to the left and T4 Ethernet to the right.
ZimaCube Pro with four SATA SSDs in RAID 0. 10Gbe to the left and T4 Ethernet to the right.
The ZimaCube Pro is obviously caching as a two-HDD RAID 0 array should top out at 600MBps.
