Thunderbolt

paulhiphop wrote:
USB 2 is too slow.

Considering the 2-bay x86 models have a USB3 port on the front, and the Duo/NV+ v2 have two USB3 ports on the rear I would be very surprised if any new desktop models introduced in the future didn't at least have a USB3 port.

The LaCie products have the same device either configured to be DAS or NAS/SAN, they swap out the Ethernet for the Thunderbolt between versions.

A competitive advantage would be to support both simultaneously. NAS/SAN for regular use or plug in a thunderbolt cable for when you have to do a full disk restore, and also use the bus externally to connect the expander chassis with better performance than eSATA

Of course now we'd need Thunderbolt 2!

I see a scenario where I connect to the DAS/NAS to my Mac Pro via Thunderbolt 2 (leveraging the device as a DAS) and support other devices though Gig ethernet (As NAS). The Thunderbolt connectivity could also then offer the ability support thunderbolt chaining, and even a hub to USB3, HDMI, Gig Ethernet for the connected Mac Pro. Albeit this could otherwise be achieved by chaining a thunderbolt dock in too, indent just supporting connectivity for the NAS/DAS device.

The ReadyNAS is not a peripheral. If you feel gigabit network performance is not enough you may wish to consider e.g. the 716x which has a couple of 10GBase-T ports.