Home Enterprise New iXsystems FreeNAS Mini Models Announced

New iXsystems FreeNAS Mini Models Announced

by Adam Armstrong

Today iXsystems announced that it has expanded its FreeNAS Mini series of NAS devices with two new models. The models are the FreeNAS Mini XL+ that is aimed at larger organizations as well as the FreeNAS Mini E aimed at entry-level deployments. The new models have tighter integration with TrueNAS and cloud services and can be managed by the company’s unified management system, TrueCommand.


Today iXsystems announced that it has expanded its FreeNAS Mini series of NAS devices with two new models. The models are the FreeNAS Mini XL+ that is aimed at larger organizations as well as the FreeNAS Mini E aimed at entry-level deployments. The new models have tighter integration with TrueNAS and cloud services and can be managed by the company’s unified management system, TrueCommand.

iXsystems’ FreeNAS Mini series of NAS devices are aimed at smaller offices that need file, block, and object storage. The NAS devise leverage FreeNAS the highly functional, Community Edition of TrueNAS, the world’s #1 Open Source storage OS. We did a fairly deep dive into FreeNAS here. The FreeNAS OS provides Network Application Services (NAS) via plugin applications that add unique user value. The new Minis, as well as existing, are all designed to be compact, power efficient, and quiet, good for small offices or homes were space is limited.

FreeNAS is now on version 11.2 and comes with a web interface and encrypted cloud sync to all of the major cloud vendors including Amazon S3, Microsoft Azure, Google Drive, and Backblaze B2. FreeNAS on the Mini models support Error-Correction (ECC) RAM and ZFS with data checksumming, unlimited snapshots, and replication to avoid any chance of data corruption, features that are not commonly found on consumer NAS platforms.

The two new models include:

  • FreeNAS Mini XL+: This powerful 10 Bay platform (8x 3.5” and 1x 2.5” hot-swap, 1x 2.5” internal) includes the latest, compact server technology and provides dual 10GbE ports, 8 CPU cores and 32 GB RAM for high performance workgroups. The Mini XL+ scales beyond 100TB and is ideal for very demanding applications, including hosting virtual machines and multimedia editing. Starting at $1499, the Mini XL+ configured with cache SSD and 80 TB capacity is $4299, and consumes about 100 Watts.
  • FreeNAS Mini E: This cost-effective 4 Bay platform provides the resources required for SOHO use with quad GbE ports and 8 GB of RAM. The Mini E is ideal for file sharing, streaming and transcoding video at 1080p. Starting at $749, the Mini E configured with 8 TB capacity is $999, and consumes about 36 Watts.

The company states that their Mini models can help to reduce TCO by offering enterprise-class data management and Open Source economics. The FreeNAS Mini series can be purchased through iXsystems or pre-configured through Amazon.

FreeNAS

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