I had a plan to replace a venerable QNAP TS-251A NAS. It sits in the AV cabinet underneath the TV and quietly and unobtrusively serves up data and runs a few container based apps - Emby, Photoprism, Mealie, etc…
Given its use and location, the Jonsbo N1 case caught my attention. I really like this case. The case format calls for an ITX motherboard and supports up to 6 drives - 5 x 3.5" and a single 2.5".
The QNAP has a Celeron N3060 processor and is rarely, if ever, taxed. An N100 processor seems like a good fit for the new build, keeping the same low power profile but giving a bit of a performance bump to provide some future proofing.
My initial selection was a MW-N100-NAS board supplied by Topton PC Store. I had escalating reliability problems with this board. The combined wisdom of the group (Would different RAM modules both failing Memtest be an indicator of a bad motherboard?) helped me identify this was a memory issue. This board would run reliably if the memory speed was throttled at 4600MHz. The problem was reported to Topton and they promptly authorised a return and refund.
My second selection was a CW-NAS-ADLN-K board also supplied by Topton PC Store. I could find both documentation and BIOS downloads for this board which gave me hope it would be better quality and supported. It also provided USB 3 for front panel USB connections. Unfortunately it also failed memory tests at 4800MHz but performed very reliably at 4600MHz. This board is also running both the CPU and system fans at full speed regardless of CPU and system temps and the thresholds set in the BIOS.
Ultimately this was solvable by setting some more sane fan thresholds in the BIOS settings. In fact, it’s sitting beside me at the moment and I cannot hear it at all. For my purposes the N100 is doing 2/5ths of bugger all, so it is mostly completely passively cooled by the radiator supplied with the motherboard.
I guess the takeaway is that if you are looking for something that just works, then these no name boards are probably not the droids you are looking for. If you are happy to chase down issues, it seems like you can get a reliable outcome for a pretty keen price point. My thoughts are for home use. If you are building for something that a business relies on, these are definitely not the droids you are looking for.