Apart from the irritating network disconnections when using USB peripherals and the loading times in the web configuration interface, the most noticeable disadvantage to the Linkstation Duo is the slow 5400RPM disks, which do impact on performance.
Drives are easily removed for swift upgrading
Grumbles aside, the Linkstation Duo is certainly a solid and reliable NAS, which is more than capable of meeting the average home or small office users daily requirements without unnecessary over complication.
Verdict
Although there are other NAS drives with similar capacities available for less money, the smooth media playback and WebAccess interface could easily make the Linkstation Duo the right choice if you are looking for a no-nonsense plug-in and go solution for data backup and media streaming with future-proofing upgradability. ®
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COMMENTS
Hmm...
My LinkStation Pro is painfully slow, both data transfer and web interface, and the drive bearings were noisy after about 18 months. I'll be looking elsewhere for it's replacement.
Hackability is great (in the good sense)
We've got an array of Linkstations (Pro & Duo) in our company, all with debian installed, locked down tight, only providing SSH. Great for a simple backup device that mirrors data at our homes.
This is why I like Buffalo drives. I'm not massively concerned about transfer rates as we use rsync to mirror our data, so massive sustained transfer rates aren't needed.
It probably uses software raid (like previous ones), so you don't even need an identical drive to swap in if one fails. This could also be the source of bottlenecks.
Security is awful
Administration through the web interface has no SSL option so the admin password is sent in the clear. Admin and user passwords cannot contain complex characters and are easily broken. Both flaws could be addressed in a software/firmware upgrade but despite complaints from users neither has been done.
Avoid until these issues are fixed.
Early model Link Station owner here
Does this model also have the problem with the allowable path name length being so short?
Not sure about that bottleneck
I am highly doubtful that the rotational speed of the hard drives has anything to do with the transfer speed bottleneck of this particular NAS box. Modern 5400 RPM hard drives easily produce sustainable transfer speeds of over 50MB/s. A slow CPU under the Linkstation's bonnet is the more likely culprit and is probably also responsible for the sluggish web interface.
