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I’ve used Ubiquiti products at home and in the workplace for many years. As I mentioned in previous articles, they started at the lower end of the networking market, and they’ve slowly been working their way up to higher-end products at prices that bigger companies cannot match.
A product category that has long needed a fresh look is network-attached storage. Ubiquiti has now taken the simplicity they brought to the network market to the NAS market with UNAS Pro.
About Apple @ Work: Bradley Chambers managed an enterprise IT network from 2009 to 2021. Through his experience deploying and managing firewalls, switches, a mobile device management system, enterprise grade Wi-Fi, 1000s of Macs, and 1000s of iPads, Bradley will highlight ways in which Apple IT managers deploy Apple devices, build networks to support them, train users, stories from the trenches of IT management, and ways Apple could improve its products for IT departments.
Unboxing and setup
The UNAS Pro supports up to seven drives, but you aren’t required to put seven drives in there. I recommend at least four so you can have some redundancy in your RAID setup. I set mine up with four SSD drives, and I can lose one of them, but my data is still secure.
Unboxing and setting up your UniFi system is straightforward and user-friendly. For an even smoother experience, I recommend using the UniFi app. The app can automatically detect the device on your local network, eliminating the need for manually entering an IP address.
Using the device
For an organization built around macOS, I think this is an incredible product and the closest thing to an Apple NAS product you’ll find. It reminds me a lot of what a modern-day Time Capsule (without the Wi-Fi) would look like from Apple. It’s simple, fast, and does what you’d need.
The device can be used in multiple ways. You can use it if you want folks in your office to access it from the web interface. You can also enable working over SMB. Once you enable SMB, you can also let it work with Time Machine. If you’re looking for an easy way to back up the Macs in your office locally, UniFi Drive might be the easiest way. It supports 10 Gbps file transfer speeds and encourages removing bottlenecks for fast performance.
Footage provided by Ubiquiti
UNAS Pro tech specifications
Mechanical
- Dimensions: 442 × 325 × 87 mm (17.4 × 12.8 × 3.4 inches)
- Weight:
- Without mounting brackets: 9.2 kg (20.3 lb)
- With mounting brackets: 9.5 kg (20.8 lb)
- Enclosure material: SGCC Steel
- Mount material: SGCC Steel
Hardware
- Processor: Quad-Core ARM® Cortex®-A57 at 1.7 GHz
- System memory: 8 GB
- Management interface: Ethernet In-Band
- Networking interface:
- (1) 1 GbE RJ45 port
- (1) 10 GbE SFP+ port
- RF interface: Bluetooth 4.1
- Power method:
- (1) Universal AC input, 100–240V AC, 3A Max., 50/60Hz
- (1) USP-Battery DC input, 11.5V DC, 19.3/14
- Power supply: AC/DC, internal, 200W
- Supported voltage range: 100–240V AC
- Max. power consumption: 160W
- Max. power budget for Drives: 135W
- ESD/EMP protection: Air: ±12kV, Contact: ±8kV
- LCM Display: 1.3″ touchscreen
- Ambient operating temperature: -5 to 40°C (23 to 104°F)
- Ambient operating humidity: 5 to 95% non-condensing
- Certifications: FCC, CE, IC
LEDs
- Ethernet:
- Green: 1 Gbps
- Amber: 10/100 Mbps
- SFP+:
- White: 10 Gbps
- Green: 1 Gbps
- HDD:
- White: Disk detected
- Amber: Disk error
- RPS: Blue: Ready
Wrap up
If you’re looking for incredible network-attached storage with Apple’s simplicity, then UNAS Pro will be my recommendation. Directory integration is now supported fully in UniFi OS 4.1 and regular UniFi Identity, so it’s perfect for single-sign-on. It includes snapshot capabilities for version control and setting up remote backups to another NAS or SMB server using UniFi’s SDWAN capabilities.
The UNAS Pro is now available from Ubiquiti for an MSRP of $499.
Apple @ Work is exclusively brought to you by Mosyle, the only Apple Unified Platform. Mosyle is the only solution that integrates in a single professional-grade platform all the solutions necessary to seamlessly and automatically deploy, manage & protect Apple devices at work. Over 45,000 organizations trust Mosyle to make millions of Apple devices work-ready with no effort and at an affordable cost. Request your EXTENDED TRIAL today and understand why Mosyle is everything you need to work with Apple.
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