Transcript for:
Synology DS1825+ Leak and Speculation

Hello and just before we start today's video I just wanted to highlight that this video is about the leak of the 1825 plus online on Synology's own site more on that later on in the video but this video is largely about examining the specifications of other products around it so we can ascertain what these specifications are most likely to be if you're not interested in this kind of stuff this video probably isn't going to be for you and when the product is more formally announced then there will be realistic hard and fast specifications but if you want to join me discussing this product stick around let's start the video hello and welcome back and that is right as the title card suggests today on to talk about the leak of hopefully a new 8-bay from sonority the ds1825 plus a new 8-bay disc station that should serve as the refresh of the frankly a little bit overdue ds1821 plus before we go any further full credit for this to Reddit user MiniStory, or MiniStory, I'm really sorry if I pronounced your username wrong there, who managed to, while browsing the Synology official product pages in the US, see a new entry appeared for the SKU DS1825+. There wasn't really any other information on that listing, and next to it was the DS1821. Not unusual when Synology fades into a new refresh of a product cycle, and ultimately, this does kind of... Go a long way to confirm some stuff that me and Eddie have noticed in the background with certain model IDs appearing on Synology official site and a Synology Officially affiliated sites that we've seen cropping up We've seen some other product IDs such as the DX525 appear in a couple of other expansion systems as well We've talked about in other videos alongside a DS8 I'm sorry DS1625 plus as well, but this is the most formative reference that we've seen here in the background to something on an official Synology product page. Now, quick disclaimers straight out the gate.

Number one, this is not an official product reveal in the conventional sense. It's on a Synology official website and that listing is no longer on there. That whole product page disappeared very, very quickly. Luckily, the user, Ministory, actually screenshotted there for everyone. Lovely stuff there.

Secondly, this isn't unusual to see Synology have model IDs in the wild when you go to certain download sections. Often during the Synology beta drops of their bigger OS releases, more often than not, we do see unintentional reveals of product model IDs along those lines. And several times in the future, the best example will be in the RS-1220.

Plus, we see model IDs that don't actually happen. They are either products that get phased into a new product release later on or... don't get released at all we've seen it several times in the past it wouldn't be unusual but very rarely do we see a product id in the background and as compares here that appears in multiple locations and on the product pages of their own site there could have been product page testing highly unlikely though and given that the 1821 plus released at the tail end of 2020 is long overdue for a refresh for a product series that more often than not if you look at the s um 18 13 15 17 19 21 this product has approximately a two to two and a half year refresh cycle.

So this is long overdue there. So overall, I think this is a legitimate thing. But moreover, I want to talk a little bit more about the specifications, because although that product list didn't reveal any specifications, we can make very, very well-informed guesses and just look at the rest of the product portfolio to make some pretty sharp assumptions here. Now, before we get onto the massive pinch of salt section, let's look at what we can pretty much confirm it's going to be a disc station it's going to be using that same eight by desktop chassis that is still nice looking it still completely serves the purpose there's no way they're going to replace that chassis it's going to have eight sarta base there for two and a half inch and three and a half inch media although we can ascertain they're going to be very creative and some might argue very selective about the compatibility drop of drives on this system i think there will be third party compatibility but it will be a very refined list as we've seen before there will be m.2 and vme on this system almost certainly and again it's going to be that whole lots of other drives for caching sonology only drives the pools um almost certainly it's going to arrive with ecc memory more on that later on it's going to be expandable no doubt with a couple of five by expansion i'm willing to bet given we've seen the dx525 expansion model id floating around that is going to be accompanying this alongside that little rack mount one that we've seen for the rack mount series um and that's pretty much it's going to be like the standard two fans there's going to have multiple ethernet ports and a pci upgrade slot and that's pretty much everything we know for certain now let's tippy toe into supposition let's go into what we think we're going to see here because the biggest two issues in terms of trying to estimate hardware specifications on this for anyone there's I've been following Synology hardware architecture in recent years. It's going to be, one, the CPU, two, it's going to be the network interface port.

So let's first tackle that CPU there. Now, up until about half a year ago, I would have 100% confirmed that that CPU was going to be the V1780B. That is what we've seen several generations of the Plus series already. The greatest example would be the RS2423 Plus and RP Plus there. that had the same CPU in the previous generation, the V1500B, same CPU on the 1821 by the way, I know this is nerdy and inside baseball, sue me, but we've seen that CPU get superseded into the V1780B, a likewise quad-core AMD embedded Ryzen processor there, which is a four-core, eight-thread CPU.

Now, until about six, seven months ago, I would have said, yep, a new eight-bay is definitely going to have that CPU. However, DS... 1823XS Plus arrived, the XS Enterprise grade series device, and it had that 1780B. I hope you're still following me.

That means that this system either, as one of three options, either has to have the same CPU as the previous generation, not unusual, Synology have done that before and stayed within a CPU family series during a refresh, or they're going to have to go for the 1780B CPU, which would massively clang against the $1,000 more expensive XS series device, or they're going to introduce a third AMD embedded Ryzen SKU, which I just can't see them doing. They're already running the R1000 series on the two and the four by and the five by model. They're already running the V1500 and the 1780. I just don't see a scenario where they get introduced another embedded Ryzen XS.

CPU into this mix. It's just going to be too many SKUs at once, and it comes down to software and support. I think of all of those options, I think Synology are going to stick with the old CPU. And I know there's going to be a lot of users that either disagree with me, or more likely, do not like the sound of that. But I think it is more than likely.

The reason being that one, when Synology first introduced the V1000 series of CPUs back in the DS1621 Plus, they made a lot of noise. about this CPU being supported by AMD for a decade. That's one of the kind of real selling points of this CPU series for Synology. Every product series that Synology come out with every few years when they refresh, one of the main reasons they do that refresh isn't to look cool, hip, and young.

God, only a not young person would say that. One of the reasons they... do it is because the CPU manufacturers are refreshing the processes and the result is that as that CPU ends its run and a new CPU run begins as they move from you know every cell on into the next series of them and that extends all the way up to Xeon by the way the NAS manufacturers that use that CPU architecture then have to refresh for their production cycles that can lead to more expensive newer CPUs being utilization or incompatibility you for a lot of the system software they have developed so that's why a lot of brands refresh their cycles every two to three years and five years in some cases depending on enterprise processes however now sonology have adopted this new amd embedded ryzon series that gives them 10 years of product support there from the cpu manufacturer and therefore less of a need to update their products and it was one of the reasons why a year and a half ago in some youtube panel videos we talked about how we think Synology is going to spend longer time between refreshes, which is seemingly played out. Now, with that in mind, Synology have got no reason to dump the V1500B processor on this series. They just don't.

And I think it's either going to be a case of them keeping that CPU, which I think is more likely, or going for that 1780B, which I think is possible, but less likely, because then it's going to clang against... the higher tier in that product family. I know this is supposition, one could argue this is all guesswork but it is informed guesswork.

So with that in mind we then have to examine what a refresh actually is going to include. They can't just stick a new number in it. They have to at least refresh something and I think the areas of improvement on a Synology NAS when you look at it generally are the following. If based on my supposition there that they'll probably stick with the current CPU remember Terms and conditions or TB confirmed I should say.

But if that is the case, that leaves them three main areas of improvement. One, the memory. Two, the USB port. And three, the network interface ports. Now Synology have made it clear time and time again when it comes to USB, they're not that interested in it.

If anything, they're pulling it back for security reasons and not really supporting it moving forward. Also, regardless of which one of those CPUs they go for, USB support on this is actually pretty mediocre. It's real improvements are kind of there on the core internal architecture and cache, and also with regards to network interface support.

These are those CPUs going all the way up to dual 10G. So I think USB support on this, short of maybe trying to be hip and cool and switching it over to USB-C, hip and cool again. That might happen, Synology have not really engaged with that outside of B station, but it's not impossible. Memory wise, we've seen Synology start increasing the base level memory on a number of their solutions in the last few years.

Upgrading from 2 to 4 gig in some cases, sorry, 1 to 2 gig in some cases, from 2 to 4 gig in some places, and from 4 to 8 gig in many places in terms of the base level memory. So I think realistically, the 1825 Plus is going to have more memory. Not, you know, not...

confirmed but i do think it's going to happen because the cost difference between ecc 4 gig and 8 gig is very very small and in an effort to make a refresh more appealing i think that's more than likely but then we're going to talk about network interface boards because if frankly if sonology f**k this up they are going to piss a lot of users off. What do I mean by that? Right now, the 1823XS Plus has got 10 GBE.

It's got 10 GBE. It costs about $1,700 to $1,800. It's got a single 10 GBE port.

A lot of users are like, great, it's got it, but it's only one port. You've stuck a couple of one gigs on there. Same goes with the 1821 Plus.

It's only got one GBE port on it. The 1821 Plus arriving at the end of 2020. A lot of users, myself included, criticised Synology for still maintaining 1GB NICs. So you might not like the 1821 and it's not the one for you.

Let's get it out there. It's 1GB Ethernet. It's a 1GB NASBOX in 2020. Come on guys. And this is an 8-bay as well, so you cannot give people the excuse about the saturation point of those 8 storage bays. This is an 8-bay device.

It's cocked. 8 storage bays, 1 GBE at this price point, I think that's a little bit... When one, the cost of a 2 gig production level is near enough identical now, and two, that CPU supported 2.5 GBE, let alone that all the years of past Synology is still not engaged with 2.5 gigabit ethernet when everyone else has. However, in a way to justify this refresh, I think Synology could roll in 2.5 GBE on this. Now the 21 Plus has got four 1 gig interface ports there.

I don't think they'd go for four 2.5 GBEs. I'm not sure the bandwidth is there without trimming the fat a little bit in terms of the PCIe. But I think integrating it into two 2.5 gigabit net ports is not impossible. It's not confirmed. I think it would be kind of out there for Synology.

currently to engage to 2.5 GBE given their history, but I think it's one of the only ways I can see this system justifying a refresh if they don't go with some new third, you know, unknown CPU from AMD's Embedded Ryzen series. Again, maybe they'll go for the 1780B. I just can't see it without it overlapping the 1823 Plus, which will only give you the extra 10 GBE that you could add via a card. I'm not really justifying. you know 800 to a thousand dollars depending on where you are in the world of price tag so i think this will finally be the moment that's knowledge engaged with 2.5 gpu because we've already witnessed 16 25 plus model ids floating around in the wild there and with sonology refreshing a lot of their smb systems within this time frame it seems like the neatest way to refresh this product family easily without it breaking the bank because the other thing sonology like to do is maintain the same price for that product every single year.

Now, what do I mean by that? When you look at the two-base, the four-base, when you look at the six and eight and 12-base, despite them running a lot of these product families for 12, 14, 15 years, the actual price point of the same products that have been refreshed every time has remained largely the same. You've had to factor in things like inflation and currency and weaknesses of the pound and dollar and isn't the world fantastic, but they maintain that price point. so they can have their portfolio very, very well positioned out.

And with that in mind, I think for them to maintain this refresh being the same price point and still make it look like it's going to be a reasonable refresh, at least from their perspective, 2.5 gigabit Ethernet is probably going to be the way to go. A lot of you aren't going to like it if they did do that, and maybe they'll even engage with 5GB, which I think would be weird, given they've not engaged with 2.5GB hardly at all outside their routers. And I just can't see a 10GB port on this. Again, much like that CPU discussion, it's going to hit the wall horrifically on that 1823XS Plus. And I just think that product has got a five-year cycle.

All of the XS series have, and it would just hit against it too much. It would bugger up their portfolio significantly. And the price tag of that device is heavily based on, notwithstanding its five-year warranty, it's based on the fact it's got a bit more memory.

It's got 10 GBE, and it's got a more powerful, capable CPU there. I think it would dilute the XS series, which would be counter to Synology's heavy influence on Enterprise of late, if they upgraded the 1825 Plus too much towards that direction. They've got to deviate it away from the 1821. I don't think they've got that much room to manoeuvre to get it too close to the 1823 XS Plus. But again, all supposition.

Right now, there's an article in the description that notwithstanding explains a lot of my thought processes here and even more. But on top of that, we'll look... Of course, we upgrade that when we learn more about this device.

When it comes to release, I think the fact that Synology are playing around with product page listings is a good sign. If that is indeed Synology themselves playing with it, I think we have to realistically expect this is going to be a Q3 or maybe Q4 device. By that, I mean somewhere in the range of maybe September to maybe October or November. Now, keep in mind, Synology have a tendency to officially reveal products.

And then they'll... were publicly available within about two weeks. The other thing to keep in mind, those previous generation 8-Bays I mentioned, if you go down the product line, one of the things you'll notice is they almost always arrive in autumn or just before the end of the year, every single time. I'll say every single time, barring one exception.

And every time they've officially launched the product, it's been in that timeframe. So with all that in mind, I think an 1825 Plus is almost certainly going to arrive in the autumn. It could arrive in the summer.

but it'd be sort of weird when everyone's on holiday and lots of companies are not on downtime, but staff have down tools to go on holiday. So I think it'd be kind of weird for a solution like this to rock out the gate then. But autumn, very early winter, I think is highly likely.

But let me know what you guys think in the comments. Obviously, when we know more, I'll do an update to the article below as well as another video. Sorry for banging the table.

Thank you so much for watching. I hope you've enjoyed this and I hope you've entertained a lot of my delusions and mad ranting, but I will see you next time.