TerraMaster F4-424 Max: Design
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
TerraMaster’s earlier offerings stood out because of their distinctive aluminum enclosures, and while the design was intriguing, they didn’t have the best thermal efficiency. The brand is addressing that with the F4-424 Max by switching to a more modest aesthetic, with a black chassis that doesn’t attract as much attention.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
What’s notable is that the sides are ventilated — similar to what you get with the DS923+ — allowing better airflow into the NAS. The server is smaller than other 4-bay NAS models I tested recently, and as is always the case with TerraMaster, you get a 120W external power brick.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
I also like that there’s now a 120mm fan at the back, and it does a fantastic job ensuring the drives don’t overheat. As an added bonus, it doesn’t get loud either. TerraMaster has a new design for the drive bays as well, with a push-to-latch mechanism that’s easy to use. The brand finally switched to a tool-free drive installation, and this makes slotting in 3.5-inch HDDs significantly easier.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
Outside of that, there isn’t much else at the front. You get the usual status LEDs, and while most NAS models have a USB port that lets you plug in a drive, that isn’t the case here — all the ports are located at the back. Interestingly, even the power button is at the back, with TerraMaster opting to go with a clean look up front that doesn’t look too busy.
The changes to the design deliver meaningful benefits. The F4-424 Max has much better ventilation, and the chassis doesn’t stand out quite as much, blending into the background.
TerraMaster F4-424 Max: Ports and connectivity
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Obviously, the fact that you’re getting two 10 Gigabit ports at the back of the NAS is the biggest differentiator, and it gives it a distinct edge — particularly when you consider that the DS923+ has dual Ethernet connectivity. You don’t get the ability to add an additional port, but that shouldn’t be an issue to anyone considering this NAS; with a 20Gbps addressable bandwidth, you don’t have to worry about the network connection being the bottleneck.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
There are two USB-A ports alongside a USB-C port, and all three get 10Gbps bandwidth. I would have liked to see the USB-C connector at the front as that makes connecting external drives easier, but other than that, I don’t have any problems with the port selection.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
The NAS comes with 8GB of DDR5 non-ECC memory pre-installed, which takes up one of the two SO-DIMM slots available. You can switch out the memory modules and increase it to 64GB (32GB in each slot) should you wish to do so. There are two M.2 Gen 4 slots available as well, and they’re easily accessible by sliding the left side panel.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
Each drive bay accommodates 22TB NAS HDDs, so the total addressable storage is 88TB without including the M.2 bays. If you are thinking of going this route, I recommend 22TB IronWolf Pro drives ; I use these in my main NAS, and they’re terrific.
TerraMaster F4-424 Max: Real-world testing
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Powered by Intel’s 10-core Alder Lake Core i5 1235U with integrated Iris Xe, there isn’t any shortage of power here. If anything, the NAS is among the best of any 4-bay server I tested, and there have been plenty of standout products over the last two years.
There are no issues in daily use, and whether it’s running a VM or managing an extensive Plex library, the NAS easily breezes through demanding tasks. It has hardware transcoding and effortlessly manages to transcode 4K videos, and I didn’t see any issues in this regard.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
In a similar vein, I didn’t notice any problems with file transfers, with the NAS able to saturate the bandwidth of the IronWolf drives with relative ease. You’ll ideally need to use M.2 drives like the WD SN850X to take full advantage of the 10GbE connectivity.
The TOS 6 software is much better than previous iterations, and you get native clients for most utilities, including media streaming, backing up data, and virtual machines. You get Docker containerization as well, so you can easily install just about any service you need if it isn’t available as standard.
(Image credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)
The only issue in this area is that the software tends to be buggy at times, and the mobile clients aren’t anywhere as polished as other brands. While there is a Photos client, it doesn’t have any of the advanced features you get with DiskStation models.
It’s clear that TerraMaster still has some work to do with the software, but I will admit that TOS 6 is a step forward — it delivers a cleaner interface and has much better usability. There’s also the fact that if you don’t like the software, you can just install TrueNAS Scale on the NAS.
TerraMaster F4-424 Max: The alternatives
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Two years after its release, the DiskStation DS923+ is still a great choice due to the software feature-set. It definitely lags behind in terms of the hardware — every other NAS I tested has better connectivity — but the rock-solid software utilities combined with the robust mobile clients make the DS923+ an enticing choice, and it does a great job as a Plex server.
TerraMaster F4-424 Max: Should you buy it?
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You should buy this if:
You need a powerful 4-bay server
You want 10GbE connectivity as standard
You need hardware that will last a decade
You shouldn’t buy this if:
You want the best software in this category
You need a great value
Outside of a few software drawbacks, there isn’t much to fault with the F4-424 Max. The hardware is clearly the main selling point, and the inclusion of dual 10GbE ports along with the powerful Intel chipset and upgradeable memory makes it a fantastic choice if you want the best Plex NAS .
While the TOS 6 software is much better than previous iterations, it’s still missing that final bit of polish, and if you don’t like the pre-installed software, you can roll your own — and that’s enticing in its own right. I’m going to install TrueNAS and write a feature talking about how it holds up against TOS 6, but the fact that you can do so is in itself a big deal.
The F4-424 Max doesn’t quite have the same value-focused pricing as its predecessors, but the upgrades to the hardware and software extensibility make it a good overall choice nonetheless.
The F4-424 Max has the best overall hardware in this segment, and updates to the software make it a great choice if you need a powerful 10GbE Plex server.
