Slim Ximeta NAS Drive Delivers Top Speed

The slender Ximeta NetDisk ND10 debuts at number one after turning in a stellar performance in our benchmarks. While other NAS units typically appear as networked drives on connected PCs, the Ximeta product uses a proprietary Network Direct Attached Storage (NDAS) chip and its own networking protocol to enable direct communication between the device and the computers. Special software that you install on each computer allows the device to appear as a local drive for each networked machine, instead of as a network drive shared among them.

The end result: Faster performance when you're transferring files to and from the device. For example, the Ximeta took just 317 seconds to copy a 3.06GB folder of files, while the second-place Infrant Technologies ReadyNAS NV (a multidrive array with its own special software) took 372 seconds, and the remaining units each took more than 500 seconds. In addition, the Ximeta NetDisk outran all comers in the file copying test, where we copy a single large .zip file.

Another notable aspect of the Ximeta drive: Besides having a custom version of Acronis TrueImage 9 backup software preinstalled, the product includes a USB 2.0 port (a rare find in NAS drives); this feature allows you to use the NetDisk as a boot drive if your system's BIOS supports booting from a USB drive.

Debuting at number four this month is Maxtor's Shared Storage Plus drive. At 500GB, the model is the largest single-drive NAS device we have tested; unfortunately, it is also among the slowest. Maxtor's utilities, which include backup and drive management, are more full-featured than most, and very easy to use. Especially noteworthy is the software's Drag and Sort component; this feature lets you automatically sort files by type (for example, movies, photos, software, documents).

Our last new drive tested this month finished out of the Top 5 despite solid performance numbers and a good price. The Plextor PX-EH40L's greatest weakness is its omission of utilities for drive management and backup, features that are common among NAS devices. To install the drive, you have to manually seek it out in Windows Explorer, and then map a drive letter to it.

The unit did well in tests--it bested all but the Ximeta among our single-drive NAS boxes--and we liked its sleek design, matching network cable, and easy-view status lights. But the lack of software kept the drive off the chart.

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Top Top Network-Attached Drives from the July 2006 Issue of PC World Magazine