The universal sweet spot for home storage, Plex 4K libraries, virtualization, and multi-year capacity expansion.
A 4-bay NAS is the industry sweet spot. With 4 drives in RAID 5 / SHR, you achieve 75% usable storage efficiency with single-drive redundancy, or dual-drive SHR-2 / RAID 6 tolerance. Choose Synology DS925+ for enterprise-grade DSM reliability, UGREEN DXP4800+ for Intel 8505 compute and native 10GbE networking, or QNAP TS-464 for mature virtualization.
The same NAS can fit an enclosure budget and exceed a budget including drives. These examples use two exact 4TB drives; they are dated calculations, not checkout offers or suitability rankings.
4 bays · Intel Celeron N5095 · 4GB RAM · 1 × 2.5GbE
NAS only: $343.99 · Dated price estimate · 2026-10-09T03:58:03.537291+00:00
With 2 × ST4000VN006 4TB: $723.97 · Dated price estimate · oldest record 2026-10-09T03:58:03.537291+00:00
8TB raw. Usable capacity depends on the supported storage layout. Tax, shipping and separate backup excluded; stock and current prices need checking.
F4-425 + 2 × ST4000VN006: component build and cost →Independently evaluated hardware configurations with verifiable specifications and total build calculations.
AMD Ryzen V1500B · 4-core · 2 × 2.5GbE
The benchmark standard for reliable home and small-business data storage. Features ECC memory protection, mature DSM 7.3 Btrfs snapshots, Active Backup suite, and DX525 expansion unit support.
DS925+ specifications and dated prices describe the enclosure. The DS925+ + 3 × ST12000VN0008 (12TB) configuration records an estimated total of $1,864.96 and 24TB planning capacity with SHR (1 Open Bay for Growth). Prices are dated observations, excluding tax and shipping; check the configuration details before buying.
Ryzen V1500B lacks an integrated GPU, making it unsuitable for 4K video transcoding via Plex Quick Sync.
Intel Pentium Gold 8505 · 5-core · 1 × 10GbE + 1 × 2.5GbE
Extraordinary hardware specs: 10GbE + 2.5GbE network ports, Intel 8505 CPU with 48EU Intel UHD graphics for supported Plex hardware transcoding, dual M.2 NVMe, and expandable DDR5 memory up to 64GB.
NASync DXP4800 Plus specifications and dated prices describe the enclosure. The NASync DXP4800 Plus + 4 × ST12000VN0008 (12TB) configuration records an estimated total of $2,079.95 and 36TB planning capacity with RAID 5 (75% usable). Prices are dated observations, excluding tax and shipping; check the configuration details before buying.
UGOS software ecosystem is newer and has fewer third-party applications compared to DSM or QTS.
Intel quad/GPU · dual 2.5GbE · PCIe
Mature QTS operating system with Container Station, Virtualization Station, dual M.2 NVMe slots, and a PCIe Gen3 expansion slot for 10GbE cards or additional SSDs.
TS-464-8G specifications and dated prices describe the enclosure. The TS-464-8G + 4 × ST4000VN006 (4TB) configuration records an estimated total of $1,268.96 and 12TB planning capacity with RAID 5 (75% usable). Prices are dated observations, excluding tax and shipping; check the configuration details before buying.
More complex initial administration and configuration than Synology DSM.
An enclosure without hard drives stores 0 bytes. Below is the exact financial breakdown when populated with verified CMR drives.
| Storage Goal | Hard Drive Selection | Array Layout & Usable Space | Est. HDD Cost | Sample Complete Total | Cost / Usable TB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter 12TB Usable (4 × 4TB CMR) | 4 × 4TB (ST4000VN006) Seagate CMR | 12TB Usable RAID 5 / SHR (75% efficiency · 1-disk redundancy) | $759.96 | $1,529.95 Recorded retailer prices | $127.50/TB |
| Sweet Spot 36TB Usable (4 × 12TB CMR) | 4 × 12TB (ST12000VN0008) Seagate CMR | 36TB Usable RAID 5 / SHR (75% efficiency · 1-disk redundancy) | $1,459.96 | $2,229.95 Recorded retailer prices | $61.94/TB |
| Heavy Storage 48TB Usable (4 × 16TB CMR) | 4 × 16TB (ST16000NT001) Seagate CMR | 48TB Usable RAID 5 / SHR (75% efficiency · 1-disk redundancy) | $2,319.96 | $3,089.95 Recorded retailer prices | $64.37/TB |
Totals use the exact listed NAS and drive model, with recorded retailer prices where available and reference prices otherwise. They exclude tax, shipping, UPS, and separate backup storage. Capacity is decimal TB before system/filesystem overhead and free-space reserves; TB-to-TiB conversion is a change of units, not formatting loss.
Check the source details: DS925+ hardware and expansion, DXP2800 supported memory, and Plex hardware acceleration requirements.
A factual breakdown of why bay count fundamentally changes storage math, expansion friction, and dollar-per-terabyte value.
50% capacity efficiency with a two-drive RAID 1 mirror
75% capacity efficiency with four equal drives in RAID 5
Evidence Note: Four equal drives in RAID 5 provide three drives worth of capacity; a two-drive mirror provides one. The cost per usable TB depends on exact enclosure and disk prices, so use the complete-build table.
No free bays; replace disks one at a time with a complete rebuild after each
Start with 3 drives; a supported fourth-drive expansion increases 24TB to 36TB (50%)
Evidence Note: Three 12TB drives provide 24TB decimal capacity with single parity; four provide 36TB. Expansion requires a supported pool operation and time to complete. Back up first and allow for reduced performance.
Impossible (maximum 1 drive failure tolerance)
Supported (tolerates 2 simultaneous disk failures with 50% capacity)
Evidence Note: RAID 6 can tolerate any two drive failures. It does not protect against every cause of data loss or enclosure failure, and rebuild time varies. Keep an independent backup and a recovery plan.
Mainly entry CPUs (N100/J4125), single 1GbE/2.5GbE, 2–8GB RAM
High-end CPUs (Intel 8505/Ryzen V1500B), native 10GbE, PCIe slots, up to 64GB RAM
Evidence Note: 4-bay models offer enough thermal envelope and PCIe bandwidth to support multi-gigabit network transfers and heavy virtualization container fleets.
Showing 33 models with recorded or reference pricing, CPU, and networking.
A 4-bay NAS hits the mathematical sweet spot: RAID 5 gives you 75% usable capacity (versus 50% in a 2-bay RAID 1 mirror), while providing full 1-disk failure protection. You can also populate 3 bays initially and preserve the 4th bay for hassle-free storage expansion.
Enclosures like the TerraMaster F4-424 and UGREEN DXP4800 represent the most affordable modern 4-bay entry points with Intel processors, starting around $400 to $450 before hard drives.
Use the exact-model cost table below the picks and compare both total spend and protected capacity. Three 12TB drives under single parity provide 24TB decimal capacity; four provide 36TB. Checkout prices, tax, shipping, backup storage, and network upgrades can change the final budget.
Some systems allow a two-drive mirror or SHR pool to grow by adding disks and migrating to single parity. The supported steps depend on the operating system and existing RAID layout; conversion is not automatic on every NAS. Read the model-specific procedure and verify your independent backup before changing the pool.
RAID 5 allocates one drive worth of storage to parity (75% usable with 4 drives) and survives one disk failure. RAID 6 uses dual parity (50% usable with 4 drives) and survives two simultaneous drive crashes, which is recommended for mission-critical business retention or when rebuilding high-capacity 16TB+ arrays.