Synology ships their NAS products in brown cardboard boxes which they usually put a sticker on denoting the models. The same is the case with the Synology DiskStation DS920+. That said, focusing on the contents inside we have a power adapter, LAN cable, some documentation and the NAS itself. The Synology DiskStation DS920+ is a 4-bay network-attached storage powered by an Intel Celeron J4125 quad-core CPU. This makes it quite a decently capable NAS and its 4GB of starting memory is a good take-off point but can be upgraded to a maximum of 8GB of DDR4 memory.
Like most Synology DiskStation designs, the DS920+ features a full black body made in plastic. The sides are bare but features the Synology logo vents. These have been their design choice for a very long time. At the back is where most of the connections lie and as a straightforward solution, the Synology DiskStation DS920+ features only the essentials. Two 90mm fans are on the back as well to facilitate cooling. These are dynamic fans and will spin up and down depending on internal temperatures and workload.
Going back to connectivities, we have a single USB3.2 Gen1 (5Gbps) port on the back. On the other side we have the dual 1GbE LAN ports, which are capable of being bonded through software for link aggregation. This is still my biggest gripe on this model but I’ll talk about that in the conclusion. Last up, aside from power and the Kensington lock notch, we have an eSATA port which is used for Synology’s expansion units, specifically the DX517.
At the front, we have the power button which is illuminated to show power status. We also have the status indicator lights as well as a USB3.2 Gen1 (5Gbps) port and of course, the four drive bays.
The bays include a locking mechanism which allows them be secured with a simple key from Synology. It involves a plastic hinge so this is intended more as a safeguard for physical drive locking integrity than actual physical safety. The lock twists which allows the drive tray to be pulled from the bays.
Synology uses drive tray to lines the 3.5″ or 2.5″ to the drive bays. You can use the included drive locks for 3.5″ bays but you’ll need to screw in 2.5″ drives through the bottom screw holes.
The drives are connected to the system via SATA backplane. Make sure that you align your drive with the backplane as forcing your drives may damage the tray, the slide bracket or the actual backplane itself.
Users will have the option of upgrading their memory via a single DDR4 SODIMM slot on the left side of the NAS, pictured above. Now Synology urges you to use Synology first-party or certified modules but as you can see, you can use other modules for your use. There are parts that may not work. For example, our 16GB DDR4-2933 SODIMM single stick ADATA XPG module did not work with the Synology DiskStation DS920+ but this stick doesn’t work with a lot of our NAS so please take note of compatibility. The spare memory we used was a Kingston CBD26D4S9S1ME 4GB DDR4-2666 SODIMM module.
