This 13-Year-Old NAS Is SHOCKINGLY Still Useable

if you buy the ones that use readyos 6 they are still supported (netgear still sells moden readynas, i buy them and use them as smb pull backup nodes) this model does support os6

look for ReadyNAS Pro 2 BIOS Update before migration to OS6

very impressive getting to custom os running on it (the usb/sataDOM is usually replaceable i did this with my qnap keep the old dom if i ever wanted to go back to qts)

I bought my readynas ultra 6 plus in the 2010-11 time frame when I was working for microserf, marketing hyper-v to the customer base of the largest server manufacturer here in texas. I originally set it up in a raid 6 with 3 tb toshiba drives, (never had a disk failure) had a power supply failure about 7 years ago, replace it and back in business. I did a hot swap from the 3 tb drives to 4 tb in 2021, and the netgear software performed the upgrade flawlessly. all of my TVs (dlna) still connect to it for media, my systems use it for storage, (smb as well as iscsi) and it interacts with my other storage (drobo, seagate, and truenas core and scale) devices. no issues from my end on this amazing, robust unit…… do I find your use "shockingly" useful? nope. I'd expect it……

Haven, We have this one at home but when I try to connect to it I can’t because I need the raidar software and the newer softwares don’t work for the nas and we can’t install older version bc idk how and only my moms 1678 pc has the software. How did you get on it?

All my MP3 are still on this NAS.

It's not that old. The computer I'm using right now is 12 or 13 years old. It does everything I need. I can run a lot of programs at the same time, as well as have dozens of browser windows open. I have a virtual machine so I can run Windows XP and old software that I really like. When I built my computer, I used top of the line parts so it would take years to get outdated. The only upgrade I've done is to replace the hard drive with an SSD, and I'm up to Windows 10. Since 11 may not run on it, if I need another operating system, I'll go to Linux.

thats a typical intel thing. i have a intel silver j5040 as my daily pc and i looked online what can the cpu do and how much it can do. i learned intel is a really confusing on such stuff.
on desktop cpus the talk about system wide memory size but on embedded cpus they talk about max ram per channel. on server there is no limit at all only a recommendation so the mainbord manufactures decide how much is to much like dell or supermicro and such. but some times these things get mixed up if the cpu us oem only or renamed for a different purpose with a slightly different socket or a different mounting package.
like the j5040 it is a normal pentium for it falls in the silver category and is for thin clients and tablets. but also for small form factor servers like a router or multipurpose nas system. in this case it is not that clear what it will be. is es nor a mobile chip or desktop or oem only or server. it says 8gb but if you look up the pentium thats in this chip this can 16gb so i tried 8gb stick and it worked also the 16gb stick worked but it had some random bugs and crashes so this might be to much this thing can really handle. so i did 2 8gb sticks in it and i use it like this for 3 years now for every thing i do except for gaming obviously ^^

I had that nas, it was so slow, and one day it. It stopped working and smelled burnt.

Old doesn't mean unusable. My Turion CPU HP Microserver is still going strong thanks to Truenas Scale.

Excellent video! You have a tenacity to find a solution that I had a couple decades ago. Now that I'm in my 50s, I'm willing to do SOME tinkering, but I'd rather find a guide/tutorial/wiki and just make it work.

I have a similar NAS, an Iomega StorCenter ix2 from 2013. It's been powered down and gathering dust since last year, when I did my first DIY TrueNAS build based off your videos. It'd be cool if you did a similar project for that model (nudge nudge hint hint)

great content tnx

When in debian you can dd content of internal mmc drive to a file to have backup of original OS.
I've installed hacked Syn0logy on my Netgear and it works fine (except it is outdated as well). I think I even have spare one somewhere.

That's a really cool way to recycle.
The PC I'm on right now is almost that old, so I'm on the same page with you.

I've been using one for Time Machine backups for the last 10+ years. Never missed a beat.

an arm/mips dev, maybe? but who in his right mind would buy a proprietary x86. this piece of metal cage was garbage the day it was released, lol

Crafty Minecraft server control panel sucks alot

My first "NAS" was built with ASRock itx board with the same CPU and 8G of ram so the CPU is supporting more ram. Your issue can be from the type of module or the BIOS. Unfortunately for me the processor is low performance and had issues with zfs especially when kernel update required the dkms module to be recompiled, but the regular mdraid was working as expected. Replaced it due to lack of space and noise that the CPU fan was generating.

Just checked ebay, only one of this model listed as of right now. Buy in now price…. $550!!

I FEEL HAPPY

I recently purchased an ITX intel atom d525 mobo and I wasn't sure how to use it yet. Until I came across your video. Thanks a lot!