Seagate BA110 NAS Review

Introduction

UPDATE: December 6th - Instead of the frequent updates such as I did with the Revodrive, I'm only updating this once. After months of failed backups, failed reboots, and all around failing, I finally just cracked open the case to extract the drive, which is incidently not a user friendly process, to see if I could at least salvage the drive. That is a no go. The drive is a complete failure. This is now the THIRD Seagate drive in a ROW to catastrophically fail in my lab. As Seagate has been less than forthcoming about updates or further samplings, I will simply conclude for now that Seagate does not have its act together, and you should avoid drives from them. If I get more drives I will review them, but don't hold your breath. 

Like my review of the OCZ Revodrive; this review will be relatively short, and lack comprehensive benchmark testing. I will get into why as we go along, but make a note to return to this review in the near future and I will update with more information once I have some product from competitors.

When I first started gathering products for this site a number of months ago, among the vendors I wrote to for product was of course Seagate. Seagate promised a number of product; including the BA440 and a couple of smaller external drives.

Finally we have the first of these items which is not a BA440 but at least it's a BA110. They call this a “Black Armor” server, and it is in the class of what we call a “network attached storage” device. Writing benchmarks on a network attached storage device is really moot as most will not even allow you to run on the drive. Once I have at least one other drive; either from Seagate or a competitor, I will run some stopwatch tests in addition to a more comprehensive look at the software and administration.

Therefore the focus of this review will be on my initial impression of the device and its usability both from a hardware and software perspective.

Overview of the Seagate BA110

The BA110 that I received is a 2TB device. This is relatively small by today's standards; certainly not enough to be backing up a production machine with 12TB or more of data. Regardless 2TB is enough to get a "feel" for the device, at least in an arbitrary sense. As the drive is not big enough to back up my entire production machines boot drive I am limited to testing it with individual folders.

If you read my early reviews I did a text version of the unboxing's. I have since moved to a full resolution video unboxing of each item when it is relevant. In this case that video is below and in my YouTube channel.

What's in the box:

• Seagate BA110 NAS server
• ethernet cable
• AC adapter
• manual and software discs

First impressions

My very first impressions can be seen in the unboxing video below. The integrity of the device itself is roughly on par with that of a midrange computer. For something called a “Black Armor”; I sort of expected something that felt a little more rugged. I'm not saying that the device is necessarily flimsy, only that it doesn't feel like "armor".

When I think of a backup device; I imagine the one thing that I will grab if the house is on fire and I need to run for it. I would want that device to have 100% reliability, a standardized AC adapter so that I can plug in somewhere else later using any adapter I can find, and is rugged enough that in an emergency as I am running out of the house I can throw it in the car and it will be able to withstand this.

Fire emergency?

I know what you're thinking. You want to see me do a video of "yanking the drive out, running outside, and throwing it into a car." Then we can see if the drive truly does pass this test. Am I going to do that? Well first; I do not run. I have a spinal disability and I will be doing no running. I am willing to let someone else do such thing should there be a demand for it. If you want to see a video of us doing this ( and perhaps making this a standard part of our review process for external drives ) leave a comment and if enough people demand it we will shoot it. If the drive ends up not passing this test, then we'll all know that, and perhaps Seagate will replace it.

The device feels relatively sturdy and contains the absolute minimum requisite ports, lacking any direct input to a computer, an omission that I find extremely inconvenient. What if I want to plug the device directly into one of my computers and simply have it available by ethernet to all of my other computers, or just simply have the ability to copy files in a more direct and infinitely faster manner? Out of luck.

The Architecture

This is the first NAS device I will be doing a review on and therefore this section will be quite brief. In order to see what hard drive is actually inside the device I would have to open it. Unfortunately upon close inspection of the device it would seem that Seagate doesn't want it open. There are no visible screws, no tabs, and nothing else indicating that the case would be easy to get into and still be able to be reassembled without incident. I am therefore reluctant to take a screwdriver to the device as I want it to work properly later.

Included software

The device comes with two pieces of software. The first they call “Black Armor Discovery”. This is really nothing more than a gateway to a browser-based login to the device itself in order to administer it. You will learn as we go along there are few things I hate more than extraneous software. Anything that can be done without an additional piece of software I am a fan of. Extra software on one’s system promotes instability and lack of performance. Having this onerous extra step is very off-putting to me.

I talked briefly about the included "Black Armor Discovery" software but the device comes with one other piece of software: "Black Armor Backup". I am told that this is a form of Acronis software.

The first problems I had with the Black Armor device can be traced to its software. I'll give you the short version: the included software is utter garbage. Don't bother installing it. The first time I attempted to make a backup of a mere 3GB file the final file on the NAS was 67GB. Believe me; I dug into the file very carefully to confirm that it did not in fact back up any of my system files with it. Upon checking with Seagate; the rep simply insisted that the problem was on my end despite the fact that I included a number of screenshots proving that the only file that was on the NAS was the one that I backed up and that it was many gigabytes more than it should have. It was at this point that I decided to find another piece of software to use with the device.

In my quest to find something suitable to work with this particular device I installed Symantec System Recovery 2011. With this combination the drive really came into its own and has worked properly ever since. I will be publishing a full review of Symantec System Recovery in a few days as well.

Test Platform and Methodology

I'm actually going to save direct testing including network performance for a later date when I receive my second review unit either from Seagate or a competitor. That way I'll be able to provide some meaningful data. In the meantime the hardware itself seems to be okay, but only time can tell. I still have some problems logging in from time to time, and that makes it sort of frustrating, but all told once paired with the Symantec software the device has been behaving itself.

Issues?

Upon first set up I had a problem logging in despite the fact that I used login information that I use for other things and typed it very carefully. Fixing this problem required a complete hardware reset of the device, but after that, it worked fine.

There is also the issue of the included software; it should not be considered a value add.

UPDATED July 26th: After a few months of trying to live with the device and frankly forgetting it's there most of the time, I'm about ready to give up on it. It is constantly "forgetting" my login info, and has never worked for automated backups. I can log in to it manually but I can't back up to it automatically.  

Other Features

Although slightly gimmicky, the device has a USB port in the back so that you can plug in a printer and share that device with your network. As this ability is built into Windows home group networking the usefulness of this particular feature is dubious at best. I would have preferred that they include a port allowing one to plug the device directly into a computer. Also, while my testing on this feature isn't comprehensive, I could not get it to work at all with an HP Photosmart C4650, despite working smoothly directly connected to any other computer on the network, and allowing network printing from those devices. 

To add insult to injury, there is another USB port on the front of the device apparently only useful for installing a USB key and transferring data. It worked, but it's cumbersome. Again; the usefulness of this feature is questionable.

Integrity Check

As this is a brand new paradigm in product reviews, I will take a moment to explain the logic behind it in each of my early reviews.

This is how it works:

For my site, my keystone paradigm is “Integrity”. It governs everything that I do. I do not “scoop”, I do not “spy”, nor will I purchase stolen hardware, or less serious but still crappy behavior such as copying content, posting something on my site as if it was my content, with a “via-“ link. There is no via ANYthing on my site. 100% of all of my content is generated by me. Period.

On that same token, I have certain standards for vendors. It has been my long experience that vendors will treat their reviewers equal to how they treat their customers. The only difference between a professional reviewer and an end user is that reviewers don’t pay for the product. However, we still, or at least, I still expect a certain degree of support, communication, acceptance of feedback, and level of behavioral conduct.

As part of this process, I will detail my dealings with each company from first contact, product acquisition, support, and follow up. Exceptional companies will gain a lot of credit here, and the poorly run, greedy, or otherwise “less thans” will be outed.

COMPANY

In the 90's Seagate was the de facto manufacturer of storage devices. I owned a Seagate elite 23GB 5.25" dual bay hard drive, which was at the time the biggest and fastest hard drive made. That hard drive cost me $2700 and at the time was worth every penny. That hard drive was in use until 2005 when my ex stole all of my computers. I have no doubt that the drive would be working to this day had this not occurred.

Unfortunately this is not the 90s. And Seagate has taken a serious hit with its recent drives in regards to reliability. I maintain anywhere from 4 to 7 computers in my lab, including a large number of hard drives of various vintage, manufacture, and size. Among my recent acquisitions; the only two drives to die are Seagate's. The first one I simply threw away because I didn't want to mess with it. The second is a much newer acquisition, and after some research on Google, it is a widely known problem with this particular batch of devices. It was a 1 TB 7200.11 drive: and the problem was the logic board. Searching for my exact model number, firmware number, and other identifying information on eBay, ( ST31000333AS - FW CC1H ) I was able to find that this exact drive is subject to this issue. Upon confronting Seagate with this I was met with only denial, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

I found this attitude completely unacceptable. I was given a choice of replacing the drive, which is still under warranty, or sending the drive for data recovery to the tune of almost $3000. On eBay I could spend $50 to acquire a new logic board, install it myself, and be done with it. This drive contains all of my personal and professional information, including backups of the site, email info, etc. Which would you choose?

Now we come to the subject of professional review. As you will know from my other articles and videos on YouTube that some vendors have been absolutely outstanding when it comes to dealing with me, some have been less than desirable, still others have been outright rude, dismissive, or lacked the most basic understanding of the English language. This does not include the vendors which did not respond to me at all. Those I give the benefit of the doubt to until I've actually heard from them. Some companies such as Intel, Gigabyte, and Coolit Systems have been quick to answer e-mails, quick to send product, and quick to resolve issues. Seagate has been none of those things. I hate to speak badly of a company that did finally send product, but I am nothing if not honest. I was promised much more and higher-end product than this, and this first co-op has been rather underwhelming, especially given the software incompatibilities, non functional features, and extraneous features. 

I will be publishing a review of the OCZ Revodrive in the next day or two as well and it represents some of the same issues that I'm dealing with here. Issues with both the company and the product are related to me. As this is the first network attached storage device I am reviewing, as mentioned above, I will not be publishing specific benchmarking numbers, but I will come back to that after I get a few more either from Seagate or someone else.

So where does that leave our "integrity score"? So far Seagate has a few dings on their record. But it is trying. Once I receive a few more products I will have a better picture of Seagate as they stand currently.

Support

So far not very good. Seagate totally left me hanging on my 7200.11 drive, forgot about me for several months even though they promised to send review units, and then dismissed my issue with the 3GB to 67GB file, essentially accusing me of being incompetent. Let's just say that I will reserve final judgment for now, but my historical confidence in Seagate has been shaken considerably.

I have a set of six 2TB Hitachi drives which have worked perfectly even in RAID for several months.

Conclusion

Reasonably sturdy construction, full uptime, and compatibility with Windows home group give this drive a lot of potential. Pair it with a copy of Symantec System Recovery 2011, and you'll have a winner, assuming you can get it to work with automated backups, which I still cannot. I'll discuss whether it's a good buy once I have some more comparison.

Shaky support and dubious extra features make this a difficult call. Much like my Revodrive review, I will hold off on performance testing and final recommendations until I have product from both Seagate and competitors to compare this to. Stay tuned for that.

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