Finally, we waited for the launch of Greenlink's new 4-bay private cloud NAS. Since this new product is "new hardware + new system", I pay special attention to it. Get started for the first time DXP4800 bring a full-dimensional guide to playing machines. Greenlink Private Cloud is full of sincerity in this upgrade, especially the new system has changed the most.
The DXP series has a stronger sense of professionalism, and the entry-level DXP4800 is more suitable for home NAS, such as: home data center, home audio and video center, home small server, etc. DXP4800 How to behave, this long article will help you find out.
1. DXP4800 Unboxing display
First of all, DXP4800 Unboxing: DXP4800 continues the design advantages of the DX4600 series, such as: the silver-gray aviation aluminum alloy shell is full of texture; The size, size, and weight of the product are similar to that of the DX4600 series. At the same time, DXP4800 has also added a lot of professional elements: first, the magnetic front cover design of the DX4600 series has been abandoned, so that the main air duct is smoother, and the hard disk rack is also intuitively displayed in front of us:
The hard disk bay of DXP4800 has also been optimized and upgraded: 1. The hard disk lock function has been added. The hard disk shelf can be locked with a matching metal key, which can not only meet the use scenarios of enterprises, but also prevent bear children at home; 2. Each hard disk bracket has a serial number. It is not easy to confuse the hard disk by disassembling and disassembling it, and it is also easy to manage the hard disk.
Greenlink's hard disk rack design has always been great, supporting quick disassembly and quick assembly, and the hard disk does not need to install screws. The drive rack also fits perfectly on the machine, and it is very smooth:
The memory and SSD are still mounted on the bottom of the NAS, and the bottom cover is finely cut (the workmanship is always high). Open the bottom cover to see 1 RAM slot and 2 M.2 slots (DXP4600 only a single memory slot).
The included memory is Samsung DDR5 4800 8G. If you need to build a large number of Docker container services or toss virtual machines, it is recommended to replace them with 16 GB of memory.
In terms of interfaces DXP4800 has also been upgraded and optimized: first, the power button has been moved to the front panel; Other ports on the front panel include two USB 3.2 Gen2 ports (1 Type-A and 1 Type-C) with 10Gbs transfer speeds, and an SD 3.0 card slot (which is a very useful interface for photography enthusiasts). The hard drive light has also been optimized, with the ability to customize the switch and customize the brightness.
Backplane ports include: 1 HDMI port; 1 USB 3.2 Gen1 port, 2 USB 2.0 ports; 2 x 2.5G Ethernet ports and 1 power port for more abundant interfaces:
DXP4800 still uses a large 14-inch fan for cooling. Due to the elimination of the magnetic front cover, the air duct is smoother. Remove all the hard disk shelves, and you can see that the backplane inside is made of solid materials:
The power supply is still the Great Wall 120W power supply customized by Greenlink, which is completely sufficient for 4 bays:
The specific hardware configurations are as follows:
| processor | N100 |
| memory | 8G ((expandable to 16GB in a single slot) |
| Pallets | 4 个 SATA + 2 个 M.2 |
| Front panel interface | 2 x USB 3.2 Gen2 ports (1 x Type-A and 1 x Type-C) with 10Gbs transfer speeds, 1 x SD 3.0 card slot |
| Rear panel interface | 1 HDMI port; 1 USB 3.2 Gen1 port, 2 USB 2.0 ports; 2 x 2.5G Ethernet ports and 1 x power connector |
Personally, I feel that the DXP4800 is better than its predecessor, the DX4600 series, in terms of design. I'm happy with the appearance, so what surprises will the new system bring?
2. DXP4800 Use
The first two most important things to say are: 1. The new UGOS Pro system of Greenlink Private Cloud is "based on Debian" and "the terminal function supports SSH and Telnet access to open SSH". "Debian-based" means that professional players can develop richer gameplay. "Open SSH" gives users a lot of freedom. 2. Turn on UGREENlink to remotely access the device through the domain name! With these two major changes, I am really satisfied:
2.1 Hard disk capacity planning and hard disk purchase guidance
First of all, let's briefly share the NAS hard drive selection and capacity planning. First of all, you must have an M.2 SSD of 256G or more for Docker container installation and virtual machine installation (installed on M.2 to improve the user experience).
4 x 3.5-inch HDDs to choose HDDs according to the actual situation: the recommended capacity of a single HDD is not less than 4T (the most cost-effective HDD is actually a large-capacity enterprise-class HDD). The same capacity of hard disks makes it easier to backup, manage, and build arrays. You can choose a hard drive according to your budget and actual needs. For more detailed knowledge about hard drive purchase, I have also shared related articles before.
2.2 DXP4800 上机流程和 UGOS Pro 特色
Install the new version of the client on your computer and mobile phone (this time UGOS Pro brings a Linux client to meet some enterprise use cases). DXP4800 Install the hard disk and power it on, scan the QR code at the bottom of the device through the client to bind and set the account password, and then you can start the journey of playing the machine. The new client icons (left) are all more professional:
It is recommended that the initialization setup be done on the computer. First, let's talk about using the Windows client. The UGOS Pro client interface is more professional, with more detailed icons and more details (for example, the upper right corner shows the performance and network speed);
On the device, go to the "Storage Manager" and initialize the hard disk. The main interface of the new version of the hard disk manager will display the indication of the installation location of the hard disk; Display the health detection status of the hard disk; You can also use the lights to indicate where the hard drive is located:
Select the unused hard disk to create a storage pool, and then create a storage space. Choose the RAID type based on your needs (Basic is the one selected for this tutorial). The file system format of the old system is XFS, while the new system file system supports Btrfs and ext4 (Btrfs will also be upgraded with snapshots at a later date).
Once the SSD and HDD have been initialized, start installing the application. The new system uses an application center mechanism (similar to the Synology suite) to install the required applications as needed, and according to the official development plan, third-party applications will be supported in the future. I started by installing Docker and the virtual machine (the apps were both installed on the SSD):
Let's set up some system settings:
2.2.1 Fully open SSH
One of the major features of UGOS Pro is that it is completely open to SSH, so the DXP4800 can be used as a Linux server. Go to the "Control Panel" and find "Terminal" to open it (it is recommended to modify the default port for security purposes):
Logging in to DXP4800 via SSH can even install Linux applications via apt commands (the experience of a complete Linux host). For example, after I install neofetch, I check the system information as follows. The new system is based on Debian, open SSH, and supports apt to install applications. Full SSH access means that some apps can be installed natively for a better experience.
Thanks to the opening of SSH, the new system has also put a lot of effort into security, with SSH having an auto-lock function (to prevent brute-force attacks) and a firewall. Remote connection permission management is also more stringent. The security details are well done (and users themselves should develop better security habits):
2.2.2 Domain name access UGREENlink
UGREENlink is another important feature that allows you to customize a domain name when you turn it on. You can remotely access the NAS with a domain name and a browser (no need for a real remote access from the client). UGREENlink is a very powerful feature, and we will introduce the advanced gameplay of UGREENlink with virtual machines later:
UGOS Pro 文件共享方式支持：SMB、FTP、NFS、Rsyc、WebDAV。 我个人习惯了 SMB：
UGOS Pro's "Shared Permission Management Function" is also more powerful, which shows that the new system has done a lot of paving the way for enterprise use scenarios.
The new system also adds the ability to back up the configuration to the cloud, allowing for quick recovery of the configuration file after resetting the system. More detailed in terms of functionality and safety:
2.3 Mobile Display
The new version of UGOS Pro has two intuitive improvements: 1. The login speed is improved, and the app is quickly connected to the device, 2. The interface is simpler, but the display information is richer and more streamlined:
The new version of UGOS Pro has laid a more solid foundation as a whole, and has more professional function support while maintaining ease of use, which I believe will be much smoother in the subsequent function development.
Now that the initialization part of the machine is complete, let's talk about Docker and the virtual machine.
三、DXP4800 Docker 部署篇
Next, we will introduce how to play Docker in DXP4800 and recommend some Docker containers that are commonly used on NAS. I'll illustrate this with a few examples:
- how to deploy Docker containers on DXP4800;
- how to deploy containers via docker-compose;
- How to migrate the existing containers of other devices to the current device;
3.1 How to deploy containers on DXP4800
Let's start with how to use the new Docker Manager. Open the new Docker Manager, search for the container name in the "Image" option, and pull the corresponding image to your local computer (Jellyfin as an example):
After the image is pulled, then click the "Container" option, there are 2 options for creating a new container: 1. Create through a configuration file; 2. Manually created. Here you can choose to create manually:
The new Docker Manager automatically assigns local mapped folders and ports (which you can also adjust manually):
After the creation is complete, you can access the Home of the container through the specified port:
3.2 How to deploy containers via docker-compose
The new system is fully open to SSH, so containers can also be deployed using docker-compose from the command line (which may be easier for some experienced NAS players). Basics: The new system disk mount path is /mnt/media_rw/string, which will be used when deploying containers using docker-compose:
在 SSH 中安装 docker-compose ：
sudo apt install docker-compose Next, we will demonstrate deploying the paint tool drawio via docker-compose. Create a new folder on the SSD named drawio and copy the compose.yaml file to that directory:
version: '3.3'
services:
drawio:
container_name: draw
ports:
- '1003:8080'
- '1004:8443'
image: jgraph/drawio SSH 到 DXP4800。 切换到该目录执行 sudo docker-compose up -d 命令部署和运行容器：
After the container is deployed, access the container Home through the configuration port:
I've also introduced Dockge, an artifact that manages docker-compose, and those who are interested can also deploy it themselves.
3.3 Migrate existing containers from other devices to the current device
How do I migrate the containers and data deployed on the previous device to the new device? For example, first export the image on the original device, import the image on the new device, and then create a new container.
Map the original device to the local configuration file and copy it to the new device mapping folder. Run the container so that the original data is migrated to the new device and works normally:
If you are familiar with docker command-line tools, you can also use docker's export, import, and other commands to migrate containers.
3.3 Common Docker containers that I recommend
Let's talk about the common Docker containers that I recommend. Due to the limited space to introduce its deployment and use, it is easy to find relevant tutorials on the Internet.
- Jellyfin: AV server
- Navidrome: Music server
- Calibre-Web：图书服务器
- Komga: Manga server
- Homepage：NAS导航页
- Alist: a network disk management tool
- HomeAssistant：智能家居服务器
- Immich: Image management service
These are general-purpose containers. In fact, around the specific needs of audio-visual, smart home, books, etc., several containers are often needed to build a complete service. I'll also share more tutorials on these step by step.
In fact DXP4800 has made major upgrades to the cloud album and video center, which can completely replace self-built containers such as Immich and Jellyfin. The photo album that comes with the system incorporates more AI elements and features, making it more playable. You can back up your family's photos here, especially if you have a family, and your wife's phone will be backed up, so you don't have to spend money on the largest version of your phone.
4. DXP4800 Use virtual machines
DXP4800 This time brings a more powerful virtual machine tool, which not only supports the creation of virtual machines, but also shares virtual machines for collaborative operations. You can install a hypervisor in the app center (it is recommended to upgrade the device memory to 16G for a virtual machine). Here I take the virtual machine installation of Windows as an example to briefly demonstrate the virtual machine installation process:
First, create a VM in the hypervisor and upload the installation image file to the NAS.
After creating the virtual machine, start and connect to the virtual machine, and then you will be redirected to a browser to access the virtual machine desktop through VNC:
The created virtual machine can generate a shared link and share it remotely through LAN or UGREENlink, making the virtual machine more diverse.
As for why you deploy virtual machines, it depends on what each person actually needs.
5. DXP4800 Experience
NAS is a data management tool designed to help us better manage our data and make it easier for us to access it. The new UGOS Pro is even more powerful in data management. It not only maintains the open direction of simple and easy to use, but also opens up more professional functions, which can meet the dual needs of home users and professional users. Home NAS often acts as a library for movies and television, music, books and comics. Make it easier for your phone, tablet, TV, and other devices to access resources anytime, anywhere. NAS is also a useful office aid, allowing you to work remotely. Facilitate access to the required documents when traveling; It is convenient to back up files in a timely manner.
The new Greenlink private cloud model is also aimed at the enterprise-level market. UGOS Pro brings some new features to meet the needs of small and medium-sized enterprises to build small data centers. So DXP4800 also has a professional side.
My summary
DXP4800 brings a nice all-around upgrade: it's still the most beautiful NAS; Richer interfaces and more specialized design elements have been added. It is a big leap forward in terms of system and functionality: the new Debian-based UGOS Pro is fully open to SSH and supports remote access to domain names. The new system is also on par with professional NAS in terms of security and rights management. Soft power has been significantly improved! I believe that there will be richer gameplay and ecology in the future. Domestic NAS is getting stronger and stronger, so it's interesting.
Judging from each iteration of Greenlink, the progress of each time is also very obvious. I am very satisfied with the new product, and what I am looking forward to now is that the old equipment can be upgraded to the new system as soon as possible!