Western Digital My Cloud DL4100 review
The future looks cloudy for WD’s new business NAS appliance
Not the fastest or best featured NAS appliance but it’s cheap and cloud access is a cinch to configure
-
+
Good value; Easy installation; Simplified cloud access; Quiet
-
-
Short on storage features; Unimpressive backup performance
Backup features and performance
For speed testing, we mapped a share to an E5-2600 v3 Xeon server and saw drag and drop copies of a 50GB file return sustained read and write rates of 112MB/sec and 104MB/sec. Real world backup operations were less impressive as a copy of a 22.4GB folder with 10,500 small files averaged only 41MB/sec.
Using SmartWare Pro to run a scheduled copy of the same test folder returned a meagre 10MB/sec. Fortunately, we only needed to do this once as it then runs subsequent incrementals.
The DL4100 also supports IP SANs and CHAP authentication but features such as thin provisioning, LUN backup and snapshots are not present. Even so, performance was good with a 500GB target delivering Iometer raw read and write rates of 100MB/sec and 98MB/sec.
It's slow but the SmartWare Pro software provides some useful workstation backup features
Sign up today and you will receive a free copy of our Future Focus 2026 report - the leading resource for IT decision-maker insight on priorities and investment areas in AI, security and more.
Dave is an IT consultant and freelance journalist specialising in hands-on reviews of computer networking products covering all market sectors from small businesses to enterprises. Founder of Binary Testing Ltd – the UK’s premier independent network testing laboratory - Dave has over 45 years of experience in the IT industry.
Dave has produced many thousands of in-depth business networking product reviews from his lab which have been reproduced globally. Writing for ITPro and its sister title, PC Pro, he covers all areas of business IT infrastructure, including servers, storage, network security, data protection, cloud, infrastructure and services.
-
AWS becomes first hyperscaler to secure 'NATO Restricted' approval as alliance members target ‘resilient and agile’ infrastructureNews The move means NATO member states and defense partners can host highly sensitive data in AWS’ cloud services
By Ross Kelly Published
-
Microsoft takes down ‘EvilTokens’ hacker service that used AI to ‘decide who to target, who to impersonate, and how to most effectively exploit’ victimsNews In just six months, the EvilTokens phishing as a service platform hit thousands of organizations worldwide
By Emma Woollacott Published
-
Civo unveils first of 40 planned edge data center sites across UKNews The first site, in Hertfordshire, will open next year, with the rest coming over the next three years
By Emma Woollacott Published