🔍 Read the full analysis: Why The UGREEN NASync DXP6800 Pro Joined Our AI Fleet on ThorstenMeyerAI.com
Prime made for students and young adults
- Fast, free delivery for dorm and study essentials
- Prime Video and Amazon Music included
- Member-only deals
TL;DR
ThorstenMeyerAI.com bought a UGREEN NASync DXP6800 Pro after duplicate iCloud backup files nearly filled a server. The NAS has been delivered but is not installed; its planned backup setup and two acceptance tests have not yet been completed.
ThorstenMeyerAI.com has bought a UGREEN NASync DXP6800 Pro after duplicate files from an iCloud-synced database backup left one server with 2% free disk space. The six-bay network storage device has been delivered and fitted with drives, but it is not yet connected to the network, and the site says it will return the hardware if it fails two planned backup tests.
The incident that prompted the purchase happened on September 17, according to the site’s November 1 report. Two machines sent database dumps with the same filename to an iCloud folder. The service retained repeated conflict copies, and 29 copies helped push the database server close to full. On October 29, a separate nightly backup job also reported an error when cleanup of old copies timed out while iCloud was busy. The report says the backup itself was intact; managing its copies was the problem.
The NAS has been equipped with four Seagate IronWolf Pro 16 TB hard drives and one NVMe SSD. The planned arrangement puts the hard drives in RAID 6, which the report estimates would provide about 32 TB of usable capacity and tolerate the failure of two drives. The SSD is intended for a separate pool for containers and test databases. These are plans, not completed configuration or tested performance figures.
The site says its present backup routine has not changed: two Macs use local Time Machine disks, and a nightly database dump is copied to iCloud. The new device must pass two acceptance tests before rollout: Time Machine backups using a non-admin account, and snapshots that remain inaccessible to that account. The NAS was purchased with the author’s own money; the report says UGREEN did not supply or sponsor it and had not reviewed the article.
Infographic 01 · The box
Six bays, two fast slots, two 10GbE ports
What UGREEN lists for the NASync DXP6800 Pro, and how we plan to fill it.
How we fill it
Delivered and equipped; the setup is our plan (1 Nov 2026)
Bays 1–4: Seagate IronWolf Pro 16 TB, RAID 6, Btrfs → ≈ 32 TB usable, any two drives may fail. Bays 5–6: free for growth. M.2 slot 1: the NVMe SSD (ordered: Samsung 990 Pro 1 TB) as its own fast pool. Slot 2: free. Six 16 TB drives in RAID 6 would give ≈ 64 TB.
What else UGREEN lists
From the product page, not measured by us
- Separate 128 GB SSD for the operating system, UGOS
- RAID: JBOD, Basic, 0, 1, 5, 6, 10
- 1× PCIe x4 · 2× Thunderbolt 4 · 8K HDMI · SD card reader
- Power: 43.07 W drives in use · 24.91 W drives in hibernation
- Stated maximum: 208 TB with 32 TB drives · 3-year warranty
Why six bays: with RAID 6, two drives always hold parity. In four bays that leaves half the raw space usable; with all six bays filled it becomes two thirds.
Sources: UGREEN DXP6800 Pro product page, checked 1 Nov 2026; Seagate IronWolf Pro data sheet DS2129.4; our setup plan, 6 Oct 2026.
Powered by Thorsten Meyer AI
Faster Restores, With New Safeguards
The purchase addresses a practical weakness in a small operation that depends on several Macs for publishing and AI-related work. A network-attached local copy could make it faster to restore hundreds of gigabytes than downloading them from cloud storage over the office connection, while giving the team a storage medium separate from its computers. That is the intended benefit; no restore-speed results are available yet.
The account also points to a distinction that matters beyond this particular hardware choice: synchronization is not the same as backup protection. A sync service can mirror deletions or unwanted files as well as useful changes. The site cites UGREEN’s help center for the behavior of its own Cloud Drives app, which it says deletes a file on the other side when it is deleted in two-way sync. Its proposed NAS plan therefore adds snapshots and an offsite copy rather than treating a mirrored folder as the whole backup strategy.
The potential consequences are material to the operation described. Its database server has had recurring kernel panics since August, and the site says one crash on August 8 caused 2¼ hours of database downtime. A NAS cannot prevent a computer crash, but a reliable local backup might shorten recovery. Whether it does so will depend on successful setup, monitoring and restore tests.
Products Worth Considering
Apple MacBook Air 13-inch with M5 chip, 16GB memory, 1TB SSD, and 12MP Center Stage camera (Midnight)
Samsung 27 Odyssey OLED G5 (G50SF) QHD QD-OLED Gaming Monitor
Apple AirPods Pro 3 Wireless Earbuds with Active Noise Cancellation
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
The Storage Problems Behind the Purchase
The site describes a small fleet rather than a data center: Macs run its main PostgreSQL database, local AI models, content pipelines and tests. Measurements taken on October 6 put storage use at about 2.6 TB on the main desk machine, 744 GB on the database server, and 3.2 TB on the model server. The database itself was about 293 GB. The site estimates its current backup need at 6 to 8 TB, noting that many model files could be downloaded again.
The DXP6800 Pro was selected over a cheaper four-bay model because its six SATA bays would leave room to add drives without replacing the existing ones, the author wrote. UGREEN’s published specifications, as cited in the report, list a 10-core Intel Core i5-1235U processor, two 10GbE ports, two M.2 slots and 8 GB of DDR5 memory expandable to 64 GB. These are manufacturer specifications, not independent test results. With six 16 TB drives in the planned RAID 6 arrangement, the report estimates around 64 TB usable.
The intended protection plan has three layers: separate, quota-limited accounts for each Mac; daily snapshots those accounts cannot access or delete; and an encrypted offsite copy sent with restic to Backblaze B2, with Object Lock intended to prevent deletion. The report says disk-heavy work would run overnight to reduce daytime noise. It rules out placing a live database change log on spinning disks, giving AI agents administrator credentials, opening remote access from the internet, or relying on a UGREEN cloud mirror as the offsite copy.
“That was the day I stopped treating a sync service as a backup.”
— Thorsten Meyer, ThorstenMeyerAI.com
Setup and Backup Tests Still Pending
The report is explicit that the NAS is not yet on the network or configured as of November 1. Neither acceptance test has run, and the existing backups remain in place. As a result, it is not yet known whether the intended account permissions, Time Machine workflow and snapshot protections will work as planned, or how quickly the system can restore data.
The drive layout and capacity figures are planning estimates based on the specified hardware and RAID arrangement, not measured results from an operating NAS. The article is not a review or long-term test, and the author says the setup has not been used in production. It also remains unclear when deployment will happen and whether the device will pass the tests or be returned.
Deployment Depends on Two Tests
The next step is to connect and configure the NAS, then test Time Machine with a non-admin account and verify that daily snapshots cannot be accessed or deleted through that account. Failure on either test means the device will be returned, according to the report. The site says it plans to report back with real results once the NAS is running; until then, the proposed storage layout, security controls and recovery benefits remain unverified.
Key Questions
Why did ThorstenMeyerAI.com buy the NAS?
The site says duplicate database-dump files created by an iCloud sync conflict nearly filled a server, while cleanup of old copies later timed out. It wants a local backup destination and storage for containers and test databases.
Is the UGREEN NAS already backing up the computers?
No. As of November 1, 2026, the device had been delivered and fitted with drives but was not connected to the network or configured. The existing Time Machine and iCloud backup routine remained in use.
What storage setup is planned?
The plan is to use four 16 TB hard drives in RAID 6, estimated by the report at about 32 TB usable, with an NVMe SSD in a separate pool for containers and test databases. The arrangement has not yet been installed or tested.
What must happen before the NAS is accepted?
It must pass two tests: Time Machine backups using a non-admin account, and snapshots that the account cannot access or delete. The report says the NAS will be returned if either test fails.
Does the NAS replace the offsite backup?
No. The planned setup keeps an encrypted offsite copy in Backblaze B2 using restic and Object Lock. The site says it does not intend to treat a UGREEN cloud mirror as its offsite backup.
Source: ThorstenMeyerAI.com
