Continuing with their notorious styling, Synology have reserved the use of the white plastic fascia for the budget model of NAS units. Last years DS212 featured exactly the same physical appearance as the new DS213. Synology have chosen to leave this aspect of the NAS untouched, personally I think this isnt something to be criticised, if it looks great there is no need to redesign. The outer shell has a rough, matt finish a stencil of the Synology logo is carved out on either side of the unit, underneath lies a combo of grey and black horizontal stripes. All of this results in a rather professional looking unit.
Matt steel outer construction sleek, stylish and professional
Synology logo on either side
Moving to the front of the unit the DS213 has a glossy plastic front fascia which is removable. Running along the right edge of the unit are various LED indicators, ports and buttons. From top to bottom there are the following:
Status LED
LAN LED
Disk 1 LED
Disk 2 LED
SD card port
USB 2.0 port
Reset button
Power button
Glossy plastic front with LEDs, ports and buttons
Spinning the DS213 round to the back we see the unit still has a 90mm exhaust fan for extracting heat from the PCB and HDDs. Beneath this fan are 2x USB 3.0 ports and a RJ45 Gigabit LAN port. Also on the back panel is the AC connector and a label with the mac address and serial number should you need these details for technical requirements.
The back of DS213 with dual USB 3.0 ports