Asustor FLASHSTOR 12 Pro Gen2 FS6812X, 12 Bay All M.2 SSD NAS, AMD Ryzen Quad Core 2.3GHz, 16GB RAM ECC DDR5, Dual 10GbE, Network Attached Storage for Video & Content Creators(Diskless)

Think twice before buying Asustor FLASHSTOR 12 Pro Gen2 FS6812X, 12 Bay All M.2 SSD NAS
UPDATE July 2025:.After owning this device for few months (it wasn’t actively used after initial transfer of about 12TB worth of data to it for backup/DR recovery purposes), time to update the original review below.Asustor FLASHSTOR 12 Pro Gen2 FS6812X is ridiculously overpriced for this lightweight flimsy plastic box and internals. It is running hot on fans set to Auto but at least it is very quiet. I’ve seen my SSDs hitting 70°C (50-55°C while idle) and the CPU/system reports about 55°C during normal use which is a bit high for my liking.What you have to be aware that this NAS is very picky about the memory (especially ECC memory) so even if the NAS boots up and ADM works it doesn’t mean that it may not have some weird problems such as random crashes. Run the memtest and keep the OEM memory module until you’re sure the upgrade memory works as Asustor support will put all blame on it if your NAS crashes. Asustor sells two brands of memory only – their own and PHS-branded memory that is listed as compatible which limits our choice for memory modules from popular brands such as Crucial, Kingston, OWC or Nemix that cost 3 times less. So the 600 USD upgrade cost to 32GB ECC memory (to get a matching pair of 16GB ECC SODIMMs) will cost you almost the half of the current price of FS6812X!!! It is plain and simply ridiculous and completely unjustified. I can have the same 32GB ECC memory from Nemix for 150 bucks, or Kingston for 200.Another thing to be aware is that because of limited PCIe lanes engineers had to make hard decisions how to spread these between all internal slots. As a result, not all SSDs you’re going to install on this NAS will get the same speed regardless what SSD you’re using: these installed on port #9 and #10 will be limited to around 800-900Mbps simply because these Gen 3×1 ports theoretical maximum bandwidth is 1 GB/s:Port #1: Gen 4x4Port #2 through 4: Gen 4x2Port #5 though 8: Gen 4x1Port #9 and 10: Gen 3x1Port #11: Gen 3x2Port #12: Gen 3x4So it makes no sense to use fastest possible NVMe SSDs for this NAS – they simply can’t reach their maximum speed except when used on Gen 4×4 slots and even then the bottleneck will be 10GbE LAN interface. Rather, use single-sided and most power efficient ones.Asustor support is slow to respond. I have an open ticket regarding the crashes for 7 days (most of the troubleshooting I did on my own) and the only thing the support did was to downgrade the ADM to older version.I am also awaiting the support to troubleshoot the issue with Network LED light on top of the unit that is off when LAN1 or LAN2 is connected to 10Gbit switch port (it is lit if the port is 2.5GbE). I noticed this issue on ADM 5.0.0.RJG2 but it could be from earlier version of software. I will revisit this review later once these issues are resolved one way or another.I am also waiting to Asustor support to provide instructions on how to roll back to previous version of ADM without opening a support ticket. Asustor support insists the NAS should be online, tied up to Asustor ID (which means it should be authenticated against my account), and root level credentials provided to support person so they can “prepare” the NAS prior to rollback. I do not want to wait days every time I want to switch ADM version so it has to be a way to do so over SSH offline once I have the desired ADM image downloaded. I have a ticket open with Asustor regarding this.Honestly, I regret this purchase, at least at this price. Specs-wise, this should be a decent NAS but cheap and flimsy plastic housing, crippled hardware, insufficient cooling, plastic pins that hold SSDs in place that easily break, ugly “modern” industrial case design, and some compatibility problems paired with slow and inactive support are not really building confidence in this model and brand as a whole.——————————————NOVEMBER 2024 initial review:——————————————This initial review is for Asustor FLASHSTOR 12 Pro Gen2 FS6812X, 12 Bay All M.2 SSD NAS purchased in Nov. 2024.I was looking to add all-flash NAS to my venerable (mixed HDD+SATA SSD + U2 NVMe) QNAP TS-h973AX, mainly to find a use for 12 2TB Samsung 970 EVO/EVO Plus SSDs I had left from my previous homelabs and laptops.Gen 1 of FLASHSTOR had only one 10G network port that was too risky to my liking and very underpowered CPU so when I saw that there is a Gen 2 FLASHSTOR that has much more potent AMD QC Ryzen CPU with 20 PCIe lanes and two 10Gbit interfaces I decided to try it out. There are not many devices for all-flash storage in this price range anyway (and I think the 1.5 Cleveland banknotes I paid for it is ridiculously high price for this lightweight plastic) but it works well with above mentioned SSDs and it is much quieter than my QNAP filled with 5x 18TB WD HDDs, two 8TB SATA SSDs, and two 15TB Micron U2s.The FS6812X came with single DSL 16GB DDR5 5600 CL46 ECC memory stick (D5XH2G081SH56B-BC) which I upgraded to 2x Kingston Technology 16GB 4800MT/S DDR5 ECC CL40 SODIMM 1RX8 Hynix A (KSM48T40BS8KI-16HA) (WARNING: this memory may not be 100% compatible as I experienced systems crashes I am still trying to troubleshoot) could as I think will be the proper configuration to have a few applications and containers running on this NAS. Please note that FS6812X uses ECC DDR5 which is a good think if one cares for their data (standard DDR5 has some error correction but not the full ECC).Whole NAS feels cheap, well, because it is made of plastic (I feel the power supply is heavier than the NAS itself) and it is getting pretty hot even with fans running on Auto. I wish it had a metal frame with some plastic for longevity since I am used to Synology and QNAP devices that last well over 10 years, and I am not sure if ASUS will not disintegrate much sooner.You’ll definitely need Asustor AS-HK1 M.2 Heatsinks since even PCIe Gen 3 M.2 SSDs are getting hot (I saw them hitting 70C while running initialization or intensive R/W).You can adjust the brightness of all LEDs on the NAS, or turn them off completely if you have the NAS serving you MKVs in your living room :-)ADM v.5x is relatively polished and although it cannot compare to Synology’s DSM and QNAP’s QuTS hero, it serves the purpose and allows you to manage the storage with ease. Some people are even installing custom OS so having a choice is always welcome.Speaking of memory, this reminds me that this device supports (officially) 64GB ECC DDR5 but I saw that some folks tested and confirmed that it works with 96GB DDR5 (non-ECC). I can’t image what they’ll be using so much memory for on this systems (since the CPU is quad core and not that powerful to run multiple virtual machines and 300 containerized applications) but hey, who knows, it might be good for something that does not require too much compute but will benefit if loaded into the RAM for faster access.Some people complain about this NAS not working with Mac over Thunderbolt 4. Well, it is NOT TB4/USB4 enclosure, it is a NAS (network attached storage) so does not expect it to work and show you your file shares by directly connecting it to your Mac via TB4 cable!I do not have any numbers yet about speed in this configuration as I literally just assembled the NAS and set one 20TB RAID5 volume on it. I hope I can return back and update this review once I have used the NAS for a while.

A solid performer with exceptional speed when used with 10G network switches
Performs exceptionally well. Recommend you add an additional 16GB or 32GB of internal RAM. Very high speed 10G network connections work well. Good internal cooling. Solid web-based interface.

I had a Synology DS220+ before this one, and I was getting realy tired how much noise it was making with its spinning HDDs even though I put it in a closet and added some sound proofing you would hear it making noises, so I have been looking for quite some time to upgrade to a full SSD NAS and after a lot of thought I decided on this Flashstor from Asustor and I was a bit worried that from what I heard that Synology DSM is so userfriendly and good and no other NAS comes close to to Syno software. That is so wrong, I frigging love Asustor ADM. it feels really good and I have no problems navigating it. And finally no more HDDs sound from the closet, all silent and nice. And the speed of the SSDs setup is just so good, my NAS is now finally super responsive and I feel like I can host more things on it and realy use.

geen Wake on LAN… Gebruik HP laptop (655 g11) en krijg via thunderbolt maar een snelheid van 400 MB/s. Ik weet niet of het aan laptop of Flashstor ligt. Verschillende kabels geprobeert. Software is vrij goed (komende van Synology (die is qua software uiteraard wel beter maar dat stoorde me niet – de basis is ok).

I bought the Asustor FLASHSTOR 12 Pro Gen2 FS6812X to consolidate all my scattered USB drives and multiple storage setups into one fast, centralised system—and it’s been a fantastic upgrade.Here’s what stands out:I installed six 4TB NVMe drives and set them up in RAID 5, giving me around 20TB of usable space with redundancy.12 x M.2 SSD slots offer massive potential for future expansion, and make this NAS totally silent—no spinning disks here.Dual 10GbE ports provide blazing-fast transfer speeds—file moves and backups are quick and effortless.The Ryzen Quad Core 2.3GHz CPU and 16GB ECC DDR5 RAM handle everything smoothly, even under load.The Asustor OS is clean and powerful with great tools for backup, media, Docker, and more.USB4 Type-C is a nice touch for external device access.Yes, it’s on the expensive side, but with these specs and performance, I think it’s worth every penny.If you’re looking for a high-performance NAS with tons of SSD storage potential, excellent speed, and a future-ready setup—this is it.