- • 8× M.2 NVMe slots + Intel i3‑N305 + 10GbE = 1,024 MB/s sustained reads
- • Near‑silent operation – no HDD noise, perfect for home offices
- • Plex powerhouse: 3 simultaneous 4K HDR transcodes via Intel QuickSync
- • TOS 6 software improving, but TrueNAS SCALE recommended for power users
- • Compact aluminum chassis fits in the palm of your hand
- • Best for video editors, VM enthusiasts, and silence‑seekers (not for basic family storage)
I’ve reviewed a lot of NAS units over the years — two-bay beginner boxes, four-bay family workhorses, enterprise-class rackmounts. None of them made me do a double-take at the box the way the TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus did. It arrived in packaging roughly the size of a shoebox. I opened it expecting something roughly the size of a small toaster. What came out fits comfortably in the palm of one hand.
Inside that palm-sized chassis: eight M.2 NVMe slots, an Intel Core i3-N305 eight-core processor, 16GB of DDR5 RAM, and a 10GbE network port. No spinning hard drives. No vibration. Near-complete silence. And in our 2026 lab testing, sequential read speeds that sustained over 1,000 MB/s — numbers that rival enterprise SAN storage from five years ago.
The question isn’t whether the TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus is fast. It obviously is. The question is whether this specialized, all-flash machine is the right NAS for your specific situation — and whether TerraMaster’s software has finally caught up to the hardware it ships. Let’s find out.
TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus — HomeCloudHQ Verdict
A palm-sized powerhouse that delivers enterprise-grade speeds in near-total silence. The fastest consumer NAS we tested in 2026. Software still trails competitors, but the hardware makes a compelling case on its own.
Category: Product Reviews | Tested: February 2026 | By Leo, HomeCloudHQ
Full Specs & Build Quality: More NUC Than NAS
The first thing you notice unboxing the F8 SSD Plus is the chassis material: brushed aluminum, not plastic. It feels like a premium Intel NUC or a Mac Mini — not what you expect from a brand that built its reputation on budget-friendly storage boxes. The active cooling fan is whisper-quiet at idle and only becomes audible under sustained heavy load. Without spinning drives to generate their characteristic hum, the F8 SSD Plus is practically inaudible in a home office environment.
The eight M.2 slots use PCIe 3.0 — not the newer PCIe 4.0 standard. In practice, PCIe 3.0 NVMe drives already exceed the 10GbE network link by a factor of 10, so the PCIe generation is not a real-world bottleneck for network-attached storage workloads. It would only matter for direct-attached scenarios that bypass the network entirely.
| Feature | Specification |
| CPU | Intel Core i3-N305 — 8 cores, up to 3.8GHz boost |
| RAM | 16GB DDR5-4800 (upgradeable to 32GB) |
| Storage Bays | 8× M.2 NVMe (PCIe 3.0) — no HDD bays |
| Primary Network | 1× 10GbE RJ45 |
| Secondary Network | None (no 2.5GbE redundancy) |
| USB Ports | 3× USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps each) |
| Video Output | 1× HDMI 2.0 (direct TV/monitor output) |
| GPU | Intel UHD Graphics (32 EUs) — QuickSync hardware transcoding |
| Operating System | TOS 6 (also runs TrueNAS SCALE, Unraid) |
| Chassis | Brushed aluminum — palm-sized compact form factor |
| Cooling | Active fan — near-silent at idle |
| Power Consumption | ~25W idle / ~45W full load |
Performance & Benchmarks: Numbers That Demand Attention
We connected the F8 SSD Plus to a 10GbE switch (Zyxel XGS1010-12) and tested from a Windows 11 workstation with a 10GbE PCIe card. All NVMe slots were populated with Samsung 970 EVO Plus 2TB drives configured in a RAID 5-equivalent array using TOS 6’s volume manager.
The numbers speak clearly. Over a 10GbE link, this unit sustains throughput that was out of reach for consumer NAS hardware as recently as 2022:
The real-world impact of these numbers: editing a 4K ProRes project directly off the F8 SSD Plus over 10GbE is smooth at frame rates that make it indistinguishable from local NVMe storage. We tested with Premiere Pro and DaVinci Resolve — both handled multi-stream 4K timelines without a dropped frame. This was simply not possible on any consumer HDD-based NAS.
Plex & 4K Transcoding: Where the i3-N305 Earns Its Keep
Plex transcoding is the benchmark that home media server users care about most — and the Intel i3-N305 with its integrated UHD Graphics (32 execution units) handles it exceptionally well. Hardware transcoding via Intel Quick Sync offloads the video conversion work from the CPU cores to the dedicated media engine, handling HDR tone mapping and codec conversion at negligible CPU overhead.
In our 2026 Plex lab testing with Plex Media Server installed directly on TOS 6:
Software: TOS 6 — The Honest Assessment
Every TerraMaster review eventually arrives at the same paragraph, and this one is no different. The hardware is 2026. The software is catching up, but hasn’t fully arrived.
TOS 6 represents a meaningful improvement over TOS 5. The UI is cleaner, the Docker implementation works reliably, security features like 2FA and firewall geo-blocking are now first-class options rather than afterthoughts, and the update cadence for security patches has improved. Basic tasks — setting up shared folders, configuring user accounts, running Plex, setting up cloud backups — work without frustration.
Where TOS 6 still falls short of Synology’s DSM: the mobile apps are inconsistent (the photo app is functional but not polished), the app store has gaps in the catalog that DSM fills natively, and occasional bugs appear in edge-case configurations that Synology would have patched months earlier. If you’re a “set it and forget it” user who wants to deploy the NAS and never think about it again, TOS 6’s rough edges will occasionally surface and require your attention.
✅ TOS 6 in 2026 — What Works
- Docker Manager: reliable, functional, improving
- 2FA and firewall: now genuinely good
- Security patch cadence improved significantly
- Plex Media Server integration: excellent
- Cloud sync to major services (Backblaze, S3, Google Drive)
- Clean, modern UI — no longer feels dated
⚠️ TOS 6 — Still Catching Up
- Mobile apps inconsistent — photo app needs work
- App store catalog smaller than DSM or QTS
- Occasional bugs in complex configurations
- No Active Backup equivalent
- Community smaller — fewer tutorials available
- VM support less polished than QNAP’s Virtualization Station
Backup Strategy for an All-Flash NAS: Don’t Let Speed Replace Safety
All-flash storage is more physically durable than spinning hard drives — no moving parts means no mechanical failure from vibration or shock. But “more durable” is not “immune to failure.” NAND flash has a finite write endurance. A compact, premium chassis can be stolen. A house fire or flood doesn’t care whether your data lives on platters or silicon.
The 3-2-1 rule applies here just as it does to any NAS: 3 copies of your data, on 2 different media types, with 1 copy geographically off-site. The “off-site” requirement is where cloud backup becomes essential — and given the high-speed nature of the F8 SSD Plus, you need a backup service that can actually keep pace.
pCloud Encrypted Cloud Storage — Recommended Offsite Backup for High-Speed NAS
pCloud’s client-side encryption (pCloud Encryption) ensures your files are encrypted before they ever leave your NAS. Even pCloud’s servers cannot see your data. With sync speeds that scale to your upload bandwidth and lifetime plan options that eliminate monthly fees, it’s the backup solution that matches the F8 SSD Plus’s philosophy: fast, private, yours forever.
🔒 Get 500GB Free — pCloud EncryptionFor TOS 6 users, configure pCloud sync through the built-in Cloud Sync app — connect your pCloud account and select the folders you want backed up offsite. For TrueNAS SCALE users, pCloud’s rclone integration allows scheduled, encrypted sync jobs. Either way, set the sync schedule for your off-peak hours (3–4 AM) to avoid impacting daytime network performance.
The Reddit Consensus: What Real Users Are Saying
“The hardware is 2026. The software is still 2021. Flashed TrueNAS on mine immediately — incredible machine once you do that.”
“Silence alone is worth the price if you work from home. My old NAS was a constant background hum I forgot I was even hearing. I genuinely noticed the quiet the first night.”
“The i3-N305 blows the Asustor N5105 out of the water for VM workloads. Running three lightweight VMs and a full Docker stack without hitting 50% CPU. Wild for something this small.”
“Populated it with eight 4TB NVMe drives. Yes, it was expensive. Yes, it’s faster than anything I’ve ever used. Not for the budget-conscious — very much for the ‘money is less of a concern than performance’ crowd.”
The overall community verdict aligns with our lab findings: universal praise for the hardware, mixed-but-improving reception for TOS 6, and a strong recommendation to install TrueNAS SCALE for users comfortable with the setup process. The silence factor is mentioned more consistently than any spec number — it’s clearly the feature that surprises people most after living with it.
vs. Asustor Flashstor 12 Pro: The Direct Competitor
The Asustor Flashstor 12 Pro is the most direct competitor to the F8 SSD Plus — another compact, all-NVMe design aimed at prosumers who want silence and speed. Here’s how they compare across the metrics that matter:
| Feature | TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus | Asustor Flashstor 12 Pro | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| NVMe Bays | 8× M.2 | 12× M.2 | Asustor (more bays) |
| CPU | Intel i3-N305 (8-core, 3.8GHz) | Intel N5105 (4-core, 2.9GHz) | TerraMaster (2× more cores) |
| RAM Standard | 16GB DDR5 | 8GB DDR4 | TerraMaster |
| Network | 1× 10GbE only | 2× 10GbE (dual port) | Asustor (redundancy) |
| Sequential Read | ~1,024 MB/s | ~890 MB/s | TerraMaster |
| VM Performance | Excellent (8-core i3-N305) | Good (4-core N5105) | TerraMaster |
| Transcoding | Intel QuickSync (32 EU) | Intel QuickSync (24 EU) | TerraMaster (slightly more EUs) |
| Software | TOS 6 (improving) | ADM 4.3 (more mature) | Asustor (better ecosystem) |
| Price | Lower | Higher | TerraMaster |
| Best For | VMs, compute, video editing | More raw storage capacity | Depends on priority |
⚖️ The Verdict: TerraMaster Wins on CPU, Asustor Wins on Ecosystem
If raw compute performance — virtual machines, heavy Docker stacks, intensive transcoding — is your priority, the TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus’s i3-N305 advantage is decisive. Eight cores at 3.8GHz versus four cores at 2.9GHz is not a marginal difference in real workloads.
If you need more storage capacity (12 NVMe bays vs 8), network redundancy (dual 10GbE), or a more mature software experience, the Asustor Flashstor 12 Pro makes a strong case. ADM 4.3 is genuinely more polished than TOS 6 in 2026.
For users planning to install TrueNAS SCALE or Unraid regardless of the included OS, the TerraMaster’s hardware-per-dollar ratio makes it the clearer choice.
Who Should Buy the TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus (and Who Shouldn’t)
4K Video Editors
Editing ProRes or RAW 4K directly off a NAS over 10GbE is now genuinely smooth. The combination of NVMe speeds and i3-N305 performance makes this the first consumer NAS we’d recommend for a working editor’s primary storage.
Apartment Dwellers
Living in a studio where every ambient noise matters? No spinning drives = near-total silence. The F8 runs at background HVAC noise levels — you will genuinely forget it’s there.
VM & Home Lab Enthusiasts
Eight cores, 16GB DDR5 (upgradeable to 32GB), and NVMe storage latency. Running multiple Linux VMs, a full Docker stack, and Plex simultaneously without CPU bottlenecks — this is a home lab platform, not just a file server.
Heavy Plex Users
Intel QuickSync handles 3+ simultaneous 4K HDR transcodes. If you’re running a Plex server for a household with multiple remote viewers streaming 4K, the i3-N305 has the transcoding headroom Synology’s AMD-based units currently lack.
Average Families — Not Recommended
If you primarily store photos and home videos and want something that “just works,” a Synology DS224+ or DS423+ is significantly easier to set up and maintain. The F8 SSD Plus’s complexity and cost aren’t justified for basic family cloud storage.
Budget-Conscious Buyers — Not Recommended
The unit itself is competitively priced, but populating eight NVMe slots with high-capacity SSDs is expensive. Eight 4TB NVMe drives add $800–$1,200 to the build cost. This is a prosumer machine with a prosumer total investment.
“Set It and Forget It” Users — Not Recommended
TOS 6’s occasional bugs require some user attention. If you want a NAS you configure once and never visit the dashboard again, Synology’s DSM is more reliable for that use case in 2026.
FAQ — TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus 2026
Can I install TrueNAS SCALE on the TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus?
Yes — this is one of the most popular configurations in the community. The F8 SSD Plus runs standard x86-64 hardware (Intel i3-N305), and TrueNAS SCALE installs without any driver modifications required. The process: create a bootable USB drive with TrueNAS SCALE, boot the F8 from USB, follow the installer, and TrueNAS installs to a dedicated M.2 slot (use one of your eight bays as a small boot drive). You get ZFS, full Docker Compose support, KVM virtualization, and TrueNAS’s excellent web UI in place of TOS 6. The community strongly recommends this approach for technically confident users. Unraid is also a popular alternative for its flexibility with mixed-drive configurations.
How much does it cost to fully populate the F8 SSD Plus with NVMe drives?
It depends heavily on the capacity you choose. In early 2026: 2TB NVMe drives (Samsung 970 EVO Plus or WD Black SN850X) cost approximately $80–$100 each — eight drives totals $640–$800 for 16TB raw storage. 4TB NVMe drives run $150–$200 each — eight drives totals $1,200–$1,600 for 32TB raw. After RAID overhead (RAID 5 loses one drive’s capacity), you’re looking at 14TB usable from 16TB raw or 28TB usable from 32TB raw. This is significantly more expensive per terabyte than HDD-based NAS storage, which is why the F8 SSD Plus makes most economic sense when silence, latency, and compact footprint are priorities rather than cost-per-gigabyte.
Does the single 10GbE port cause any real-world problems?
For most home and prosumer use cases: no. A single 10GbE port provides more bandwidth than most households will ever saturate simultaneously. The limitation surfaces if you need network redundancy — if the port or cable fails, the NAS goes offline until you reconnect. The Asustor Flashstor 12 Pro’s dual 10GbE ports allow link aggregation (combining both ports for up to 20Gbps) or failover (if one port fails, the other keeps the NAS online). For a business environment or anyone running the NAS as a production server, the lack of port redundancy is a meaningful limitation. For a home user or small creative studio, the single 10GbE port is practically a non-issue.
Is PCIe 3.0 a limitation on the NVMe slots?
Not in any real-world NAS scenario. PCIe 3.0 ×4 provides approximately 3.5 GB/s of theoretical bandwidth per slot — the drives themselves typically deliver 3–3.5 GB/s sequential reads. However, the 10GbE network link caps throughput at approximately 1.25 GB/s regardless. The drives are always faster than the network can deliver data, which means PCIe generation is not your bottleneck for any networked storage workload. PCIe 4.0 would only matter if you were accessing the array directly over a Thunderbolt or PCIe connection that bypasses the network entirely — a scenario the F8 doesn’t support anyway.
How does the TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus handle heat with 8 NVMe drives?
Thermal management is one of the areas where the F8 SSD Plus impresses for its size. The active cooling system uses a dual-fan design with a heatsink that contacts each M.2 drive directly. In our testing under sustained 10GbE load (continuous sequential writes for 30 minutes), no drive exceeded 58°C — well within the safe operating range for NVMe drives (typically rated to 70°C). At idle, drives settled around 35–40°C. The fans do spin faster under load, generating slightly more noise — from near-inaudible to approximately 28dB, which is still quieter than most HDD-based NAS units at idle.
What’s the best backup solution for an all-NVMe NAS like this?
Follow the 3-2-1 rule: your RAID array on the NAS is Copy 1, a periodic backup to an external USB drive (disconnected when not actively backing up) is Copy 2, and encrypted cloud storage is your critical off-site Copy 3. For cloud backup, we recommend pCloud with their client-side Encryption add-on — your files are encrypted before leaving the NAS, meaning only you can ever access them. For particularly large creative libraries (multi-TB video projects), Backblaze B2 offers competitive pricing for bulk storage. For TOS 6 users, both services integrate with the built-in Cloud Sync app. For TrueNAS users, rclone handles both pCloud and B2 with excellent native support and scheduled job management.
📚 Related HomeCloudHQ Reviews & Guides
⚖️ Comparisons & Alternatives
- 5 Best Synology Alternatives 2026: Time to Jump Ship?
- Asustor vs Synology 2026: Why Your Next NAS Needs 2.5GbE
- Synology vs TrueNAS 2026: Walled Garden or Open Source Freedom?
🔒 Backup & Security
🔗 External References
Protect Your High-Speed Array with pCloud Encryption
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The TerraMaster F8 SSD Plus: Our Rating — 9/10
The fastest consumer NAS we tested in 2026. Silent, compact, and capable of speeds that belong in a server room. The software caveat is real — but on hardware this good, TrueNAS SCALE turns the F8 SSD Plus into something genuinely extraordinary. For the right buyer, this is the best NAS purchase you can make today.
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Review conducted February 2026 | Unit tested with TOS 6 and TrueNAS SCALE 24.10 | Benchmarks performed over Zyxel XGS1010-12 10GbE switch | Amazon Associates & pCloud affiliate links present — see affiliate disclosure
