I am never surprised by the DIY NAS builds Brian Moses publishes each year. I am usually on the other end of a chat helping him choose parts. I have been excited about the motherboard and case for this year’s DIY NAS build and giveaway for so many months, but Brian always asks me to keep my mouth mostly shut.

He won’t get mad if I talk about things, but I suspect he would yell at me if I published a blog with the NAS specs before he managed to do so!

I didn’t even mention the awesome Jonsbo N1 case in the title!

The Jonsbo N1 looks fantastic, doesn’t it?! It is tall. It is somewhat narrow. It is also packed to the gills with hardware. Or you can lay it down and it will be short, narrow, and rather deep.

I am usually all about hiding computers where they can’t be seen. In my opinion, monitors, keyboards, and mice are meant to be seen. The hardware that drives my experience is meant to be hidden. If I built a server around the Jonsbo N1 case, I would absolutely need to find somewhere to display it. It just looks awesome!

The Jonsbo N2 was released shortly after Brian had already ordered a Jonsbo N1 for the 2023 DIY NAS build. The specs of the Jonsbo N1 and N2 are almost identical. They both require an SFX power supply. They both have room for a Mini-ITX motherboard. They both have room for five 3.5” hard disks and a single 2.5” hard disk.

The Jonsbo N1 is tall and narrow. The Jonsbo N2 is very nearly a cube, and it gives you easy access to hot swap your NAS hard disks. The spec sheet says the Jonsbo N2 is smaller, but they are pretty similar in size. Both are super dense.

I think they are both really amazing cases. The Jonsbo N1 looks cooler. The Jonsbo N2 is a more practical server. I love them both.

The Topton N5105 motherboard is the heart of the 2023 DIY NAS

The Topton N5105 Mini-ITX motherboard is my favorite part of the build. When you combine it with the Jonsbo N1, it is like peanut butter and jelly.

I have been waiting for a motherboard like this ever since I built my AMD 5350 server in 2015. At first, I was a bit disappointed in the Topton. I was able to buy the motherboard and CPU for that build in 2015 for about $90, and the Topton motherboard definitely costs a good bit more than that.

The Jonsbo N1 and the Topton N5105 at Brian's House

Then I remembered that prices on PC components are higher than ever, and the Topton packs in so many features that I didn’t have eight years ago: six SATA ports, two m.2 slots for NVMe drives, and FOUR 2.5 gigabit Ethernet ports. It manages to pack all this hardware into a small package and still keep the power usage down just like my old server.

The Celeron N5105 has enough encryption acceleration magic to push Tailscale past one gigabit per second, and its integrated GPU is supposed to be fast enough to encode and decode 4K video streams for Jellyfin. It packs a pretty good punch for its 10-watt TDP!

Have you entered to win the 2023 DIY NAS giveaway?

I entered the giveaway! Brian didn’t manage to write the rules in a way that exclude my participation. I don’t know if it would be fair if I win, but entering was fun!

All you have to do is publicly explain what you would do with the DIY NAS if you won the contest. You can post it on your blog, on YouTube, on Instagram, on Twitter, or pretty much any other public space. As long as you can link to his blog post, and there is a way to link to your content, then you are likely eligible to win. You should check the actual rules instead of my summary paragraph if you want to know for sure!

Conclusion

I think this is the coolest DIY NAS build in quite a few years. This is a power-sipping build with room for more than 100 terabytes of storage, and it is packed into a beautiful case the size of an overgrown shoe box. I would be excited to have this NAS on a shelf in my home office!