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QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready — main product image
QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready
QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready
QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready
QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready
QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready
QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready
QNAP

QNAP TS-673-8G-US 6-Bay NAS Server 10G-Ready

★★★★★4.3 (138 reviews)
4K4GB DDR4PCIe Gen3

Quad-core AMD processor and dual PCIe Gen3 x4 slots give this 6-bay NAS the headroom to grow from file server to 4K transcoding appliance.

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Overview

The QNAP TS-673-8G-US is a 6-bay NAS and iSCSI IP-SAN appliance built on an AMD RX-421ND quad-core processor clocked at 2.1GHz base and 3.4GHz turbo, paired with 8GB DDR4 and 512MB DOM flash for the QTS operating system. What distinguishes the TS-673 from entry-level NAS hardware is its two PCIe Gen3 x4 expansion slots — a hardware provision that means this appliance can be reconfigured as network infrastructure evolves. Today it may serve as a high-capacity file server over four aggregated Gigabit links; tomorrow a QXG-10G card brings it into 10GbE territory, and a validated GT 1030 GPU enables hardware-accelerated 4K transcoding via Plex or QNAP's own media server application. These aren't theoretical upgrades — they're designed into the hardware architecture.

The TS-673 targets IT administrators, creative studios managing large media libraries, and prosumer users who want enterprise-grade storage flexibility without enterprise pricing. The six drive bays support 3.5" and 2.5" SATA drives in any combination, while the dual M.2 SATA SSD slots feed QNAP's Qtier auto-tiering — software that continuously analyzes access patterns and migrates hot data to SSD tiers automatically, improving effective throughput without administrator intervention. iSCSI IP-SAN support makes the unit viable as block storage for VMware or Hyper-V deployments where a shared storage target is required. At 64GB max RAM, the virtualization and containerization headroom is real: Docker containers, Linux Station VMs, and QTS application workloads can run concurrently without memory contention. For buyers willing to invest in PCIe expansion hardware, the TS-673 grows with the workload rather than becoming a bottleneck.

Key Features

AMD RX-421ND 2.1~3.4 GHz, 4GB DDR4 RAM, 4x 2.5"/3.5" + 2x M.2 2280/2260 SATA 6Gb/s drives, 4x GbE LAN, optional 10GbE PCIe expansion

Two PCIe Gen3 x4 slots support QM2 cards, 10GbE adapters, or wireless network cards

Supports the NVIDIA GeForce GT1030 graphics card, allowing for 4K video transcoding and output

Dual M.2 SATA 6 Gb/s SSD slots allow for setting up caching or storage pools, improving file access efficiency

Qtier auto-tiering technology and SSD caching enable 24/7 optimized storage efficiency

Specifications

Processor
AMD RX-421ND 2.1~3.4 GHz
RAM
8GB DDR4 RAM
Drive Bays
4x 2.5"/3.5" + 2x M.2 2280/2260 SATA 6Gb/s
Ethernet Ports
4x GbE LAN
PCIe Slots
Two PCIe Gen3 x4
Optional Expansion
10GbE PCIe expansion
Graphics Card Support
NVIDIA GeForce GT1030
Features
Qtier auto-tiering technology, SSD caching

Pros & Cons

👍 Pros

  • Two PCIe Gen3 x4 slots provide genuine hardware expansion capability — 10GbE networking, GPU-accelerated transcoding, or M.2 storage cards can be added as requirements evolve without replacing the unit.
  • AMD RX-421ND quad-core processor with 3.4GHz turbo handles concurrent workloads — simultaneous iSCSI, SMB shares, Docker containers, and surveillance streams — without the single-core bottlenecks that weaken ARM-based NAS competitors.
  • Expandable RAM ceiling of 64GB DDR4 accommodates heavy virtualization workloads that would exhaust the memory capacity of fixed-RAM NAS appliances.
  • Qtier auto-tiering with dual M.2 SSD slots optimizes storage efficiency continuously without manual intervention, keeping frequently accessed data on fast media automatically.
  • Four independent Gigabit Ethernet ports enable link aggregation configurations delivering up to 4Gbps aggregate throughput on existing GbE infrastructure.

👎 Cons

  • 4K video transcoding requires purchasing and installing an additional NVIDIA GT 1030 PCIe GPU — it is not a built-in capability, adding cost and setup complexity for users who want media server functionality.
  • The base 8GB DDR4 is adequate for file serving but insufficient for running multiple VMs or containers simultaneously; memory upgrades are an additional cost to unlock the platform's full capability.
  • 6-bay capacity is a ceiling — users expecting to scale beyond six drives will outgrow this chassis and have no expansion path without migrating to a larger unit.
  • All drive bays are SATA-based; there is no NVMe U.2 or NVMe PCIe drive bay support, meaning NVMe storage must go through the M.2 slots in a SATA-limited configuration rather than full PCIe bandwidth.
  • The AMD RX-421ND platform is several CPU generations old, and QNAP's QTS software ecosystem continues developing while hardware performance headroom for future container-heavy workloads remains fixed.

Frequently Asked Questions

The TS-673 ships with 4x Gigabit Ethernet ports but no built-in 10GbE. Achieving 10GbE requires installing a compatible 10GbE PCIe NIC into one of the two PCIe Gen3 x4 slots — QNAP's QXG-10G1T or QXG-10G2T cards are validated options. This is a deliberate design choice that lets you buy 10G capability only when your network infrastructure actually supports it.
The TS-673-8G-US ships with 8GB DDR4 (not 4GB as the feature list notes — the description is authoritative at 8GB), expandable up to 64GB. Increasing RAM beyond 8GB provides measurable benefit in two scenarios: running multiple VMs or containers simultaneously via the QTS virtualization layer, and improving metadata caching for large NAS environments with millions of files.
The two M.2 2260/2280 SATA 6Gb/s slots can be used either as dedicated SSD caching pools (accelerating HDD array read/write performance) or as independent storage volumes. QNAP's Qtier auto-tiering can also incorporate them into a tiered storage pool that automatically migrates hot data to the SSDs and cold data to HDDs — a meaningful real-world efficiency gain for mixed workload environments.
Not natively. 4K transcoding requires installing a compatible NVIDIA GeForce GT 1030 graphics card into one of the PCIe slots — the AMD RX-421ND CPU alone lacks the GPU acceleration needed for smooth 4K transcode. The GT 1030 is specifically validated by QNAP for this purpose. Purchasing and installing the GPU is an additional cost and step not included in the base unit.
For most NAS use cases — simultaneous SMB/NFS shares, iSCSI targets, surveillance recording, and container apps — the RX-421ND at up to 3.4GHz turbo is not the bottleneck; network throughput and storage I/O typically constrain first. The processor becomes the constraint in CPU-bound tasks: software-based video transcoding without GPU assist, heavy encryption overhead, or running multiple resource-intensive VMs simultaneously.

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