THIS MONTH THE DOCTOR TACKLES...

> Better NAS mobo?

> Explorer crashes

> Speed up Handbrake

Alternative N100 board

In your article on building a NAS system in the April 2024 issue, two possible N100I motherboards were mentioned. In doing research on the components in the system, I came across a third possibility, the IKuai OS N100 ITX motherboard. Looking at the specifications, it seems like a much better fit for your NAS build. Some advantages over your choices are that the IKuaiOS has six SATA ports, four Ethernet ports, and two M.2 ports built into the motherboard. It does lack audio output, but I don’t think this is a problem for a NAS server. Using the iKuai OS board would seem to eliminate the need for the M.2 SATA card, the Ethernet card, and the SATA SSD drive (an M.2 SSD would replace it and there'd still be another M.2 slot available). An extra SATA port would be available for an optional SATA SSD drive if desired.

Currently, the iKuai OS N100 ITX motherboard is available from both iKuai’s website and Walmart for $138 and $135 respectively. IKuai also offers a package deal of the board plus a 16GB RAM chip and a 1TB M.2

SSD for $276. I don’t know the brands of the RAM and M.2 SSD included. My question is: would this motherboard work with your design and be a better and cheaper fit than your choices? How about popping one into your April NAS build, testing it, and letting us know the results?

—James Snell

THE DOCTOR RESPONDS: The iKuaiOS board you refer to is manufactured under another brand name—BKHD— with the product name 1264-NAS-MB. You can access its official website at www.bkipc.com/en/product/1264-NAS-MB.html for a detailed description and access to both a manual and a single BIOS update, dated December 21 2023.