ASUSTOR AS-302T Review – Ultimate Home Multimedia Centre

November 10, 2013 Andy

The AS-302T, 3 series NAS, supports XBMC instead of Boxee (used in 6 series)

The ASUSTOR AS-302T features a Intel CE5335 dual core 1.6GHz Atom chip, 1GB memory and HDMI 1.4a video out that is capable of high definition 1920 x 1080 output.

The Intel CE5335 SOC (System on Chip) has got enhanced graphic capabilities that allows for smooth full HD multimedia playback or transcoding to lower bit-rate for streaming to other devices. The hyper threading capability on the CE5335 SOC give a performance boost to Apps that are capable of making full use of its 4 CPUs.

Media Mode gives the NAS better performance using multimedia playback

There are no lack of multimedia App on App Central – Plex Media Server, XBMC, iTunes Server, etc. There is an interesting “Media Mode” prompt when you install any of these multimedia apps. The “Media Mode” actually reserves a portion of the system memory for certain Apps to use for multimedia playback. Well, you want smooth video playback right? This is what it does, prioritising the memory for multimedia usage over the others.

XBMC – Home Theatre Software

The AS-302T supports XBMC and installation is a breeze via App Central. For those who have used the ASUSTOR 6-series NAS enclosures, you will notice that Boxee is not supported on the 3-series.

To control the XBMC, you will need to download the XBMC remote control application for Android / iOS via Play Store / App Store. Just follow the onscreen instructions to configure the XBMC remote control application soon you will be enjoying 1080P high definition videos on your television. Otherwise, you can grab the ASUSTOR Remote Control (an optional accessory) for the same purpose.

iTunes Server – Streaming your music around your home network

iTunes Server serving videos and music to your iTunes

If you are still keeping your videos and music locally on your computer at home, it is time to consolidate them onto the iTunes Server and access them from any computer on the network using iTunes. Yes, iTunes will discover the AS-302T as a shared library and allow you to steam contents off it.

Is the AS-302T a great Multimedia Centre?

Yes. The ASUSTOR AS-302T does seems to be a great multimedia centre albeit lacking in the area of on-demand content App. So no Netflix, Google Hulu Plus, Pandora, etc. Well, to be fair to the ASUSTOR AS-302T, I am not aware of other NAS enclosures that has on-demand content App.

The different parts of ASUSTOR AS-302T review