HP's Speedy Media Smart EX495

The EX495 ships with one 1.5TB drive instead of the two 750GB units that the EX487 features--which means there's no possibility of data redundancy unless you add another drive. The EX495 is otherwise physically identical to the EX487, with four bays (three open) for internal storage expansion, as well as four USB ports and an eSATA port for external storage and printers. It's also one of the more attractive-looking units on the market.

With the addition of more processing power (2.5GHz versus 2.0GHz), HP's MediaSmart EX495 not only bested its EX487 stablemate that we reviewed earlier this year, but proved to be the fastest network-attached storage box we've ever tested. Move over, Synology DS209+ II! The EX495 was particularly fast during virus scans and at finding files thanks to the indexing feature of its Windows Home Server operating system.


The EX495 offers a nice array of services, including backup and restore of network PCs; backup of the unit itself; and photo, music, iTunes, and video serving and sharing--but none of the more esoteric features such as the video surveillance that Synology and others have implemented.