Dealectric

Best 2-bay NAS for Time Machine backups from a couple of Macs (2026)

Updated 2026-11-08

Short answer. Buy the UGREEN NASync DXP2800 ($389.99; buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp2800), the best 2-bay NAS for Time Machine backups from a couple of Macs at its 2026 price, $389.99 diskless on 2026-11-03: UGOS Pro (firmware 1.9 or later) serves Time Machine over SMB with Bonjour, a capacity quota per shared folder, and the strongest hardware under $400 (Intel N100, 8 GB DDR5, 2.5GbE, two M.2 slots). Set it up as one share per Mac, each with its own quota, so one Mac cannot fill the other's space.

What to know: UGOS has no per-user Time Machine quota, only per share (hence one share per Mac); Synology's DS225+ (about $360–431, Celeron J4125, 2 GB) has the most complete Time Machine and quota documentation if you want the safest software on weaker hardware, and TerraMaster's F2-425 ($239.99–249.99) is the cheapest 2-bay with Time Machine support, with a forum-reported quota quirk in TOS 6. Apple's rule is a backup disk at least twice the Mac's storage, so two 4 TB drives in RAID 1 (4 TB usable) cover two Macs holding about 1 TB each; buy bigger drives for more.

Where to buy

Published 2026-11-03 · prices checked 2026-11-03.

ModelCPU / RAMLANTime MachineQuotaWarrantyPriceCode
UGREEN NASync DXP2800
Buy: https://dealectric.com/go/ugreen-nasync-dxp2800		Intel N100, 8 GB DDR5 (16 GB)1× 2.5GbEYes, SMB + Bonjour (UGOS Pro 1.9+)Per shared folder; one share per Mac2 years$389.99No discount code applies.
UGREEN NASync DH2300Rockchip RK3576 (ARM), 4 GB2.5GbEYes (Cult of Mac: enable Bonjour, then 'a breeze')Per shared folder2 years$239.99 (UGREEN NAS store, 2026-11-03)Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
Synology DS225+Intel Celeron J4125, 2 GB (6 GB)1× 2.5GbE + 1× 1GbEYes, SMB (Synology says turn AFP off)Per user or per shared folder; Synology's guide sizes it at 2–3× the Mac's data3 yearsabout $360–431 (trackers, undated)Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
Synology DS223jRealtek RTD1619B (ARM), 1 GB1× 1GbEYesPer user or share2 yearsNot listedNot sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
QNAP TS-262Intel Celeron N4505, 4 GB (16 GB)1× 2.5GbEYes, SMB 3 (QTS tutorial)A Time Machine user with a quota per Mac; QNAP suggests 2× the Mac's storage2 yearsNo US price foundNot sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
QNAP TS-233ARM Cortex-A55 4C, 2 GB1× 1GbEYes (QNAP's page)Per user2 yearsNo US price listedNot sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
TerraMaster F2-425Intel Celeron N5095, 4 GB1× 2.5GbEYes (TOS 6, Backup → Time Machine)Separate Time Machine quota; a forum thread reports any quota hiding the shareNot found$239.99–249.99Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
TerraMaster F2-425 PlusIntel N150, 8 GB DDR5 (32 GB)2× 5GbEYes (TOS 6)As aboveNot found$399.99Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
Asustor Drivestor 2 Pro Gen2Realtek RTD1619B (ARM), 2 GB1× 2.5GbENot confirmed on Asustor's pageAn owner reports no per-folder quota on their model3 years$269–312 (resellers)Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.
Ubiquiti UniFi UNAS 2ARM; RAM not confirmed2.5GbE (retail pages)Yes, SMB with a Time Machine toggle and per-user credentialsNot covered by Ubiquiti's articleNot found$199 ($214 with the memory surcharge)Not sold through Dealectric; listed for comparison.

Rows marked with a code and buy link are products Dealectric lists: the price was verified on the brand's own US store on 2026-11-07 and the code is tested daily in that brand's cart; the date shown is its last pass (last check 2026-11-13). The other rows (Asustor, QNAP, Synology, TerraMaster, UGREEN, Ubiquiti) are included so the comparison is complete; their figures and prices were read from the makers' own US pages on 2026-11-03 and are not re-checked daily. The buy links are affiliate links: they open the brand's official US store at no cost to the shopper, and the commission pays for the testing; see the disclosure.

Setting it up on the DXP2800

  1. Update UGOS Pro to 1.9.0.0035 or later and enable SMB and Bonjour in Control Panel.
  2. Create one shared folder per Mac (Backups-Air, Backups-Pro) and set a capacity quota on each: at least twice that Mac's storage, per Apple, and never so small that Time Machine reports "insufficient space" (UGREEN's own warning). A sparsebundle's maximum size is fixed when it is created, so set the quota before the first backup.
  3. Turn on Time Machine for each share, then on each Mac choose its share in System Settings → General → Time Machine. Use separate NAS user accounts so one Mac cannot read the other's backup.

What is known and what is not

UGREEN's own support article (350) states the firmware and macOS 12 requirements and the per-share quota; reviewers set up Time Machine on the DH2300, DH4300 Plus and DXP4800 Pro without trouble. No sourced report of sparsebundle corruption or macOS 26 failures on UGOS turned up, which is thin evidence rather than clean evidence: macOS 26 (Tahoe) Time Machine failures reported on Synology, QNAP and UniFi units came from SMB signing and credential changes and non-ASCII names, problems any NAS can hit. Test a restore once the first backup completes, on any brand.

Drives and RAID

Two drives in RAID 1 give one drive's capacity and survive one failure; a Time Machine backup that lives only on the NAS is still a single copy, so RAID 1 is about not losing the backup when a disk dies, not a second backup. Two 4 TB NAS drives give 4 TB usable, enough for two Macs with about 1 TB of data each under Apple's 2× rule; 8 TB drives double that.

Sources

Published 2026-11-03; figures for other brands read on 2026-11-03; our prices verified 2026-11-07. Corrections welcome at [email protected] or /feedback.