UGOS update for UGreen NAS systems

Last week, UGreen released an update of the UGOS system to version 1.6.0.2917, which introduces several improvements to the operating system.

Introduction

With the DXP4800 plus, UGreen has brought very good hardware to the market for a reasonable price. At this price point, you won’t find features like a 10 Gbit network or M2 cache on the competition. However, it’s also true that UGOS has some drawbacks and many things are open to criticism.

Last week, UGreen released version 1.6.0.2917 of the operating system. However, there were immediate problems with this version, so I’ve only just installed the new version.

Let’s take a look at the new version and clarify what, if any, has changed.

The Snapshot App

The BTRFS file system is known to be able to create a snapshot of the current state of the file system, which can also be restored. This is now also possible in the interface with the Snapshot app.

This is a real step forward, as it means that users who might not be able to configure it at the shell level can take advantage of this file system feature.

However, a snapshot created via crontab is considerably more flexible when it comes to creating snapshots.

I had already set it up this way via SSH. However, if a .snapshot directory already exists in the folder from which you want to create snapshots with the app, the folder is grayed out in the app.

External Drives

There is a bug regarding the use of external USB storage devices directly via a device’s USB interface. This occurs at least when a regular user plugs in an external USB drive.

The drive is mounted and can then be used, but a regular user cannot eject the device; only someone with admin rights can do that. This is actually a no-go, because if you allow a normal user to use drives, they must also have the option to remove the drive properly.

And one more thing: if the drive is ejected, it’s back after 1-2 minutes, automatically inserted and mounted as an external device.

No more SSH access

In addition to the standard admin user, I have another user, who can only gain root privileges via SSH using sudo if necessary.

After the update, I couldn’t log in via SSH because this user wasn’t part of the admin group. I find it pretty bold of UGreen to delete this as part of an update, especially without warning. I’ll be surprised when the Postfix I installed will be deleted or at least disabled with one of the next updates.

Conclusion

I’m happy with the Snapshot app because now every user can take advantage of the file system, even if you’re much more flexible using SSH and a cron job. The other updates are more marginal, and I’m waiting for the day when the underlying Debian Bookworm also gets an update.

That would be important for anyone who provides internet-accessible services on the UGreen NAS.

ciao tuxoche