Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is no reason to use a synology device anymore with RPI’s having sata shields and other SoC boards that are readily available that run Linux. Yes, Synology was easy but so is the decision to not ever use them again…
RPIs have no ECC RAM. Without ECC RAM you can get bitrot in your RAID/ZFS much more easily.
Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
421–430 of 679 posts
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#422Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is no reason to use a synology device anymore with RPI’s having sata shields and other SoC boards that are readily available that run Linux. Yes, Synology was easy but so is the decision to not ever use them again…
Another way to put this is that Synology misjudged their customers' appetite for alternatives. The ease of use of the Synology solution was always a plus of the product, but Synology misjudged the values and abilities of its core customer. They also misjudged the rapidly maturing market of competitors (e.g., why am I buying a Synology instead of UGREEN?) Their core customer always had the ability to set up their own…
That is exactly where I am. The value prop on synology has fallen off. Esp since they have let their kernel rot. There are tons of perf they are leaving on the table. The default external ports are usually 1g and most others have moved to at least 2.5g.
I just wanted something I just didnt have to mess with a lot. And could pop in an external USB drive here and there. Other solutions will fill that need just fine too. Just didnt really want to fiddle with DIY.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#423Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm uncertain of why $40 vs $300 is even a point of debate on HN. The latter is a one-time investment and you likely can expand it a bit i.e. add a 2.5" or M.2 drive later. What's the gain of running 12 RPi, exactly? Do you do research work requiring distributed low-cost computing?
I do distributed computing, and doing it at home for low costs without cloud spend helps…
Are virtual machines not an option for your use case? From the outside looking in they appear like they would be easier to manage and far less costly.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#424The decision to restrict 3rd party harddrives may be part of the reason why sales (allegedly) plummet, but i'm guessing lack of innovation also plays a big part. Synology has been resting on the laurels for years. They had a "hit" with DSM 6, then did mostly nothing for a decade, released DSM 7, and again, nothing but minor things since. On the hardware side of things, they're mostly still using decade old hardware,…
Oh nice, thanks for mentioning UGREEN. I had a quick look at the website and it looks fairly cheap. I wouldn't trust their software but the base system comes on an MMC, does it mean I can flash it with TrueNAS or Unraid?
It is 100% normal x86 mini-PC, just with HDD bays.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#425Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly the route I took. I had an aging tower machine full of spinning disks running on an old LSI adapter that was doing hardware raid. They were out of space and I began to get nervous the LSI adapter could die and I would trouble replacing it. Decided JBOD for the future. External drives were on sale, I bought several and setup with a RPI. Lots of headaches. It took effort to iron out all the USB and external dis…
I think most LSI adapters you can get a battery backup for. I've got one on mine, plus a spare battery sitting on a shelf somewhere. I admit when I put the system together for the first time I was a little hesitant to go with hardware RAID but it's worked out fine so far.
I reckon the issue is more in replacement than transient data loss: what are you going to do when you can't find a replacement controller card, or it only available at ludicrous prices?
With a proprietary on-disk format you can't exactly hook them up to any random controller and expect it to work: either you find a new one from the same controller family, or your data is gone.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#426When leadership makes decisions that are so out of touch with their customers it also severely impacts internal morale. Yeah, so they reversed eventually. But the technical and support people at Synology probably tried to fight this and lost. That feeling of being ignored despite having given this company your everything for many years. I bet many woke up feeling that the magic that made Synology a good place to work…
What is interesting here is that Synology leadership is quite technical and there was no acquisition or other big event that I am aware of that resulted in this strategy. It was a complete own goal and as predictable as could be. Synology apparently wasn't aware of what their brand values were as perceived by their loyal customers and that's the kind of move you make at your peril. I'll be surprised if they survive t…
I went with a UGreen NAS a couple of months ago specifically because Synology had added this restriction. It's been a happy decision so far.
When reading up and watching videos for what I should get, everything pointed at Synology as being the "Apple of NAS products." But everything I looked at showed they were coasting on their status and had actively worsened their products in recent revs.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#427When leadership makes decisions that are so out of touch with their customers it also severely impacts internal morale. Yeah, so they reversed eventually. But the technical and support people at Synology probably tried to fight this and lost. That feeling of being ignored despite having given this company your everything for many years. I bet many woke up feeling that the magic that made Synology a good place to work…
What is interesting here is that Synology leadership is quite technical and there was no acquisition or other big event that I am aware of that resulted in this strategy. It was a complete own goal and as predictable as could be. Synology apparently wasn't aware of what their brand values were as perceived by their loyal customers and that's the kind of move you make at your peril. I'll be surprised if they survive t…
AND they haven't publicly admitted they made a mistake yet, either. That would be another missed opportunity to correct their course.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#428Bose first, Synology second. Bad execs need to go.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#429Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t know if their brand is that great. I have been using synology NAS for about 15 years. It is very solid and easy to use, but the hardware is expensive, non customizable, the underlying OS is based on an ancient linux kernel. I have now run into the volume size limits (200TB) and disk sizes keep increasing exponentially. And they don’t support enterprise SSDs (SAS/U.2). So in my mind I was already thinking of m…
Can you run a standard Linux distro on them? Is their OS custom or based on OpenWRT or something else?
Why would you want to? That’s not what they’re for.
The kind of person who wants to do that is squarely outside their market. And you’d be paying a real premium for nothing.
Re: Synology reverses policy banning third-party HDDs
#430NOT true. They have NOT fully reversed on this. Please read: https://kb.synology.com/en-global/DSM/tutorial/Drive_compati...
> Last updated:Jul 30, 2025
Appears to be stale documentation.