Apr 28, 2025 23:00:00

Synology has released a NAS that limits storage from other companies, but the vast majority of users on the Internet are saying they will switch from Synology to a NAS from another company.

Synology has announced that

it will restrict the use of third-party storage with its own NAS . On Thursday, April 24, 2025 (Japan time), the first personal NAS equipped with a third-party storage restriction system, the DS925+ , was released. However, overseas reviewers have given the DS925+ a negative evaluation, and in an online survey, the overwhelming majority of respondents said they would switch from Synology to a third-party NAS.

DiskStation DS925+ | Synology Inc.
https://www.synology.com/ja-jp/products/DS925+

FAQs about Drive Compatibility Policy for Synology Storage Systems Starting in 2025 - Synology Knowledge Center
https://kb.synology.com/ja-jp/DSM/tutorial/Drive_compatibility_policies

Synology has previously implemented a restriction system for third-party storage in its enterprise NAS, but on April 16, 2025, Synology's German subsidiary announced that it would also implement similar restrictions for personal NAS. As a result, Synology NAS devices released after 2025 will only be able to support Synology-branded HDDs and SSDs.

Synology NAS is trying to restrict the use of drives other than those certified by the company - GIGAZINE

Then, Synology released the 4-bay NAS 'DS925+' on April 24, 2025.

When you check

the list of storage that can be installed in the internal tray of the DS925+ , you will see a list of Synology branded HDDs. In past products, this list had a 'Third Party' item, which also displayed storage from manufacturers such as Seagate, Toshiba, and Western Digital.

Only Synology-branded SSDs can be installed in

the built-in M.2 slot .

Android Central, an overseas media outlet, published a review article on the DS925+ on April 23, 2025, stating that 'Overall, it's a great product, but it's ruined by not being able to install third-party storage.' Below is the warning screen that was displayed when Android Central installed Seagate's NAS HDD 'IronWolf ' on the DS925+. It seems that even the NAS management system ' DiskStation Manager (DSM) ' could not be installed when the Seagate HDD was installed.

In addition, when NAS comparison site NAS Compares contacted Synology, they received responses such as 'Using verified drives makes you 40% less likely to experience critical disk issues' and 'Models that

adopt the new HDD compatibility policy have up to 88% fewer critical storage anomalies compared to previous models.'

Following Synology's decision to 'limit third-party storage,' a survey was conducted on the online bulletin board Reddit asking whether people would 'continue to use Synology NAS' or 'switch to another NAS brand.' A total of 1,193 votes were cast in the survey, with 258 people saying they would continue to use Synology products and 935 people saying they would switch to another brand.

There have been many posts on Reddit expressing dissatisfaction with Synology's past responses. The following post lists past responses such as 'removing the iTunes server function,' 'significantly reducing support for USB devices,' and 'making it impossible to play H.265 videos.' In particular, the move to make it impossible to play H.265, which can significantly reduce video file sizes, can be seen as a measure to force users to store larger video files and increase the frequency of replacing storage.