The free and open source software market has made a tremendous leap forward in recent years, so today thousands of companies are using FOSS instead of public clouds. You don't have to buy a huge server to run your micro-cloud, you can set up a lot even on a desktop NAS.

The two-sided SSD layout always promises interesting speed, and when you have two DDR4 cache chips on board under the control of a 4-core controller, Silicon Motion SM2264, the result is high stability in mixed loads and excellent multithreading up to 128 threads.

This model shows that even a small 2-disk desktop NAS can pleasantly surprise with storage capabilities: up to 4 NVME SSDs and up to 16 hard drives when using cards and expansion shelves. The ability to configure layer-by-layer storage and run applications in containers in a compartment with a 2.5-gigabit network makes it an excellent choice for a modern office with remote access and Wi-Fi 6.

The most difficult thing is not even to pick up packages to replace Synology services with free ones, but to support their work, promptly responding to glitches and updates. This is not an easy, but doable task that can be completed in a few weeks.

You are very lucky if you used the NAS's of this company only for storing files: you will easily find a replacement for yourself. It's much worse if your business is actively tied to DSM services, including those related to virtualization, video surveillance, backups and fault tolerance.

Do you install new SAS-12 or SATA-600 hard drives into a self-assembled server or workstation, and they do not start and are not detected? The controller does not see the HDD, there is no sound of the spinning platters and the cracking of the heads? Even if the disk has worked in another server before, it does not start either in the disk cage or when cables are connected directly? Most likely, you bought the disk at seconadry market or from an unofficial seller, but do not rush to apply to the warranty or return the money, as the solution may be simple or cheap: it is possible that your HDD supports the Power Disable Feature technology, which prevents it from starting in the server. This is a fairly old problem, but there is not much information about it on the web, and the solution is simple and trivial.

A simple inexpensive NAS that has Plex, Owncloud, Nextcloud services, supports Docker, cloud management and its own backup system for Windows and Linux clients. It can work absolutely silently by turning off its fan.

A very unusual NAS, which the manufacturer himself considers to be Smart Edge switches. It has a built-in PoE switch for 16 ports, as well as 2.5-Gigabit Upstream interfaces and a software architecture with isolated network spaces for video surveillance.

Will Vendor Lock be implemented, how did the company survive the mining fever, how does it look at Web3 and decentralization, ZFS and RAID 2.0+, will DSM be sold separately? We are talking about this and other topics with the CEO of Synology.

Icy Dock company is the most famous manufacturer of disk cages for HDD and SSD, widely known for its series of metal cases for hard drives ToughArmor, which could drive a car without damaging the drives. Today, when it seems that the world has already completely switched to SSD, and Name M.2 boards are replacing SATA SSDs, there are still reasons for choosing 2.5-inch hard drives. This is a relatively inexpensive volume, which is provided by SATA models with a capacity of 4 TB, and high reliability of hybrid Enterprise HDD, such as the Seagate Exos 10E2400. In particular, SAS SSDs with a thickness of 15 mm are quite common.

A modern NAS is quite capable of protecting itself from most attacks and guaranteeing not only the continuity of the service, but also the inviolability of the stored data. Even with minimal settings and following the manufacturer's recommendations, the NAS can become an impregnable fortress for an attacker, so reliable that you can connect the device directly to the Internet without a Firewall, leave it literally in an unguarded place (which is important for peripheral installations), being absolutely sure that even if it is physically stolen, your data will not be in the hands of competitors and will not be merged into the network.

We have a typical business NAS of the Mainstream class: with two 10-Gigabit network ports, a fault-tolerant power supply unit and an 8-core Intel Xeon D-1541 processor. This is a solution for most large and small organizations, which can be assigned to file sharing on the network, backup and operation of various services.