Synology DiskStation DS1520+

Beautifully packaged and simplicity itself to set up. The screwless bays come with screws, which in my case certainly stay in the box. The drive cages slide silently into the box and I will apply the key to them later although there are no little fingers to cause any accidents any more.My first impression is how quiet the thing is, although I can feel the air being pushed from the back and out through the side and front. I love the design where there is space around the drives used for cooling. Also the separate brick power supply is perfect for me as I have plenty of space for it and it takes heat away from where it matters.I popped in 5 WD40PURX drives and DS7 installed like it was on rails. DS7 warns about these drives not being on the nice (WD40EFRX) list but I don't know why: it seems a bit pedantic to me. Perhaps on their NVR series they warn the other way around? I chose Synology Hybrid Raid for flexibility and maximum usable capacity, and the BTRFS format which is new to me. DS7 is very quickly up and running and I'm signed in to my Synology account to get a Quick Connect ID. Product registration via the a/c is automatic. After a day or 2, DS7 gives the drives a clean bill of health using an unintrusive background check, and the drive lights flash incessantly until that's done. After that, power saving puts everything to sleep when demand is off, which it will be frequently for me as a home user.I bought this as a consolidation of several disparate lesser NAS boxes. I had already been impressed by DS6 and DS7 but a DS115 or DS215j did not have anything like enough power for surveillance or Photo Station. This relative beast has 8GB non-upgradable of DDR4 RAM and a quick quad-core processor and I look forward to tackling surveillance and media again. CPU and RAM monitors are pretty idle right now. There are 4 gigabit ethernet sockets out back and I am taking full advantage with Netgear GS724T switches and link aggregation (LAG) between them using ethernet and fibre channel (FC) cables.Apart from surveillance and photo, my core uses are file, audio and video sharing, backup and web site hosting, all of which I could do on a Zyxel NSA320 vintage 2012. But DS7, cameras and mobile phones are the future.I have installed Photos and transferred a few dozen old JPGs to make a start. The interface is quick, unlike the DS215j. I haven't tried mobile access or sharing yet, but I'm sure the DS1520+ is more than adequate.Just 2 words to the wise: 1) Don't expect to be able to expand an SHR volume with smaller drives later; use your smallest capacity at the start and (2) Beware the WD EFAX which although a red drive does not perform, unlike the standard EFRX; think of it as a Red Lite (pun intended).I am very impressed, although I have yet to try Surveillance Station or photo sharing.I am also about to try the cache with 2 NVMe M.2 SSD drives, which hopefully will make a difference to popular Web pages when the hard drives have to spin up.

Had this a while now so thought it time to do a review.The Nas came nicely packaged and was easy to setup with the hard drives i purchased elsewhere.Installed only 3 x 8TB HHDs and 2 500GB M.2 in the base.Once setup complete, switched on and run through setup and was up and running i very little time.Have Plex running through mine as well as using for backup of main pc.Synology seem to have got it right with the software, having tried rival company NAS.Overall, interface for uploading, downloading, streaming etc is great and simple to do.I thought it was going to be hard but even if you are not that tech minded, you should have little to no problem setting one up.

Having used drobos for over 10 years, I was surprised how quiet this unit is with very little fan noise. Certainly something that works within a home office environment without being distracting.The raid setup is straightforward and user friendly. The ability to mix and match drive sizes and upgrade as and when you need is a real must have.Setting up email notifications was very straightforward and you get audible alerts in the case of a fault or drive degradationFor more advanced users, the ability to run docker containers on the NAS is particularly useful.

I've wanted a NAS for a few years to use as a Plex server and for general backups. I settled eventually on Synology after seeing many reviews and I'm glad I did.I have the 5-bay DS1520+ with 3 bays populated. This gives me enough space for all my media files and personal backups. DSM 7 is fantastic and really fast and both 1st and 3rd party apps are well made and work 100%.It doesn't have some of the more advanced features you'd expect at this price range, like 2.5Gb or 10 Gb ethernet or PCIe expansion or even HDMI, but I can't say I'm too bothered about this.Copying to and from the NAS is fast enough for me (100MB/s to 115MB/s) and Plex on my TV can playback movies with a bitrate of up to 50mbps (could be more with a better TV). Also, hardware transcoding is supported and available to Plex Pass users.

Decent NAS. Relatively easy to setup if you've used a NAS before. But remember you have to create a volume yourself. It doesn't happen as part of the setup routine.Very fast. Getting 125Mb/s constant write speed for large video files.No issues using mixed hard drives manufacturers. I'm presently using WD blue, Seagate Barracuda and a WD unamed drive. All 6TB drives pulled from external hard drives to save money. No issues. All drives work fine with the NAS.Recommended.

Easy as usual I have used synology for a few years super fast delivery. I know some people can hear the fans what you have to remember this is at the higher range of the synology and with 2 fans at the back I have mine set at cool mid range and yes I can hear ot a little but for me it's fine. Set up with link aggregation very easy to set up. I did get some nmve for cache but like an idiot I got the wrong one I didn't look and got sata ssd so will get the right one at some point. In all love this and it will work hard over the years very happy.Synology are not cheap but for what you get it can do some amazing things and I'm into my photography so plenty of options for that.I have played with the synology chat seems OK a little discord of your own but will look into that more.But I do like it alot.

Drives easy to install. Good software. Would recommend.