Synology is a storage technology brand known for its enterprise and consumer class storage products, where products such as storage machines and NAS (Network Attached Storage) are seen as popular among ordinary users and small businesses alike.
Recently, along with the introduction of their latest Synology Plus Series NAS series, Synology confirmed that to get the full benefits of this latest NAS storage system, users will need to use a separate Synology storage system.
Among the features that cannot be accessed if the user uses a third-party hard disk include hard disk health reports, storage lifetime analysis, massive storage duplication and automatic firmware updates.
This is not to say that third party storage should no longer be used, but the features stated above should not be accessible to users, and if you work in an office, and want to ensure that your hard disk storage is healthy and usable before it needs to be replaced.
It is speculated that these Synology hard disks may actually be developed by companies like Toshiba or Western Digital, and come with built-in DRM to ensure these additional features can only be accessed through those systems.
Synology also confirmed that this issue will only be featured on their latest Synology Plus Series NAS systems, and models launched before this year will not face this issue.
This is not the first time Synology has limited feature support like this. In the past few years, they have limited features like this to their enterprise offerings for their data centers and storage machines, where companies need to use their own Synology storage.
There is a possibility that Synology will also introduce a list of third party “official” hard disks that can be used with their new NAS in the future, but it is not confirmed if this will be the case.
For large companies, it is generally not an issue to purchase stores like this, but for small companies that may want to reduce operating costs as much as possible, this may be something that is somewhat difficult to accept.