100 Reasons DIY NAS (TrueNAS, UnRAID, Proxmox) are BETTER than Turnkey (Synology/QNAP/etc)

Last updated on 01 Dec 2025 📧 Subscribe

Why Many Users Choose TrueNAS, Unraid, Proxmox, OMV or ZimaOS over Synology QNAP, Terramaster and More –  100 Reasons

Plenty of people who start with Synology, QNAP or other turnkey NAS boxes will quietly admit that they keep hearing the siren call of DIY platforms like TrueNAS, Unraid, Proxmox, OpenMediaVault and ZimaOS. They see the videos, the benchmarks and the insane builds that squeeze every last drop out of consumer and ex-enterprise hardware. No one is pretending that turnkey systems are not convenient or polished, but more and more users are realising that the raw control, scalability and flexibility you get from rolling your own NAS can be worth the extra effort. In 2025 it is easier than ever to grab a used server, a pile of drives and a USB stick and end up with something that outperforms many branded appliances, both in speed and long term value. So, below are 100 reasons why users decide to jump ship from the safe, curated and sometimes expensive world of turnkey NAS, and instead join the more open, powerful and endlessly customisable world of DIY storage. Some points are very homelab focused, others are about cost and longevity, and some are specific to individual platforms such as TrueNAS ZFS, Unraid parity arrays or Proxmox clustering.

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER – Different tools suit different tasks! I use both DIY and Turnkey Solutions in my own personal/work data storage environments (as well as a little bit of DAS and even some off site cloud!),. This article is not designed to ‘attack’ or ‘slag off’ one side of the home server market over another! It is to help understand why users might choose one over the other. Not disimilar in some ways to how some people prefer PC gaming vs Console gaming (or even exclusively mobile, though even struggle to wrap my head around that one!).

1. Full control over your hardware

With TrueNAS, Unraid, ZimaOS, Proxmox or OMV you choose everything yourself, from CPU and RAM to motherboard, HBA, NIC, case and power supply. You are not restricted to a small list of approved chassis and expansion units, so you can build around quiet small form factor systems, big tower rigs, or used rack servers depending on your needs and budget.

2. No vendor lock on drives

DIY NAS platforms let you use almost any SATA or SAS drive you like, including shucked external drives and mixed brands. There are no vendor media lists, no compatibility warnings that nag you for using third party disks, and no artificial limits that push you toward expensive branded drives.

3. Advanced file system features

TrueNAS and some other DIY platforms give you direct access to ZFS features such as copy on write integrity, end to end checksums, compression, snapshots, clones and send or receive replication. You can design datasets and snapshot schedules exactly as you want rather than relying on simplified abstractions.

4. Flexible storage layouts and mixed disk sizes

Unraid and ZFS based DIY stacks allow non traditional layouts, with mixed disk sizes, parity only arrays, mirror vdevs, striped vdevs and multiple pools. You can start small and grow over time without following the fixed bay patterns or limited RAID options of many turnkey systems.

5. Deep performance tuning

DIY NAS operating systems usually expose more dials for memory usage, cache behaviour, record sizes, sync policy, queue depths and network stack tuning. Power users can squeeze more throughput or lower latency from the same hardware by testing and adjusting these settings, something appliance firmware often hides.

6. Multi role server in one box

A DIY NAS can be more than just storage. With Proxmox, Unraid, ZimaOS or OMV plus a hypervisor you can run VMs, containers, network services and lab workloads on the same system. This suits homelab users who want their storage server to double as a general purpose compute node.

7. Better use of high end or unusual components

If you invest in many core CPUs, large amounts of RAM, enterprise NVMe or special purpose HBAs, DIY platforms can take full advantage of them. You are not limited by a turnkey vendor firmware that assumes mid range hardware and sometimes underuses powerful components.

8. Lower cost at large scale

Once you move beyond a handful of bays, appliance NAS pricing climbs quickly. Building a DIY NAS with commodity parts or refurbished enterprise gear often gives you a much lower cost per bay and a cheaper upgrade path over five to ten years, especially for media servers and backup targets.

9. Reuse of existing hardware

Many people already have a spare gaming PC, workstation or decommissioned server. DIY NAS software lets you repurpose that hardware rather than buying a completely new appliance. You can then gradually replace parts over time without throwing the whole system away.

10. Independence from vendor roadmaps

With TrueNAS, Unraid, Proxmox or OMV you are not tied to one company product line or release schedule. If a vendor drops a feature, changes licensing, or stops making a class of device, your DIY stack keeps going and you can add or swap components as you see fit.

11. Open source transparency and auditability

Many DIY NAS platforms are open source or based on open distributions. You can inspect the code, follow public issue trackers, and see exactly how data path and management components behave. For organisations with strong security requirements this transparency can be more attractive than opaque appliance firmware.

12. Rich community plugin and container ecosystem

TrueNAS, Unraid, Proxmox and OMV all have active communities that publish templates, stacks and guides for a huge range of self hosted services. New applications usually appear first as containers or community charts, so you can experiment with cutting edge projects long before they arrive in any vendor app store.

13. Clean integration with existing homelab tools

If you already use tools such as Ansible, Terraform, Salt, Proxmox clusters, or Kubernetes, a DIY NAS fits into that world more naturally. It behaves like another Linux or BSD server, so you can reuse automation, monitoring, and configuration patterns that you already trust.

14. Freedom from feature based licensing

DIY platforms generally do not charge extra for adding more cameras, shares, users or applications. If your hardware can handle twenty containers or twenty camera streams, you can run them without buying more licences. That is very different from some turnkey systems where extra features are tightly controlled.

15. Strong privacy control and no enforced cloud accounts

TrueNAS, Unraid, ZimaOS, Proxmox and OMV can all run fully local with no requirement to create cloud accounts or sign in to a vendor portal. You choose if you want remote access and which VPN or reverse proxy you trust, so it is easier to keep storage isolated from external services.

16. Powerful scripting and automation options

Because DIY NAS software sits on standard Linux or BSD layers, you can use cron, systemd timers, full shell scripting and language runtimes such as Python or Go. Backup pipelines, integrity checks, archiving rules and housekeeping tasks can be scripted exactly as you need them.

17. Better fit for larger and denser builds

If you want twenty four, thirty six or more bays, DIY approaches scale more smoothly. You can use dedicated JBOD shelves, fibre or SAS expanders, and multiple HBAs, with TrueNAS or Proxmox managing pools across them. Many consumer appliances run out of official options long before that point.

18. Easier experimentation with new technologies

DIY platforms are ideal for lab work with new storage ideas, for example experimental ZFS features, new compression algorithms, alternative filesystems or clustered storage layers such as Ceph and Gluster. You can try these on real hardware without waiting for a turnkey vendor to embrace them.

19. Ability to virtualise the NAS itself

A DIY NAS stack can sit inside a virtual machine on top of Proxmox, VMware or another hypervisor. That makes it easier to move the entire storage system between hosts, snapshot the system disk, test upgrades in clones, or run multiple separate NAS instances on the same physical hardware.

21. Alignment with strict open source or compliance policies

Some companies and institutions prefer or require that core infrastructure runs on software with open licensing and source availability. DIY NAS stacks based on standard Linux or BSD distributions make it easier to satisfy those policies than closed vendor operating systems.

22. Efficient use of decommissioned enterprise hardware

The secondary market is full of cheap rack servers, HBAs and SAS shelves that are no longer wanted in data centres but are perfect for home or small business storage. TrueNAS, Proxmox and OMV can run happily on this hardware and give you enterprise level resilience for a fraction of the original cost.

23. Custom network roles on the same machine

A DIY NAS can also act as router, firewall, VPN concentrator or reverse proxy if you want to consolidate equipment. Proxmox or Unraid can host a firewall VM, DNS resolver and other network tools right next to your storage, which is not how most turnkey NAS devices are designed to be used.

24. Fine grained control of encryption and keys

DIY platforms usually let you decide exactly how encryption is applied, how keys are stored, how passphrases are entered and how this interacts with snapshots and replication. You can integrate with external key managers or strict manual processes rather than using a one size fits all wizard.

25. Easier avoidance of telemetry and phone home behaviour

If you want a storage stack that never connects to any remote service unless you deliberately configure it, DIY software is easier to keep quiet. You can review services, outgoing connections and packages yourself, instead of relying on a vendor to document what their appliance firmware does.

26. Flexible data retention and tiering schemes

Because you control the hierarchy of datasets, shares and pools, you can implement very detailed retention rules and archiving flows. Cold data can move to slower and cheaper disks, hot data can live on SSD pools, and you can enforce lifecycles with your own scripts instead of fixed vendor policies.

27. Shared skillset across storage and compute

When your storage servers and application servers all run similar bases, for example Debian or FreeBSD, the same administration knowledge applies everywhere. Teams do not need to learn a unique vendor interface for one box and a completely different approach for the rest of the estate.

28. Support for niche and emerging services

DIY NAS ecosystems often adopt new projects quickly, whether that is a young media server, a fresh photo tool, or an unusual database. Community templates for Unraid or Proxmox arrive much faster than official packages on proprietary platforms, so you can explore niche services early.

29. Long term reuse of hardware for other roles

If your storage needs change, a DIY NAS box can become a general server, a lab hypervisor or a test bench machine simply by reinstalling or repurposing the disks. You are not stuck with a chassis that only really makes sense as a proprietary NAS.

30. Lean installations without extra bloat

DIY stacks can be installed in a minimal way with only the services you actually need. There is no requirement to run vendor photo portals, cloud connectors or bundled office tools if you do not want them, which keeps resource use low and reduces the attack surface.

31. Granular control over updates and versions

DIY NAS platforms usually let you decide exactly when to update the core system, plugins and containers. You can hold a known good version for months, run a newer kernel only on a test VM, or pin specific containers while the rest of the stack moves forward, instead of accepting a single vendor update cadence across everything.

32. Ability to run several NAS platforms on one machine

With Proxmox or similar hypervisors you can run TrueNAS in one VM, Unraid in another and maybe a plain Linux storage stack beside them, all on the same hardware. This lets you compare platforms, migrate gradually or dedicate different virtual NAS instances to different clients without buying multiple appliances.

33. Deep visibility for troubleshooting and performance analysis

DIY systems expose full system logs, kernel messages, packet captures and low level profiling tools. When you hit a strange performance issue or network glitch you can drill right down into iostat, tcpdump or perf, rather than relying only on a high level vendor dashboard that may not reveal the root cause.

34. Configuration managed like code in Git

Because most DIY NAS configurations live in text or structured files, you can store them in Git, review changes, roll back to older commits and clone the same setup onto another node. This aligns your storage servers with modern configuration management practices instead of keeping all changes on a single vendor GUI.

35. Option to extend or maintain abandoned components

If a plugin, driver or feature you rely on is dropped by its original maintainer, an open DIY stack at least gives you the option to fork and maintain it or hire someone to do so. With a closed appliance firmware, once the vendor removes or changes a feature you generally have no way to bring it back.

36. Freedom to fully rebrand or white label

Service providers that build solutions for clients can install TrueNAS, Proxmox or OMV on standard hardware and theme the interfaces, hostnames and portals to match their own brand. There is no prominent third party logo on the front of the GUI, which is often preferable when you are selling a complete solution.

37. Direct choice of monitoring and alerting stack

DIY NAS servers can run native agents for Prometheus, Zabbix, Checkmk, commercial monitoring suites and whatever log pipeline you already use. You do not have to rely on a vendor specific cloud portal or proprietary alert format, so storage monitoring fits seamlessly into the rest of your infrastructure.

38. Support for unusual hardware form factors

Because you can install DIY NAS software on almost anything that runs a suitable kernel, it is easier to use very compact systems, blade servers, dense JBOD trays or custom builds that no turnkey NAS vendor offers. This flexibility is valuable when you have physical constraints or leftover hardware that does not match appliance shapes.

39. Full control over repositories and software sources

On a DIY stack you decide which package repositories are trusted, whether you mirror them locally and which versions are allowed. This is useful in secure environments that need all software to come from internal mirrors and want to block any unapproved external package feeds.

40. Faster access to new kernel and protocol features

New SMB or NFS versions, fresh filesystems, driver updates and network features typically land on general purpose Linux or BSD first. DIY platforms that stay close to upstream can adopt these improvements long before a NAS vendor ships them in a future firmware for a specific appliance.

41. Stronger learning value and career skills

Running TrueNAS, Unraid, Proxmox or OMV teaches real storage, networking and operating system concepts. Many homelab users treat their DIY NAS as a training ground, and the knowledge they gain with ZFS, KVM, Docker and Linux often translates directly into professional roles in IT and DevOps.

42. Better use of GPUs and accelerators

DIY NAS systems can use almost any supported GPU or accelerator card for tasks such as Plex transcoding, AI workloads, video processing or scientific computing. You can pass devices through to VMs or containers and tune them as you like, instead of being restricted to a short list of vendor approved cards.

43. True multi tenant storage on a single chassis

With Proxmox or other hypervisors you can run several separate NAS VMs for different customers or departments on one physical box, each with its own web UI, users and policies. This multi tenant approach is attractive for managed service providers and is harder to implement cleanly on a single turnkey NAS.

44. Custom identity and multifactor authentication integration

DIY NAS environments can tie directly into whatever identity stack you prefer, from simple LDAP through to complex single sign on with custom multifactor rules. You can adopt advanced access controls or experiment with new identity providers without waiting for a NAS vendor to support them.

45. Alignment with strict internal security tooling

Organisations that already use SELinux, AppArmor, central audit frameworks or host based intrusion detection can apply the same policies to DIY storage nodes. A TrueNAS or Proxmox box that runs on a standard distribution can join existing security baselines, which is much harder with proprietary NAS firmware.

46. Support for exotic and high performance networking

DIY NAS stacks can use specialist network cards such as Infiniband, RoCE capable adapters or unusual fibre interfaces as long as the drivers exist. This allows you to experiment with very high throughput or low latency technologies that are rarely supported on commodity appliance NAS hardware.

47. Custom backup and replication pipelines

With tools like ZFS send and receive, rclone, Restic or Borg you can build very specific backup and replication flows. You can script encryption, throttling, snapshot selection and multiple targets in a way that fits your environment instead of being limited to the fixed policies of one vendor backup tool.

48. Colocation friendly and data center ready

DIY NAS builds can follow data center norms such as using standard rack servers, redundant power supplies, remote management controllers and IPv6 heavy networks. Colocation providers expect this type of hardware, and DIY software lets your storage blend into a standard server fleet rather than being an odd office appliance.

49. Fine grained admin delegation at operating system level

On a DIY NAS you can use normal user, group and sudo rules with SSH keys to control who can run which commands. One person can manage pools, another can manage virtual machines, another can handle monitoring agents, all with precise restrictions that go beyond the coarse admin or user split of many appliances.

50. Integration with dynamic energy and solar setups

Because DIY NAS software can talk to external APIs and home automation systems, you can schedule heavy tasks such as scrubs, backups or transcoding to run when solar output is high or electricity tariffs are low. This kind of energy aware behaviour is difficult to achieve with fixed vendor power schedules.

51. Deep home automation and MQTT integration

DIY storage nodes can publish events into MQTT, Node Red or Home Assistant whenever backups finish, disks fail or space runs low, and can also respond to automation signals from the rest of the house. This lets your NAS participate in a wider automation fabric rather than living as an isolated appliance.

52. Use of enterprise secrets management for keys and passwords

DIY NAS servers can fetch encryption keys, passwords and API tokens from systems such as HashiCorp Vault or other corporate secret stores. That allows central management and rotation of sensitive data instead of keeping secrets inside a proprietary NAS configuration database.

53. Network boot and golden image strategies

You can build a standard disk image or network boot environment for your DIY NAS with all tooling and configuration baked in. If the system disk fails or you want to spin up a second node, you simply redeploy the image and reattach the existing storage pools, which is a very different model from appliance firmware.

54. Validation of changes through continuous integration

When configuration lives in files managed in Git, you can run linting and simulation jobs in a CI pipeline before applying changes to your DIY NAS servers. This allows you to catch syntax errors or bad parameters automatically, which is impossible when all edits happen only through a click driven vendor interface.

55. Custom user interfaces and portals on top of APIs

DIY stacks expose command line tools and often REST APIs that allow you to build your own lightweight dashboards for particular users or teams. You can present a simplified view for media editors, a different one for backup operators, and keep the full complexity of the base system hidden in the background.

56. Tailored localisation and language choices

If the default language or terminology of the platform does not suit your users, you can adjust translation files or web templates on a DIY system. Community contributions in minority languages are also easier to ship and maintain than on a closed vendor NAS where only official translations exist.

57. Customised drive qualification and burn in workflows

You can design a strict process for testing new disks, for example running multi day read and write passes, specific SMART tests and temperature checks before a drive ever joins a pool. Scripts and reports can enforce this burn in policy across all your DIY NAS nodes, something turnkey platforms rarely expose in detail.

58. Robust behaviour in extreme or niche environments

In vehicles, ships, remote cabins or unstable power conditions you may need unusual behaviours such as aggressive throttling at certain temperatures, logging to serial consoles or special shutdown routines. DIY software gives you the hooks to script and tune these reactions in ways that appliance firmware does not anticipate.

59. Clean integration with formal change management processes

Organisations with strict change control can insist that all NAS configuration changes arrive through reviewed pull requests and automated deployment tools. A DIY NAS whose configuration is driven by code fits smoothly into this world, whereas an appliance managed only through a browser is harder to audit and control.

60. Easy experimentation with clustered storage technologies

If you want to explore scale out storage such as Ceph, Gluster or other distributed systems, DIY hardware and open platforms are the most practical route. You can repurpose existing nodes into a cluster, test resilience and performance characteristics, and later reuse those machines for other lab work if requirements change.

61. Easier long term data salvage and portability

With DIY platforms such as TrueNAS, Unraid, ZimaOS, Proxmox and OMV, the on disk formats and pool layouts are widely documented and used in many contexts. If a motherboard dies in several years, you can move the disks to new hardware, reinstall the same software and import the pools, instead of hunting for an identical appliance or vendor recovery tool.

62. Broader protocol support and deeper tuning

DIY NAS software lets you expose storage over SMB, NFS, iSCSI, rsync modules, sometimes NVMe over TCP and more, with detailed control of versions, encryption, timeouts and caching. You can tune each protocol for a specific workload instead of accepting whatever subset and presets a turnkey vendor offers.

63. Custom hooks on file and dataset operations

Because you control the base system, you can attach your own scripts when files are written, moved or deleted in particular locations. That allows automatic virus scanning, metadata extraction, indexing, transcoding or business workflows that trigger whenever content changes, rather than relying only on built in features.

64. Comfortable operation with serial console and no local screen

DIY NAS platforms are happy on machines that have only serial console or out of band management with no HDMI or local keyboard. This matches how many server rooms and colocation racks actually work and lets you manage storage over low bandwidth links without any graphical tools if needed.

65. More compression and deduplication options per dataset

ZFS based DIY systems allow you to choose different compression algorithms and record sizes per dataset and to enable or disable deduplication only where it makes sense. You can optimise for databases, media archives or virtual machines individually rather than living with a single vendor setting for an entire volume.

66. Clear separation of storage and management planes

On a DIY NAS you can keep the storage node lean and run most of the management logic on other servers through SSH, APIs or orchestration tools. The storage device can behave as a focused data plane while the control plane lives elsewhere, which is attractive in environments that want very thin appliances.

67. Community culture that embraces experimentation

The forums and communities around TrueNAS, Unraid, Proxmox and OMV are full of people who enjoy deep technical dives, benchmarks and off label use cases. For homelab users and engineers that culture can feel more welcoming than vendor moderated communities that discourage unsupported combinations.

68. Reuse of one reference design across home, lab and office

Once you settle on a particular DIY stack and layout, you can repeat the same design at home, at work and in test environments with only minor changes. Automation scripts, monitoring templates and backup strategies can be shared almost unchanged between all these machines.

69. Neutral target for testing third party backup strategies

A DIY NAS can act as a neutral storage target for many different backup products and appliances from other vendors. You can point various commercial systems at the same TrueNAS or Proxmox storage, then compare how they behave for restore, versioning and verification, something that is harder when your main storage is itself a fixed vendor appliance.

70. No hard limits on shares, datasets or exports

DIY platforms rarely impose artificial limits on the number of datasets, snapshots, exports or shares you can create. As long as the underlying system can handle it, you can build very granular layouts for different teams, applications and projects without hitting a model based cap.

71. Better fit for reproducible research environments

In academic or scientific work, it is often important that another team can rebuild the same stack years later. A DIY NAS with configuration stored in code and based on standard distributions can be recreated on any suitable hardware, which supports reproducible experiments and shared lab setups.

72. Combination of storage and high performance computing

In some labs and studios the same physical machines are used both for heavy compute work and for fast local storage. DIY NAS software can happily coexist with HPC toolchains and schedulers on the same hardware, allowing you to run compute workloads close to the data without separate appliances.

73. Precise control of time and clock integration

DIY platforms give full access to NTP, Precision Time Protocol and kernel timing controls. For environments where consistent timing is critical, such as finance, measurement systems or some industrial setups, the storage node can participate in the same strict time hierarchy as the rest of the infrastructure.

74. Better support for unusual backup and archival devices

If you need to attach tape libraries, optical jukeboxes or rare archival devices, a DIY NAS running a general purpose operating system is more likely to support them. You can install the required drivers and tools for these devices rather than waiting for a turnkey vendor to recognise them.

75. Ideal for storage that is a pure backend service

Some administrators want their storage nodes to be invisible to end users and to present only block or file protocols to other systems. DIY NAS installations can be trimmed down to offer only SMB, NFS, iSCSI or object storage with no media portals or user apps, which suits this backend only role very well.

76. Flexible data transformation and ingestion pipelines

Because you can run whatever tools and containers you like, a DIY NAS can also host data transformation jobs. For example, you can receive raw data, clean it, compress it, encrypt it and then push it to cloud storage or another site, all driven by your own scripts and schedules.

77. Reduced reliance on any single vendor decision

With DIY platforms you are not waiting for one company to decide which media codecs, hardware accelerators or remote access features are allowed. If a particular vendor chooses a direction you dislike, you can still adopt the tools and configurations that suit you within your own stack.

78. No forced hardware replacement at support end dates

When a commercial NAS model reaches the vendor end of support, users are often encouraged to buy a new box even if the hardware is still reliable. With DIY storage you can keep updating the operating system on the same machine for as long as the components remain healthy, decoupling software support from hardware marketing cycles.

79. Good fit for very lean remote management

In remote or bandwidth constrained locations, being able to manage the NAS entirely with text tools and small configuration files is valuable. DIY platforms let you perform upgrades, configuration changes and even troubleshooting over slow links without relying on heavy web interfaces.

80. Custom quality of service tied to processes and containers

On DIY systems you can use native resource controllers to limit bandwidth, CPU time or IOPS per container, process group or user. This makes it possible to enforce complex quality of service rules that prioritise critical workloads while still allowing experimental services to run in the background.

81. Strong separation between data layout and hardware chassis

With pools and datasets defined at the software level, you can move storage from one chassis to another or rebalance between servers without changing how applications see their paths. This separation makes it easier to evolve the physical layer over time while keeping logical layout stable.

82. Use as a standard test bench for vendor devices

A DIY NAS environment can act as a standard reference platform when you test routers, backup appliances or other network gear. Because it is not tied to one brand, it is easier to observe how third party devices behave when they read and write to a known stable storage backend.

83. Ability to layer multiple security models

DIY stacks allow you to combine filesystem permissions, network firewalls, container isolation, mandatory access control frameworks and external identity providers in creative ways. You are not limited to the single security model that a turnkey NAS interface exposes, which allows more nuanced defence in depth.

84. Fine control over logging and audit detail

You can configure exactly what is logged, where logs are stored and how long they are kept, from kernel messages to application events. Logs can be shipped to central collectors in formats that match your existing observability stack, making compliance and forensic analysis simpler.

85. Tailored behaviour for backup and disaster drills

DIY platforms can be wired into automated disaster simulations, where systems are repeatedly torn down and rebuilt to prove that recovery works. Storage configurations can be recreated from code, pools imported and test data restored on a schedule, instead of relying on manual wizard driven tests.

86. Ability to swap out components in the software stack over time

Over the lifetime of a DIY NAS, you can replace almost every layer: change the init system, switch to a different web interface, adopt a new container engine or even move from one DIY distribution to another while keeping the same pools. This modularity keeps the platform adaptable as tastes and technology change.

87. Better fit for organisations that avoid proprietary formats

Some organisations have policies against storing important data in formats that depend on closed code or single vendor tools. DIY NAS solutions using standard filesystems and open source utilities are easier to justify under these rules than appliances that use proprietary volume managers and configuration stores.

88. Helpful for education and training labs

Training providers and universities can deploy DIY NAS stacks inside virtual environments so that students can break, repair and rebuild storage systems without touching production gear. The same images can be reset between classes, giving learners realistic hands on experience at low cost.

89. Capacity to follow very specific legal or regulatory rules

In some jurisdictions or industries, unusual requirements appear, such as special retention schedules, local encryption standards or niche logging rules. DIY NAS environments can be scripted to satisfy these specific requirements even when no turnkey NAS vendor has considered them.

90. Natural choice when mixing many self hosted applications

If you already run a wide range of self hosted tools in containers or VMs, adding storage duties to that world with DIY software keeps everything consistent. The NAS simply becomes another service in the same orchestration fabric rather than a separate product with its own way of doing things.

91. Easier experimentation with new network filesystems

When new network filesystem projects appear, such as experimental user space protocols or research systems, they nearly always target Linux and BSD first. A DIY NAS gives you a platform to test these technologies for specific problems, long before any commercial vendor would consider supporting them.

92. Ability to enforce very conservative update policies

Some organisations prefer to update only once or twice a year after extensive internal testing. DIY NAS stacks allow you to freeze versions and postpone upgrades until you have validated them, instead of accepting automatic firmware updates that may change behaviour on the vendor schedule.

93. Better suitability for mixed licence environments

If you already pay for certain commercial tools but want the storage layer to stay licence free, DIY approaches give you that mix. You can run proprietary database or backup software while keeping the underlying storage platform open and under your control.

94. Simple way to expose standard development environments next to data

With Proxmox or similar platforms you can spin up development VMs or containers right next to the storage that holds source code and artefacts. Developers can work close to large repositories and test data without hauling everything over the network, using the NAS as both storage and dev host.

95. Easier to integrate with custom dashboards and reporting systems

Because DIY NAS boxes export metrics in standard ways or can run your own collectors, it is straightforward to feed storage statistics into company specific dashboards and reports. You can show exactly the charts and summaries that matter for your audience instead of relying on whatever reporting screens a vendor includes.

96. Straightforward reuse of disks in other systems if needed

If your plans change, you can remove disks from a DIY NAS, wipe or repurpose them in other servers without dealing with vendor specific metadata or compatibility warnings. The drives are just drives, not part of an opaque appliance ecosystem that expects to keep them forever.

97. Good platform for testing security tools and hardening guides

A DIY NAS can serve as a lab for experimenting with new security scanners, vulnerability assessment tools and hardening recommendations before you roll them out to production servers. You can observe how these changes affect a real storage workload and adjust accordingly.

98. Realistic environment for practising incident response

Because you control every part of the stack, you can simulate failures, intrusions or misconfigurations on a DIY NAS and then practise your incident response procedure. This kind of training is harder with commercial appliances where you cannot fully control or inspect all layers.

99. Freedom to keep legacy protocols alive while you migrate

In some environments you still need to support older protocols for a while, for example legacy SMB dialects or older NFS versions. DIY NAS systems let you keep these services available during migration while still offering modern protocols to new clients, with careful isolation where needed.

100. Serves as a long lived foundation independent of brand trends

Vendors come and go, change direction or pivot to new markets, but the core technologies behind DIY NAS platforms have existed for decades and are used in many places beyond home storage. Building on that foundation means your data and workflows are less tied to the fashion of any particular hardware brand.

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      197 thoughts on “100 Reasons DIY NAS (TrueNAS, UnRAID, Proxmox) are BETTER than Turnkey (Synology/QNAP/etc)”

      2. I severely regret buying this Chinese bullshit. I can’t even get the app (which has like 80 reviews and a developer name entirely in hanzi…) to find the stupid thing and trying to use their website is pointless because it literally will not stop bringing up Chinese style bullshit “enter your email for a chance to win” pop ups.
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      4. I’m looking for my first NAS and I agree UGREEN hardware is better, but I have a couple of questions. Since Synology has now lifted the ban on 3rd party drives for their 25+ model NAS devices does that change the equation? My second question might seem a bit out there, but with the US government and others worried about back doors in TikTok, TP-link, Huawei and ZTE, should we be worried about security of our UGREEN devices?
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      5. Yesterday I was watching you review of the UGREEN DH2300 and took away (as from other reviewers) it’s an entry level NAS with only one flaw, the 1Gbps NIC. And even that would be ok for most “entry level” type people, me included. I’m not going to edit on this.
        What strikes me from this video, while the NAS is “entry level” easy, keeping the security side sorted seems not so much. If I was UGREEN and had seen your comparison of the NAS with others, where the UGREEN once lights up red with Chinese flags… I’d be concerned, especially as security discussions become more and more important. I wonder if they ever came back to you after sending in your findings?
        Anyway, Thanks for the video and the effort that went into making it. Keep up the work, looking forward to #2 on this. (I know I’m 2 months late so will have to see if it’s already out)
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      8. wow, all this connect to China really worries me. What keeps the China govt to command ugreen to scan my data? That is their way – I’ve been to China many times – the govt has control of EVERYTHING. There is no saying no to the govt. See how the govt treats their high tech companies.
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      11. Genuine question. Is it not true that network requests to US servers should be of far greater concern than requests to China. Based on the conduct of the two countries?
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      14. Thank you so much for taking the time to make this video, really helpful. I have my Unifi network setup blocking all traffic form lets say China. Would this mean quite some apps on a UGreen NAS wouldn’t work or am I thinking too simple? Thanks again!
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      15. Great informative video; thank you – a ‘dry’ subject very well presented. As many people, I found this as eyeing up the DH2300 as a relatively inexpensive first foray in a home NAS. Usage would be mostly simple file storage – and the unit is being sold by Ugreen as “your first NAS made simple” – so would expect many buyers wouldn’t even consider this side of things at all (I hadn’t!).

        But… the UK government is dithering about whether or not it trusts China (it does for trade, but not cyber security). Meanwhile Chinese companies have stakes in vast swathes of UK interests including Heathrow Airport; British Steel; UK Power Networks; Northumbrian Water; Thames Water and even Hinkley nuclear power plant. And connected car brands including BYD, MG Motors, Omoda, Jaecoo and more – so, should we (me) really be over concerned about these DNS links reporting back – to what is, a Chinese made unit. I’m sure the EVs would be reporting back ‘somewhere’ and be much harder to identify/trace. Not doubting the importance of what you have uncovered – but in reality, someone in China may have access to 100s of images of various dogs, meals and holidays that I’ve taken over the years. Given we trust either Apple of Google with mobile devices; Microsoft for ‘everything’; Amazon; Facebook – I bet anything connected could be compromised somehow.

        But I will definitely do as much as I can in terms of 2FA and blocking of ports that you shared. And interested in any follow-ups, etc. ????
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      16. Do not trust a device which uses it’s own DNS settings instead of network DNS Settings. Unless you are using Chines DNS servers it shouldn’t be going to China to look for DNS.
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      20. The firmware is the base layer, any OS on top has no way to protect itself from vulnerable firmware. Any firmware vulnerabilities whether present now or in future updates are still vulnerabilities. The fact that the govt in the country of manufacture has strong influence over companies there should be a concern. If they flip the switch then they flip the switch, no hack needed.
        This video is not by any stretch of the imagination a security review of the company or their products.
        If you think you have no data anyone wants then you do. It’s your data that you want.
        Enter the phishing attack!
        This video spends too much time ignoring the real issue here.
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      22. Love the vid. I’d really enjoy (and need) a video with your security and network setup. Or at least a starting point to get it up and running locally and access safely from the outside.
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      24. There is a reason no enterprise would buy these, chinese spyware. My company passed on these as didn’t know if we could trust putting PII on them, so we spent 100k for a fully loaded synology.
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      25. Funny, ‘fear of china’… as if the US manufactories are more reliable, knowing companies like Blackrock and Palantir already ‘stealing’ all of our data (via our phones). Adobe already ‘skimming’ peoples art work in the cloud ‘for training their AI’ , same as facebook and insta.

        And most , will get similar ‘logs’ when just ‘watching stuff on the internet’, so…
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      27. Interesting video, especially as I just purchased the DXP4800. I find it a great NAS for the money, especially since upgrading from a Synology DS220j – difference is outstanding. However, not too concerned about the extrenal connections it makes, as once it is ready and I have migrated everything to it, its internet connection will be blocked at the router.

        The purpose being, it is my own personal cloud, for you on my own home network. No way so I want the ability to access it remotely and I want my home network as secure as strong as possible ????
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      31. the clip is biased, you say the connections are resolved for (most) of the other NAS devices and only this gives so many china unresolved services/stuff. at 18:09 is a perfect example, you have google dns 8.8.8.8 and still the service is not put there by unifi, the conclusion is simple – you altered the settings in the 2 tests, impossible for 8.8.8.8 to not be shown as DNS Google
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      32. In the Video you mentioned less interest in this kind of videos. So here I am doing what I rarely ever do: I write a comment on a YouTube video. In this case it’s mostly to say thank you and boost this kind of content which is less „selling“ and more „education and security awareness“. Please do more videos like this!
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      33. Sure a lot of them may be DNS servers, but ask yourself WHY are they using Chinese DNS servers when the Chinese Internet is behind a firewall from the outside world. If it’s querying a Chinese DNS server, something is trying to access something within China that is allowed by the CCP. You can’t just visit Chinese websites based on Chinese servers without being monitored by the CCP. So…No thanks. DNS server or not, it’s still suspicious since there is absolutely no need to query a Chinese DNS for a NAS outside of China.
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      36. I saw this device just released on someone else’s thumb nail and immediately searched for your channel to watch the review of this NAS. The ONLY place i come for NAS reviews.
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      37. As a matter of fact you made this video incredibly interesting. Is it possible to skip the account creation and all of that and just use web interface ? would the OS still ping those DNS servers or it is ideally to just before setting up, create a VLAN for the NAS and use a home VPN to connect to it?
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      38. as long as they are a chinese company in country where the government requires you to handover data under the terms of “the national secuirty law” and you can’t even challenge it in court or make people aware of the request they aren’t
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      41. Why are you so fixated on DNS? The primary security issue is rogue updates to apps or the OS that allows the system to exfiltrate or encrypt your data (and hold it hostage). You dismissed this concern as “pretty slim” and said any regional IP is vulnerable. Regional IPs are mostly irrelevant. The real issue is whether you can trust uGreen’s update servers and that wasn’t discussed at all except to give them a free pass.
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      45. My Android phones are oftern connect to North America despite I am far away from North America. Andoid phones are connecting to North America every day at 3am when I am not using the phone and am a sleep. Should I be worried?
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      46. Maybe use wireshark to capture and inspect network traffic to and from China. The youtuber Apalrd’s Adventures did this with a nanokvm sent to him for review. He didn’t find any obviously malicious activity, but some potential security issues, do to poor software/web development coding practices. Kind of like Chinese hardware – you get good stuff, you get crappy stuff (often bad QA/QC), it’s a crap shoot.
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      47. Thank you for making a video on this topic. I think we should be careful with all stuff we connect on the network. So I would love to learn more about how to set devices up in secure way.
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      48. Thoughts.

        There would probably be greater value in processing the log to show total packets per IP. Giving a clearer picture of the width and depth of the hard coded traffic. Eg. 1 IP a hundred times is easier to allow/block/understand, than 100 different IPs.

        Similarly if anything in your connection is blocking any IP or Port (even your ISP) it could generate more & wider attempts to connect even in a properly written (but hard coded) application/service. A poorly written app might even go into a meltdown of retries!

        There might be a regional context here too. Do the Chinese consumers have regular problems with Router and DNS setup and availability? Either locally or at their ISP? It might explain a culture where apps and services have a (long?) hard coded list to “get things to work” without relying on other configuration settings and services. I’m not saying it’s a good idea for security – but it could be a market specific method that’s escaped. A nation wide solution to “helping your uncle over the phone when he doesn’t understand what a router is and his ISP blocks everything but port 80″.

        Let’s remember that a lot of consumer routers used to use a very short hard coded list of NTS time server IPs and essentially drowned a number of primary time servers – – rather than using domain names (or even IPs) of consumer tier servers. Partly as it was very old code/lists carried over generations of routers and noone had considered what happens if I sell 100,000 of these”.
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      53. I have region blocked all traffic to 43 countries, including China, in my UniFi OS. Amongst those 43 blocked countries are known sources of malicious scans, attacks and botnets. I’m implementing the zero-trust mentality not just on a per device level, but also on a per country level intertnet-wide. And maybe you should too. If some service ends up not working because of one of the region blocks, then that specific traffic can be added to the allow list. Otherwise everything is completely blocked by default.
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      55. I’d rather have links to China in my Nas than links to America. Ugreen is a Chinese product so it is logical that there are many links to China. I would rather be worried if there were a lot of links with America. I have more faith in China than in America or England and all eyes of America. Chinese products are simply much better than American ones. Look at the Chinese cars n e.g. Huawei, and now this Ugreen Nas. Get rid of those dictator traits of American products and synology. I am convinced that Ugreen will later get its own server instead of Amazon. So that the 4800 plus is completely separate from the fascist America and friends.
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      56. That is such a great info! Hard work there. Respect. ???? I still believe that Ugreen have a lots of potential and i will buy the new 2Bay UG DXP2800 and put on RAID 1, changing my old Syn, and trust them. Let’s see if it’s a success, like other stuff that i have from UG, that i love, or if UG NASync DXP2800 is a bluff. But.. i will configure Proton VPN directly on the Router and check the outcame ???????????????? Thanks!
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      58. Robbie, excellent video as usual. I’m still going through your “Complete” video to setup my UGREEN NAS and I am concerned about how to secure an internet connected NAS. I’d like to see a “complete security” video as well if you think that content would be popular
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      59. No, not safe…All the data you stored will be backed up in China by CCP’s regulations as the same as DJI and Hikvision. If you don’t care, go ahead! ????????????
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      60. Great vid as always! Please install a non self signed SSL cert on your Nas. 🙂

        You can use Wireshark to have a deeper look at the uGreen Nas … Connect the Nas and a pc/laptop via ethernet, then monitor that port and start the uGreen…. Would be keen to see what goes on (requests sent) during post and boot.
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      61. Literally have the non plus model of that NAS you were using in the video out for delivery right now. So are you saying that these apps by default ignore my network’s defined DNS lookup source (I’ve got unbound running on a Pi configured as my DNS) and directly look up something configured internally to the various programs/apps? Debating if I should immediately return it and try and find something else, or try some light configuration. I don’t like the idea of it ignoring my network setup that has local and preferred fallback DNS defined already. If I return, suggestions? I don’t need AI, or anything significant in media serving as it is intended to be just a reliable backup for a couple family members files and photos.
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      62. ‼ *It is an incredible shame to advertise UGREEN. UGREEN is a Chinese company and is 100% NOT safe.* ‼
        ‼ *❯ China operates concentration camps with “space” for over a million people. If you were there, you would wish you had been in one of Hitler’s concentration camps,* because Hitler didn’t torture you for decades.
        ‼ *❯ China fights against democracy and openly supports Russia, the murderer of millions.*
        ‼ *❯ China WILL attack Taiwan.*
        ‼ *At the latest, when China attacks Taiwan, EVERY Chinese piece of hardware in the West will become a weapon against us or a spy. You will hate it* when YOUR hospital can no longer help you, when you freeze in winter, when the internet collapses, and there is hardly any energy available.
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      65. You should be comparing this to other well known bands. In other words, is this more than Synology? Also, what happens if you block the NAS from all Chinese IPs?
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      67. Interesting. I have the DXP4800 PLUS. Fully loaded with nearly all apps but no JellyFin, qBittorent, Firefox, HomeAssistant. 5 days of uptime now. During that time I only had two China connection attempts. Both were blocked with no ill effects so far. The NAS can only be accessed from WAN through Tailscale or Wireguard.
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      68. How difficult would it be to send data to a server in US and then redirect the data to China? It’s not just sending data to China directly. It is also that China has it written into law that all companies ands individuals must cooperate with the government for “national security purposes.” That includes any passwords or encryptions.
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      72. There is NEVER a reason for a device to use its own DNS (outside of failure fallback which should be a user exposed setting). That’s not what’s going on here so very scary if these are DNS requests hitting China. Are these DNS requests or HTTP requests hitting China?
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      74. Those frequent ICMP requests to the DNS servers could be turned off by renameing or deleting the file /etc/firmware_config/test_dns.txt
        It seems the process hwmonitor is the source for those requests.
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      75. Just checked my DXP2800 (again). Bought it from Amazon Germany, running in Europe. ~1600 calls for a month. All of them US, Germany, Netherlands and few local NTPs. Most of them DNS and some to a Germany located UGreen server (which has a resolvable name). ZERO China. @nascompares I guess the calls you see are either because of some extension that I don’t have installed or it is something related to physical region/location.
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      79. I understand this is a less exciting video than new product reviews or at least product updates, that said, it feels more important. We should get Ugreen to see this and our concerns and hopefully Ugreen would change at least take some measures.
        I am seriously considering Ugreen Nas because of their performance to price ratio, but I was already kinda worried about it being a Chinese company before this video. I would go with synology but what pisses my off more than their hdd policy is their poor hardware, I want to run some apps for my business and when I compare DXP2800/DXP48000 to their synology equivalents ds725 and 425 I am scared away because of their awful specs.
        Keep it up, great job as usual
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      80. Well, I’m using a Unifi Cloud Gateway Fiber myself and have two PI 5s as my DNS Servers (Adguard Home). I just checked the traffic logs of my DXP6800 Pro and there are ZERO DNS request to China. Most are to Germany (70%), US (20%) and Switzerland (10%). Everything is routed thorugh my Adguard Home DNS servers. Also subscribed to CyberSecure Enhanced by Proofpoint and Cloudflare on my UCG Fiber.
        I think using Adguard Home or Pi Hole as your DNS helps a lot and would be worth trying in your next video.
        Also curious about ZimaOS, Unraid, OMV and TrueNAS.
        For me there is no casue of concern so far. Sure… I have nothing exposed to the internet.
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      82. I don’t understand most of ppl here worry about UGREEN or other Chinese NAS, you are not in China, unlike me, if you are a Chinese lives in China, you should be worried.

        Giving your data to other countries’ governments is almost always better than giving it to your home countries’ government
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      85. Bearing in mind that these things can have the likes of TrueNas installed, I’m not so much concerned with the security of the software it comes with , but on the hardware itself. Hardware of course can have a “silicon backdoor”, or “supply chain implant”.
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      86. I run Unbound on my firewall and am concerned that some of these OSes and/or apps have DNS Server IPs hardcoded rather than using the one being provided by the LAN’s DHCP Server.

        Monitoring and blocking these IPs one by one is impractical. I don’t have a UGREEN NAS so am unable to determine if the BIOS would generate outbound network traffic regardless of the installed OS.
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      89. i build me own nas or san. i will not use off the shelf items. i have never had an issues with my own, but had issues with others when it came from spoofing from other counties.
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      90. Holy crap, security nightmare out of the box. I’d rather have locked hard drives from $ynology than phoning home to China. Guess I’m building my own NAS next time, I don’t think I have faith in any of the off the shelf solutions anymore.
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      91. It’s good to raise security awareness, but… please take this as constructive critique: you should probably team up with somebody with a bit more security/network experience, if you want to do more content like this. I don’t mean to bash on you, security is *hard* and explaining it to people not working with it professionally is **very** hard.

        But e.g. your advice to do whack-a-mole blocking of individual IPs is potentially harmful – it’s ineffective, it ends up with a lot of cluttered individual block-rules you can’t really reason about, and it’s easy to end up blocking something that makes wanted functionality stop working… which then becomes hard to fix because it’s lost in the myriad of individual block-rules.

        You deserve credit for not being alarmist, though! Sure, the video title is the somewhat-clickbaity youtube norm, but you aren’t scare-mongering, and the advice to check up on device traffic is good (albeit most people don’t know what to look for, and might get spooked at the traffic logs).

        As other people have commented, it would be interesting to see the traffic pattern after a week of only having the base OS with no apps installed.
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      92. A NAS that ignores your DNS settings and directly queries Chinese DNS servers is not behaving transparently or securely. At minimum it indicates poor design, and at worst it could indicate intentional backdoors that can be activated this way. This behavior is a serious red flag, indicating it should not be trusted.
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      93. Better to drop the default OS on these newer Chinese NASes & go with something with better history like TrueNAS, Zima, Unraid, Proxmox etc. open source ones are generally better.
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      94. Excellent video. Very well researched too. I’d be very interested to see how it performs (along with applications and update services) with many of those unknown DNS servers blocked. See what trips up.
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      95. I would think that replacing the UGreen OS with TrueNAS would eliminate most/all of these callbacks, but I’d consider it a worthy endeavor to test that supposition to make absolutely sure we don’t have a false sense of security by simply swapping out UGreen’s OS for TrueNAS.

        Nevertheless, great job! Thanks for the detailed breakdown on what’s going on under the hood. I do wonder what applications are the worst offenders.
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      98. Important subject, only thing is I now I realise I know nothing about networking / access control, would you think of doing a “ new nas user guide “ for us ???? who are not up to speed.
        I got the Ugreen dx4800 plus fo4 my photography library …
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      99. For your firewall rules, you could create from top to bottom something similar to this. Just make sure deny/ block all is at the bottom. Hope this helps.

        1.Allow your subnet range or local ip to allow access to your nas

        2.Block all countries/regions (not your own)

        3.allow only ports you need

        4.Block/deny all

        Also Disable the Ugreen link remote access
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      103. 1) Interersted in the same test with ZERO additional apps installed and access to the internet limited apart from checking for NAS OS upgrades.
        2) From the comments below TrueNAS seems better behaved
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      104. Oh, I just got to the end, it’s one thing getting the info aka being engaged until the end, it’s another thing actually creating router/gateway policies and setting up 2FA for all admins.
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      105. Region blocking on my Cloud Gateway Ultra includes China. So far my 2800 works just fine. Also added to a /30 VLAN and region blocked the network as well as content filtered
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      106. there is no doubt that China is not the most open, and not the best to support open speech etc. but why do we all think that e.g. USA is much better ?
        Install Pi-hole, or adguard and block it if you have issues
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      107. “DNS tunneling is a real concern. More than once, I have been able to set up a VPN tunnel to break out of an air-gapped network. You can search for tools like iodine, DNSCat2, and DNSexfiltrator. Even with a local, recursive DNS, there is still a chance to exfiltrate data or even set up a reverse tunnel. Therefore, it is indeed a bit concerning.”
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      108. Not living in the US myself, although I did before, these days I wouldn’t trust the US either. In the end, it’s seems to be about how paranoid people are but yes how the info is or isn’t being used. A lot of assumption are made based on what we hear, often without concrete proof but I do understand we also have to be cautious with our data. And yes, this applies to all NAS, not just UGREEN. Good video as always.
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      110. can you run the same test but with truenas or another OS on the UGREEN NAS? completely taking out the SSD with UGOS and replacing it entirely? I’m curious if it’s just the software or is it hardware forced
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      112. So it’s safe as houses, but the current property market may make you think of addiitional security 🙂
        I’m looking at replacing my home router soon, I’m getting quite keen on Ubiquiti’s offerings
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      115. UGOS has a built-in DNS server it uses to supply its own apps and OS to get around ISP/router filtering and that is almost certainly where you are seeing the wide range of upstream DNS being pinged by. I discovered this when trying to install a Technitium DNS server container and found port 53 in use. I permanently disabled/renamed the service file (it *will* re-enable on reboot, so rename the .service file!) to allow me to take over port 53 for Technitium.

        Once this was done, I pointed the DNS address in UGOS network settings to itself (actual IP, not loopback) and that allowed their apps to run without issue, while respecting my filters in Technitium.
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      117. NAS are %100 unhackable if you leave them inside of your network with no internet access
        Or if you have to have access, make a VPN, and your NAS will be safe too
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      119. What a great canary (or seagull) in the coal mine video. DNS is such an important part of Internet Trust and your explanation gives the novice a clear understanding of the danger. Of course, I would like additional dives into other vendors or maybe even a quick walk thru of doing simple blocking. Can the UGreen Firewall be set up to do the blocking and a quick sanity check that it was successful by external logging would be an excellent follow up topic.
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      120. It may take time before ugreen nas security is tested: hackers typically prefer to go after products with large fleets because they need a high number of targets to justify the “investment”.

        Why not a ugreen nas hardware with an open source nas OS installed over the vendor’s own? As a bonus, you avoid the suspicion that comes with Chinese software..
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      121. Look like this can be a nice DDOS platform. Not to mention the possible blackdoor(s) . Network traffic that using hard coded ip address(es) also doesn’t need to contact DNS.
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      122. You want to see the logs jump up, see what happens when you block the NAS from talking to the internet. 10,000+ logs in 24 hours being blocked from the U-NAS
        In short, block it all like I do. If you need access to your files remotely then VPN into your home network or use something like tailscale. Only unlock it temporarily if needed to do an OS update or download the OS update and do a manual install keeping all outgoing communication blocked.

        I only have a base system that I am not using yet, trying to decide if I want to keep uGreenOS or not. It has base 12 apps installed.
        In the last 6 hours my network has blocked 3,291 attempts out to the internet from the U-NAS. Over 10K in the last day, and 10K is the limit currently for my logging.
        Things that bother me is ping to google DNS servers, it’s a DNS why piling it. I also have CloudFlare for the DNS being relayed but it try’s to avoid that. I have a local NTP relay on my networks but it ignores that. And the rest is HTTPS encrypted traffic to random server addresses. Don’t let the china servers concern you as most can use local servers like amazon AWS anyway and still accomplish the same thing they are doing or logging on china servers. I can’t explain the Germany servers I am seeing. A location of a server doesn’t constitute trust in what the code is doing or collecting.
        NOTE: With these 12 apps installed I have not seen any DNS reaching outside. I am only seeing ICMP, NTP and HTTPS. But it’s possible the unify system is reporting the DNS protocol wrong since it’s showing ICMP to all DNS server?
        My 12 apps installed are:
        Photos,Theater,Cloud Drives,Universal Search,Files,Logs,Sustem Management,Sync & Backup,Support,Task Manager,Control Panel,Storage
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      123. As you say, a dry, nerdy subject, but probably worthwhile doing comparisons for the major brands that you cover. Would be interesting to know if you get any feedback from U Green about this.
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      124. Maybe this could be a collab with @LAWRENCESYSTEMS a unify expert to go over things like security rules, firewall settings and vlan settings to help create a walled garden for sketchy network attached devices like NAS drives.
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      125. So how do I produce a similar live status page of accesses on my three Synology systems? Where do I even go to see what my devices have been up to over time for comparison (trolled through every possible network and log page while this video was running)? I can find nothing.
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      130. Comment in general for all Chinese devices (applicable to any brand from any country, but for obvious reason extra caution is to be taken with Chinese products. Apart from security, we should not forget that it was already demonstrated that some popular Chinese products either have built in weaknesses on purpose, either sleeping backdoors you cannot detect unless activated. Since most people use those devices not in an isolated environment, any app trying to do a call home (even for a simple DNS record, a ping, whatever, collecting logs for analysis should be approached very carefully as any kind of traffic (even a ping) can carry data to its destination and can bring data back with instructions to launch something (it can be as simple as a ping packet coming back with a specific bit pattern intercepted by the network card and translated into an action from within the hardware.) Is this far fetched? Yes, of course. But it remains China. And believe me: lots of Chinese look at US products the same way> I still stand by my opinion that within the West we should avoid as much as possible to use electronics from companies having a Chinese mother company. For a couple of tens of dollars more, you can in general get a similarly specced product built in a Western country. I personally refuse to use anything Chinese in my house if it is having a network connection or cell connection or carries data.
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      131. Hi! ????This is a good start of ugreen security analysis. However, for whathever ip address it is communicating to the Internet, what about the data that is travelling inside any “conversation” that is transporting to? You only concentrated your analysis on what ips it is talking to and where. But what informations, what data it is transmiting. It would be interesting to sniff the communication betweeen ugreen nas and internet. Is Unify firewall can do that? Can you use Wireshark. Is any expert can look into that ? Also, no matter what options or security tool ugreen may have put in its OS, nothing prevents it from having hidden something that bypasses this. What we call a backdoor.
        Looking foward for another great analysis video from you about these security concerns.???? thx
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      134. Aren’t there several levels to this. Yes, it is worrying that individual components are each using different DNS providers for their services. Begs the question of how many of the address resolutions result in IPs that not reachable by preferred and trusted DNS services. That might raise a question as to why a dedicated DNS resolution has been put in place. 
        Also, I would have thought that any questionable communications would be random and dispersed in time to draw less attention to analysis. Anything hooky needs only one message. Catching that is a needle in a haystack job. Sending repeated and frequent messages is so easy to spot. 
        So, is it deliberate or just early days limitations and laziness?
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      135. I want to side-step the analysis and look at it from the developer’s view.
        They need to develop software that functions properly even when the NAS is not properly configured. If the network does not have a DNS server and the app requires DNS, it must have internal servers listed.
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      139. Ugreen should allow to choose Country during initial set up, like iPhone, when choose America or other countries, it will automatically use DNS that’s in that country instead of China.
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      140. There is also something to be said for the less popular brands. If you’re a hacker, you will want to find the weakness that affects as many installed units as possible ( at least I would ). There was a somewhat recent attack on some Asus routers. It’s just one reason why I prefer my Synology routers; they are not nearly as popular and, to my way of thinking, less valuable as a broad target for a security breach. It was the reason that I didn’t use WordPress for a website. And, low and behold, before long, sites using WordPress were targeted.
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      142. The DNS issue is relatively easy to fix. Just block all DNS to the internet, redirect all DNS to an internal server, the allow only that server to only your chosen DNS servers. I do the same thing with NTP just to be safe.
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      144. With Ugreen, i personal won’t be supprise that there is hidden back door sittings inside the sorce code and just waiting for an activate condition pattern on the internet to activate, That’s Why there is this so many IP connection
        or there is a software so call security change on any piece of packages can activate it anytime with just a small section of code change
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      145. Ever since getting into the Unifi world with such clear logging (my old router didn’t tell me anything!) I’ve become much more interested in this topic. So a thumbs up from me for more like this.
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      146. Regarding how they handle future security incidents due to unintended vulnerabilities, I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think it’s in their best interest to provide inferior service. I’m more concerned about potential backdoors that could expose my private data to China. It might be nice for Plex or something, but even with a different OS like TrueNAS, my private data won’t end up there.
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      147. The bottom line for any NAS you buy is that it’s only as secure as the administrator running it.

        If you don’t open any ports in your firewall and make it internet-facing, you’re going to be perfectly safe unless the hacker has physical access to your house.

        If you need external access, the ways to achieve that, in descending order of security, are:
        1. Overlay VPN like Tailscale / Netbird
        2. Set up a self-hosted Pangolin in a VPS and host an instance of their newt container in your LAN so Pangolin can wireguard tunnel into your network (you can use Cloudflare tunnel if you want to, but their ToS prohibits certain kinds of traffic)
        3. Create one or more “External” VLANs that are isolated from the rest of your LAN, and put any public-facing services there, then open the port and forward to the server hosting the external services
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      148. @nascompares How about addressing the fact that after a year we are still missing lots of features (emails, encryption, camera app, plex ap, etc…) on UGOS and the fact that UGreen doesn’t seem to bother updating those compatibility lists at all.

        That includes the HDD or NVME drive lists, the UPS list such as of now lists ONLY their own US3000-UPS (Synology vibe).
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      149. Services shown are nothing to do with DNS. They are based on ports used. Custom applications very often use non-defined ports, that’s what non-defined ports are for. If you start blocking stuff that your NAS is trying to connect to then you are just breaking it. If you are this paranoid then you’d be better off building your own linux based NAS.
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      150. *WORTH READING FIRST* After a comment from @sirlikealot about DNS handling, I’ll need to return to the logs (the video was made a few weeks ago) to be sure, but as I recall, I made a minimal setup (NAS default, directed into the UniFi gateway, then installed all the officially labelled UGREEN Nas apps). Everything was default as possible.

        I set the NAS up on my LAN with DHCP, so in theory all DNS should have gone through the resolver provided by my router. What I actually saw in the UniFi logs was that some of the built-in UGREEN apps weren’t just using my chosen DNS, but were also reaching out directly to other resolvers – a mix of public/free ones in different regions. That would explain why the log looks so noisy/messy/’like the character select screen of Street Fight II”, and why there are so many showing up. To be clear, most of those are just DNS lookups rather than data transfer, but it does mean the system isn’t consistently respecting the network DNS settings and I need to investigate. But you are right (if I understand your point), it makes traffic harder to control or audit, and depending on the resolver used, it can also leak metadata outside your preferred path. I don’t think it’s evidence of malicious behaviour, more that some apps have hard-coded DNS endpoints built in for things like metadata, updates, or cloud relay. But I agree it’s something users should be aware of and ideally something UGREEN should give more control over in the settings.I’ll send this to UGREEN also for clarification on their side, as well as update on what my dynamic/static setup was back during the record!

        +++ for those that miss this in the vid (some of it, anyway!), @praetorxyn ‘s comment below covers the “what else can I do” even better:

        If you don’t open any ports in your firewall and make it internet-facing, you’re going to be perfectly safe unless the hacker has physical access to your house.

        If you need external access, the ways to achieve that, in descending order of security, are:
        1. Overlay VPN like Tailscale / Netbird
        2. Set up a self-hosted Pangolin in a VPS and host an instance of their newt container in your LAN so Pangolin can wireguard tunnel into your network (you can use Cloudflare tunnel if you want to, but their ToS prohibits certain kinds of traffic)
        3. Create one or more “External” VLANs that are isolated from the rest of your LAN, and put any public-facing services there, then open the port and forward to the server hosting the external services
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      151. All IPs are regional. Buy a Chinese NAS, expect Chinese IPs. Let’s get real, it’s almost certain that the Chinese government have backdoors/day 0 vulnerabilities baked in, but that is no different than the US government. They won’t be targeting millions of NASs, they will use these backdoors to target specific targets. Home users and small businesses that aren’t in any way involved with national security need not worry.
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      152. Do I understand correctly, that you have set up this NAS on your own network using DHCP, and there were parts of the NAS or applications you installed which have ignored the DNS you have set for your network and used their own DNS instead? Which in total sums up to pretty much a dozen of different free DNS available in the world?
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      155. Best to have a solar panel, charging a power station, connected to a pure sine wave UPS powered by the power station, in turn connected to the NAS. This way the UPS provides very clean power to the NAS, and when there is no sun for days at a time due to heavy rain storms and the power station runs out of power, the UPS will do a clean shutdown of the NAS.
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      156. I have two ds220J’s (potatoes) a laptop, router and NBN modem oh and fridge freezer running 24/7 from my solar setup; if the battery gets low in winter after a few days of cloud it switches over to the grid.
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      158. a NAS on solar? I’m not sure I think that’s reasonable. Now having said that I have built machines for a customer who intended them to be able to run on solar.

        This was quite a few years back and the customer was a university. They had developed a fire wall/router software, quite advanced for the time, and they needed simple to use computers to run it. Now the solar part came from the ambition to use them in different African countries to provide internet access in remote areas where there were no chance they would ever have a chance to get internet access using a normal ISP. To make this possible the computer would have to be small, solid without any fans or ventilation and it would have to be very power efficient. So we started with deciding on the processor and motherboard, then we designed a chassis in 8mm aluminum. A professor at the university designed a power management system that allowed the computer to be run on mains or a 12V battery backed up by a solar panel. They would be installed mainly where mains power was available, but as it was common that power went out they would have a 12V car battery and a solar panel connected. Not having any air flow was to make sure the computer wouldn’t get filled with sand and dust. Oh yes, most would be installed on transmission towers where needed.

        I remember sending a box to a university in some African country and it got held in customs. I then learned that although this was one of the most well working countries in Africa they would still need to pay what was effectively a bribe in order to get the customs official to let them have the box. This was in addition to the tax they also had to pay. The bribe was seen as perfectly normal over there. It was just how it worked.

        I have no idea how well this worked, if it did. We just built the machines to order and the people from the university took care of getting them to Africa and have them installed. That once was the only time I sent a machine directly to that university. At the time I did a look at google maps and could see that the city where the university was located looked amazing. Not at all what you would expect from an African city but more something you would see in a very wealthy town in the US or Europe.
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      162. Just something to note, having the inverter to generate AC uses power as well (probably about 20w). Along with the losses converting DC from the batteries to AC then back to DC using a power brick us loosing about 20%. If you can plug the NAS/Router/etc from DC. You can get USB to barrel jack adaptors at 12v, it wouldn’t surpise me if you could find a synology power cable that uses a USB port as well. Failing that you can use the DC Car Port or Barrel Ports on the solar generators to output about 12v and use buck/boost regulators to convert that to whatever voltage the devices needs. I have used a 300W boost converter to power my 3D printer so you can get get quite a lot of power if you needed too.
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      164. As a home owner with 8.2kw of solar for the last 4 years, i love it but i get many sometimes consecutive days with zero generation over winter. My 2 pence, small scale is pointless, as a hobby project, fun but will never pay back the money invested. House scale i expect it to cover the cost within 5 or 6 years. Pure profit after that point ????
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      165. Only 5 min in, but some quick math for the US… At the max draw of 18W and cost of $0.12 per kWh (US average), this maxes out at $0.05/day – or $19/yr. If the solar power setup costs $300 for battery and panel, we’re looking at over 15 years for pay-off.
        I still need to watch the rest of the vid, but was curious where we stand. And obviously you can probably run more off the solar/battery than just the NAS, so that could help offset the cost too.
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      169. I’m running a “similar” set-up but different.
        Allow me to comment/feedback;
        First, I believe from the looks of it, your solar panel are not in the optimal angle?
        Looking at the size of the panel, I’m not too sure if it will be able to deliver 140 watt but I strongly recommend tilting the panel and look at the solar input of Portable Generator. Rule of thumb for an approximate of your ideal angle: Take your latitude and add 15 degrees for winter, or subtract 15 degrees for summer.
        For example: if your latitude is 40 degrees, the angle you want to tilt your panels in the winter would be: 40 + 15 = 55 degrees. In the summer it would be: 40 – 15 = 25 degrees.
        Next, the portable Generator; those are not that ideal, they contain a lot of (extra) electronics and thus overhead and not that efficient. (in our investigations we came to about 60% to 70%, but these were bigger-sized portable generators, 1KW and 3KW but we also tried 500W and even 300W).
        I also strongly, very strongly recommend using (also) an UPS when using your such a set-up; These kind of portable solar generators often use LiFePO4 cells. These are quite powerful with one drawback; their discharge-curve is quite horizontal until about 10% charge-left. Then it drops quite steep. You will notice that often that the portable generator will indicate a fair charge for quite some time but suddenly will go down all of a sudden rapidly and turn off (to protect the LiFePO4 cells against deep-discharge). With a UPS you have a wee bit more time to gracefully turn off the NAS gracefully.
        As stated, we use a similar set-up, using a bunch of 100Watt solar panels (and these are quite bigger in size, I noticed), 3KW 12-volt inverters, and a bank of LiFePO4 prismatic cells with a BMS. In our current set-up, we can run for about 3 days without power and no disruptions. At all.
        And lastly, I strongly recommend external (roof)antennas for your wifi, that might also reduce the power consumption. We use directional antennas.
        Granted, what I describe might be way over the top for a typical set-up, but you can most certainly downsize it to your needs, set-up and budget.
        If you are willing and able to go a wee bit into the DYI route.
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      170. One issue with these power units is that they typically don’t provide a UPS interface (serial or USB) that could be used to power down a NAS cleanly…
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      171. Love this content! Going to lose a lot of efficiency with the AC inverter.

        I have a larger power station but seems to draw about 20 watts with the inverter just switched on.

        It should be possible to provide the synology direct DC power at 12 volts
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      177. After just over a year of using Truenas I am now going to dump that system completely, it’s unreliable they push out certain upgrades which completely breaks all the apps that you are currently using and you cannot upgrade those apps anymore so you don’t get any security fixes or any extras that are being upgraded the example was upgrading to next cloud 27 that required a complete change in the system which I couldn’t implement because the system itself is just completely broken it cuts to the point where you’ve got to basically back up all your data then destroy the whole system install these upgrades alleged upgrades and then re-import all your data back I mean what the fuck are they thinking? Put out a system and then put out modification that breaks valuable data storage that the whole point of data storage is that you’re trying to protect your data not fucking destroy it, As such I would never recommend true scale or any of Truenas systems because they’re just inherently unreliable badly maintained they push out updates without thinking about how it might affect their consumers and they’re just not a very good company to be quite honest they want to make out that they’re really helpful and that they’re really useful but if you actually go to their forum pages most of them are full of gibberish the help pages are pretty un useless and obviously this whoever does actually design in the system is smoking far too much dope. Also the completely unfriendly user permission system is a mess as well I mean I don’t even know what it’s been designed that way really there’s so many other variables out there that use different systems and they have able to manage their systems correctly without having all this absolute gibberish everywhere. Basically true mass has been designed by a bunch of stoners who spent too much time at university and not enough time in the real world actually using the systems that they’re designing. it appears to me that this whole system has been designed because they want you to employ them to fix it they pretend that the system is designed for anybody to use but the fact of the matter is it isn’t designed for anyone to use it’s like Apple where they only do the repair themselves and for the most part of the system is probably like that for 80 to 90% of the people that use it will not be able to repair it in the event of a Breakdown they will have to troll the forums and do everything just like it used to be with another particular server that I’m not gonna mention And it just smacks of windows to be quite honest pages and pages and pages of useless information that doesn’t really help anyone at all. The fact of the matter is if you want a decent system the better off just installing synology using the project that’s up on GitHub and then you won’t have any of this crap to deal with that this company is doing
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      179. I own two Synology NASes, they are (so far) a reliable storage and okay software experience,
        I’ll be exploring TrueNAS Scale from now on, as it seems to be much more capable thanks to more powerful hardware support, and with Docker + Kubernetes and VM support it’ll likely become my primary application hub, keeping Synology as rcync backup mostly..
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      181. I understand the desire for flexibility and customization of the TrueNAS, but Synology has always been rock solid in my experience and I love the simplicity.
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      182. Excellent Video.
        But you have missed certain parts of Truenas.
        1. With Truenas, even if your system bricks, you can still mount the zfs pool on any BSD / Linux System [ Especially motherboard failure ]
        2. You can expose shares as NFS as well CIFS simultaneously [ Not advisable though ]
        3. Snapshot replication in encrypted form over wan is very much a use case. [ We do this all the time ]
        4. You can install Wire guard.
        5. You can excellent LSI HBA’s to extend number of drives.
        6. Boot Time is much lower in case of Truenas.
        7. Mounting earlier snapshot as separate share .
        8. Not tied up a particular hardware.
        9. API everywhere.
        10. Costly but pays every penny in long run. Its enterprise system all the way.
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      183. Great video, just a question isn’t a microserver g8 with a xeon cpu and up to 24gb ram better than any up to date synology, I know synology has allot more software, clour, remote photo synk…. thank are good but, now they recommend disabling remote access to prevent getting hacked,
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      184. The benefit of Synology is that it’s a full featured operating system not just a home NAS software.
        You also don’t get things like BTRFS scrub, snapshots, low power consumption, stability, consistency, etc.
        And if you’re using this for cloud storage and backup then mobile apps should matter to you.. which, again, Synology wins.
        You pay a lot more for lesser hardware but it’s not the hardware you’re paying for.. it’s DSM.
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      187. I think it will be more fair to compare qnap too, although recently they got qlock issue but I believe it might due for default settings not tight enough or the user lacking update the version. I used nas long years which recently eyeing to upgrade to ts-h973ax
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      188. ❤️ Hermosa eleccion 4.FO/Elizeid de mejor
        1 (elecciones ) 9.9/10 2 ( culturales ) 9.7/10
        Son unos de los mejores conciertos
        , no-puede-ir-pero-de-tan-solo verlos
        desde pantalla,, se que estuvo
        Sorprendente .
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      189. Hi, I run a company and I use Synology Nas to share and receive data. Each customer has their own user name and can access file station using quickconnect. This works very well but my only issue is that I need to manually access each folder to see if there has been an upload. Is it possible to get an alert when a user logs into DSM using quickconnect or a notification when there was been an upload?
        Thank you
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      191. If only Synology didn’t complicate things by locking out other branded HDDs and not supporting SHR for some of their range regardless of the performance impacts sometimes there is a use case where you need the flexibility of mixing drives. They could recommend NOT to use it in the setup with a description of why but taking that choice away is a mistake.

        I am looking at buying a larger NAS at the moment and unfortunately synology is immediately disqualified from my choices due to their decision on forcing their HDDs. Why didn’t they just have the advantage of updating HDD firmware with a button push or maybe a longer warranty if using their drives as a carrot… they are forcing me to look at other options… who know maybe when I look elsewhere I will like what I find and never come back… really REALLY silly decision.
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      192. You did really well with this and as unbiased as you could possibly be.

        My background isn’t in IT, so I initially looked at QNAP, then Synology and for my needs they weren’t sufficient in the event of multiple types of failure. I had the money and more importantly I was prepared to put in the effort for greater file integrity/safety. I didn’t find the Apple approach to data that Synology use (you can have it back, if you buy another Apple), but I appreciate that’s for ease of use.

        I started by throwing an install on an Athlon CPU machine (very old) that I had knocking around and had 6 320GB drives to use as well (along with a spare SSD for the boot drive). I just played with it very casually, harshly pulling drives and seeing how easy it was to fix. Direct play Plex used only a few percent CPU usage, which impressed me – it only pushed the CPU with transcodes.

        Two years on and I have an understanding of a system that I trust with my business and personal data. As so much of our lives are stored in bits and bytes, it makes sense to do what you think matters when it comes to protecting it.

        Well done for this, it was really interesting to see the Synology GUI.
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      194. ???? I’m a DSM fanboy, but I need that safety net of TrueNAS available to me, if Synology changes their business model to a subscription service or pushes their hard drives more.
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      195. QNAP system, btw, jokes apart; really… i’ve tried synology, i’ve tried freenas, i’ve tried truenas, i’ve tried them all… in the end i always come back to qnap system, cause are the best for my needs 🙂
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      196. For the novice… Dsm…
        For the little bit more advanced user… Truenas.

        In general Truenas, because you can use your own hardware or the ix system hardware.
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