DS2422+ HDD compatibility
Synology 2022/2023 NAS and WD & Seagate Hard Drive Compatibility
If you have been considering a large-scale business or enterprise NAS solution from Synology in 2022/2023, then there is a good chance you have heard about a relatively recent change in how Synology has approached hard drive compatibility in this tier of their portfolio. This change (in brief) is that this tier of systems is only designed to be used with their own branded range of hard drives and SSDs (the HAT5300, SAT5210, HAS5300, etc) and practically all hard drives from long-standing partners such as WD and Seagate are not officially supported in their business/enterprise-scale systems. Now, it is important to stress that this is NOT a complete closed-door policy here. Indeed, after the initial negative reception to this policy change demonstrated in DSM 7 featured in the DS3622xs+ and DS2422+ reveals (Danger notifications, limited drive interaction options in storage manager, etc), Synology changed a number of these areas in their DSM 7.1 system when using 3rd party drive media. However, many users are still concerned with where they stand on using popular NAS hard drives such as Seagate Ironwolf, WD Red, Ultrastar and EXOS in their brand new Synology NAS drive. So, today I want to go through pretty much everything that you CAN and CANNOT do with 3rd Party hard drives in the larger scale Synology NAS drives with DSM 7.1 right now. However, if you are in a rush or just want the TLDR:
The GOOD News
- Practically ALL Storage Services and Features of Synology’s DSM 7.1 platform are available when using 3rd Party HDDs (Seagate Ironwolf, WD Red, Ultrastar, etc) and I only found 2 things that weren’t (and even one of those is pretty small)
- Thanks to recently released specifications and compatibility on the DS1522+ and RS422+ NAS for 2022, we can confirm that these system do NOT have limited HDD compatibility listings and in fact list all the usual HSS and SSD models you would expect
- Synology has changed the red ‘DANGER/CRITICAL’ warning in the DSM notification panel of DSM 7.0 to show ‘Warning’ in amber. Still not ideal, but still a step up visually
- SMART, testing, Scrubbing, Hot Spare, Drive management and ALL RAID configurations are available to 3rd party HDDs
- ALL File Management tool are available with Volumes that contain unverified drives
- ALL 1st Party Applications that I tested did not complain/refuse the use of volumes that contained 3rd party media
Video Chapters
00:12 – Why Are People Concerned with HDD/SSD Compatibility in Synology DSM 7.1?
00:54 – The Test Setup for HDD Testing in DSM 7.1 and the DS2422+ NAS
02:18 – VERY IMPORTANT – MOST DSM 7.1 NAS DRIVES SUPPORT 3RD PARTY DRIVES
03:45 – What you will see in DSM 7.1 on a Business Class/Enterprise Solution when using 3rd Party HDD/SSDs
06:36 – Testing a 3rd Party HDD in DSM 7.1 & the DS2422+ NAS
08:07 – Storage Manager Features and Services that are Available
10:35 – Creating a New Storage Pool & Volume with 3rd Party Hard Drives in DSM 7.1 + DS2422+
14:14 – Resource Monitor & 3rd Party Hard Drives in DSM 7.1
15:07 – Indexing Media & 3rd Party Hard Drives in DSM 7.1
17:27 – Testing 1st Party Synology Apps with 3rd Party Hard Drives in DSM 7.1
22:39 – Why has Synology changed it’s position on 3rd Party Hard Drive Compatibility in DSM 7.1 for Synology Enterprise NAS in 2022/2023?
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I can understand Synology not wanting to test every HD made for the lifecycle of a product and going with their own certified products however, Synology’s core competency is not in HDs and what they are demanding consumers buy is not best in breed.
Their NAS machines start off with components made 4-5 years ago. They are stuck on 1GbE LAN ports, no support for Thunderbolt, and now they want to put our valuable data on a subpar HD’s? Anyone want to buy my Synology machines? I am ditching mine. Oh PS Btrfs is not better that ZFS.
Synology HAT3310 16TB Plus
workload rating of 180 TB/year
1.2 million hours MTBF
3 yr warranty
Seagate IronWolf Pro – 16TB
workload rate of 550 TB/year
2.5 million hours MTBF
5 yr warranty
WD Red Pro – 16TB
workload rate of 550 TB/year
2.5 million hours MTBF
5 yr warranty
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Synology is playing a perfidious game. They know that their customers trust and follow their HDD compatibility list. When asked how Synology can reduce the effort to test compatible HDDs and increase profit at the same time, Synology has found an answer: We simply say that very few third-party HDDs are still compatible and say that our own Synology HDDs are the very best. In fact, Synology hard drives are nothing more than Toshiba hard drives with modified firmware. Synology sells OEM hard drives made by Toshiba for twice the price.
I ordered a DS1621+ because I wanted to upgrade from a DS1515+. This perfidious game of Synology has become clear to me when I have dealt with the question of which hard drives would fit so from 12-18TB.
And what can I tell you, there are other manufacturers who play with their NAS in the same league – it will now be a 6-bay NAS from Qnap. Too bad, I was many years very satisfied with the NAS of Synology from the DS152+, DS1513+ to the DS1515+. This company policy of Synology is not clever, they lack the unique selling proposition to push this through – hopefully.
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So basically Toshiba paid Synology a lot of money for exclusivity on NAS drive usage, and made up this silly verified and unverified coding in DSM. How can 3rd party drives suddenly be unverified when they’re working perfectly in the past? DSM may be nice for RAID/NAS management, but I think I’m gonna take my money else where for my new NAS.
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The issue with random fake warnings popping up all over is that when a REAL warning shows up, users may ignore it.
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Thanks for all your hard work. This video was helpful
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I have a HGST Deskstar NAS 4TB 7200RPM SATA III (HDN726050ALE610) currently on my older DS216play and I want to upgrade to the DS720+. Will I have issues if I just use the same HDD in the new DS720+? I’m running DSM 6, haven’t upgraded to 7
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interesting. I have a DS216J and I just upgraded to DSM 7.1.1-42962 update 2. the next day I started getting “bad sector” messages and from what I can tell, there is no way to run S.M.A.R.T. diagnostics from the new DSM update. I have two WD 3 TBs but was thinking of upgrading to two 6 TBs. Now I’m uncertain.
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Imagine, a client just spent thousands or tens of thousands on brand new stuff from you and immediately get warning and security issues popping up due to Synologies deliberate programming and then you have to say, oh no just ignore those ::wink wink:: trust me ::wink wink:: it’s really not an issue ::wink wink:: (awkward laughter). Is that really the kind of scumbag company you want to partner with. It was probably difficult and expensive just to acquire that customer and already you look like a lying scumbag.
I’m tempted out of principle to buy 10k-20k worth of synology garbage on amazon just to return it a few times as defective so that they have to rma the whole lot back to synology as defective when its really their scummy programming.
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I was going to go with a new synology system for my nas but after learning about their “hard drive compatibility list” I wrote off synology completely. To bad too because I was looking at the RS2421+ with redundant power supply and the expansion unit. I guess they just don’t want to make any money. Oh well I wish them the best on their new hard drive selling venture…..
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Long time symbology customer. Never again.
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Thanks for going through this. Sadly this is a colossally stupid business move by synology, in Australia and New Zealand small – medium companies cannot buy synology branded drives, so great going synology you removed yourselves from the market.
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This is a lesson in how to kill your brand…
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That company is just abusing the system and making you buy their own proprietary hard drives. I think there are much better products out there without limitations. This is a massive setback for them and they’ll be left behind just like Nokia was
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I own two DS1821+ right know with the latest DSM. Both populated with 5x16TB Toshiba HDDs. I liked the idea of not supporting the duopoly of WD/Seagate by buying Toshiba. Plus, Toshiba is cheaper and still some specs are even better than WD’s.
I don’t receive any warnings on my DS1821+. But if this will change, I am out. Synology gets my middle finger.
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Question for some random person that can help me, because this guy never answer the comments. I got an 8 bay Qnap, I know that I can start just with one drive right? But what happens later with the information on the drive if I want to add 4 more drives for example and make a RAID 5, do I need to give new format and loose everything every time I change the RAID config, or is the NAS going to reposition the content I had there without loosing information while changing to RAID 5? Thanks!! ????
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Please don’t confuse this video with your recent Synology NASes. The HD compatibility issue is just for the latest Synology NASes released in 2022. If you have a plan to buy a Synology NAS of the current model, I suggest you check the Compatibilty List before making your purchase to verify your HD on hand or to purchase.
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Synology was top of my list for a nas but if they aim to lock you into their line of disks i’ll look at qnap or other alternatives.
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If you can make also a video of “CAN and CANNOT” regarding SSD-Cache and NVMe usage 🙂 The new models are only “support” the Synology NVMe. The question is, whether the DSxx22+ is creating a SSD-Cache with Samsungs 970Evo+ or Seagate….
Thx in advance
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Sounds anti competitive. Aren’t there laws about that?
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I’m wondering if I could put 12X 16TB Iron Wolf pro drives in the DiskStation DS3622xs+
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The thing that Synology needs to keep in mind is that their drives don’t have wide availability in all regions. While that is the case then what they’re doing is asking for trouble… for their customers! And yes, while I agree for the most part there is full functionality with NAS units like the DS2422+ with 3rd party drives it still throws up a warning without the possibility of making it go away. Why is this important you ask? For the simple reason that there may well be a warning come and an it gets ignored. If the NAS admin gets desensitised to seeing “warning” all warnings may then be ignored. So while I get Synology’s perspective, for the xs series and up but not with the Plus range, I am not really agreeing with Rob here either. Warnings should always be taken very seriously when it comes to someone’s data.
Synology should implement a mechanism which allows these warnings to be negated on a drive by drive basis which makes it the full responsibility of the owner/admin. Only then can other warnings carry their correct weight. That, or allow the purchase of an expanded drive compatibility list. That way they get compensated for their extra work while at the same time offering choice for their customers. As su h it would be no different to purchasing an extended warranty.
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You know, you can steal people’s wallets and tell them you just wanted to help them lose weight. It’s just not advisable to tell your customers up front you’re really taking them for idiots. Which is precisely what they’re doing. They’re FAR too small to manufacture their own drives. So, they grab some from whatever undisclosed manufacturer that usually isn’t on their “compatibility list”, add a flag to the firmware and €225 to the sticker because their over-priced stuff just can’t satisfy their endless greed as it is.
Sorry, just add the up charge to the device and let people use the quality drives they want and that are as good if not better than their branded gear. It’ll make the same ridiculous total and people won’t buy it either way. I’m in the market for another NAS and considered getting another Synology, but that ship has sailed. I wonder if I’m the only one. Fewer people will buy into that scam, and they’ll end up with just the same profit as before due to alienating numerous former customers. As if it wasn’t enough to dump countless functions from DSM after finally making the jump to version 7 after several years. Great job shooting yourself in the foot, Synology. ????
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I have 2x 8TB IronWolf bought on Amazon and running in DS920 with latest 7.1 42661 and I have Ironwolf Health tab present to run the maintenance test on it.
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Im confuded. I am running a DS1821+ with 3rd party drives. But the system status is showing as Healthy…. When watching this video it says it should be flagging a warning message? OS is 7.1-42661 Update 1.
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I am NOT buying a NAS that will not fully use my SeaGate drives. To me this is a very short sighted thing to do. Nope not going to buy a Synology NAS while this is going on
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So here is a thought:
Why can they not build a User Acceptance Message into the software…Once you have acknowledged that “Yes I know the drives are not verified” It removes the warnings?
Why keep troughing in your face the whole time? Via the UI? Come on…these are not kids toys…we, the user, know what we are getting into…
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Synology should seriously re-consider their philosophy…business plan
Yes Enterprise is fine Enterprise has money and can buy into the echo system fully to get the support…etc. So yes for Enterprise I fully understand their thinking.
For enthusiast/Home use…they are seriously shooting themself in the foot…We cannot afford “enterprise” class stuff, we buy what we can afford that has good support IE: Seagate Ironwolf/Exos or WD Red…so if this is their route for the Enthusiast/home user…they are falling out of favor!!
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I don’t care. It’s another excuse from Synology as expected. Now, the higher capacity plus-series, and later when they have a wider capacity range of “original” HDDs it will be the whole series. And eventually it wouldn’t be a surprise if all of their products will have soft locks. And you might say “oh sure, it’s just an annoying perpetual message on your desktop”. I disagree, rather it’s on par with intrusive ads saying “buy our (lower capacity lesser quality overpriced) shit, or we will keep spamming you forever”. I will not be buying any more of their products.
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The same goes for most enterprise storages. I can add some of 3rd party drives and write a supported firmware to it through the CLI but not through the GUI (NetApp being one of them). I was able to do an emergency recovery because the drives in question no longer were supported or sold by NetApp or their partners. It is the burden of a storage dude working in a company that acquires others and finds himself, once again, that the acquisition was done in a bar and not by doing a proper hardware audit 😀 You know what I mean….
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On an 1817+ I use seagate and toshiba 8Tb and I don’t get any messages to compatibility.
Seagate ironwolf
Toshiba MG05
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I’ve been saving money for a NAS — they are expensive — and have been looking at older Synology. But there is no certainty that firmware updates won’t limit older systems as to hard drives that can be used. So I’m leaning toward other than Synology. It’s already a problem that RAM is made proprietary at inflated price. And the complaints about lack of support is also a consideration.
That proprietary limitation/monopolizing will adversely impact Synology’s market share.
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Hello, very good video, but I’m still a little confused, i have DS920+ already for 1.5 year, with WDC 4TB Red drives, and I have the message that there is an update 7.1 ready. Can I now update without that annoying warning of 3e party hard disks? Best Regards, Mark
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