2 Bay NAS Recomendation

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Networkn
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#3445466 18-Dec-2025 18:07

Handle9:

The whole point of Synology is meant to be “it just works” but increasingly it doesn’t.

It 'just works' if you size and spec it properly.

No reasonable consumer believes that no matter what their use case is, a Synology NAS will meet it. It's not a matter of not just working, it's a matter of ensuring your use case is covered by your device selection.

Handle9

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#3445468 18-Dec-2025 18:22

networkn:

Handle9:

The whole point of Synology is meant to be “it just works” but increasingly it doesn’t.

It 'just works' if you size and spec it properly.

No reasonable consumer believes that no matter what their use case is, a Synology NAS will meet it. It's not a matter of not just working, it's a matter of ensuring your use case is covered by your device selection.

It’s entirely reasonable to expect hardware that is capable of transcoding to do it. Arbitrary crippling by synology is a risk you run now with all their hardware.

Senecio

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#3445469 18-Dec-2025 18:46

networkn:

It's not a matter of not just working, it's a matter of ensuring your use case is covered by your device selection.

Which is why I came here asking for advice.

On on that note, thanks to everyone who has offered their advice. Its about what I was expecting to be honest but its reassuring to know I was on the right track. I think where I'm at right now is that my best bet is to keep an eye out for DS224+?

networkn

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#3445470 18-Dec-2025 18:53

Handle9:

It’s entirely reasonable to expect hardware that is capable of transcoding to do it. Arbitrary crippling by synology is a risk you run now with all their hardware.

If only you could avoid a situation like this, by checking if the unit meets your needs *before* purchasing it.

Which existing units had transcoding removed retrospectively? My understanding is that Synology has moved the expectation of transcoding to client devices.

dafman

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#3445502 19-Dec-2025 08:34

Handle9:

networkn:

Handle9:

The whole point of Synology is meant to be “it just works” but increasingly it doesn’t.

It 'just works' if you size and spec it properly.

No reasonable consumer believes that no matter what their use case is, a Synology NAS will meet it. It's not a matter of not just working, it's a matter of ensuring your use case is covered by your device selection.

It’s entirely reasonable to expect hardware that is capable of transcoding to do it. Arbitrary crippling by synology is a risk you run now with all their hardware.

(Transcoding is a hill @Handle9 is willing to die on)

Handle9

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#3445805 19-Dec-2025 23:37

Synology have behaved in a pretty shitty way towards their SOHO customers this year.

They removed transcoding from their 2025 DS units because they didn’t want to pay a very minimal fee. They phrased this as making it their “expectation” that client devices would transcode. Of course they didn’t have the same “expectation” that Bee-station client devices would do the same.

They also had the “expectation” that users should pay for their inflated storage prices. Unfortunately for them the NAS market is extremely competitive now and they had to back down on their storage decision due to terrible sales.

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Tinkerisk

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#3445807 20-Dec-2025 01:55

What interests me much more is where at least one backup is made from this 2 bay NAS. 😁😎😉

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Senecio

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#3445818 20-Dec-2025 07:11

Tinkerisk:

What interests me much more is where at least one backup is made from this 2 bay NAS. 😁😎😉

Did you miss the bit where I said that anything important is also cloud synced?

Tinkerisk

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#3445823 20-Dec-2025 08:16

Senecio:

Tinkerisk:

What interests me much more is where at least one backup is made from this 2 bay NAS. 😁😎😉

Did you miss the bit where I said that anything important is also cloud synced?

Apparently, because from my point of view, that's a risk. But okay, to each their own. 😉

freitasm

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#3445889 20-Dec-2025 10:31

@Senecio:

Tinkerisk:

What interests me much more is where at least one backup is made from this 2 bay NAS. 😁😎😉

Did you miss the bit where I said that anything important is also cloud synced?

Cloud sync is not a backup, unless it implements versioning. What if your new NAS is compromised and encrypted content is synchronised back to the cloud provider of choice?

A backup on the other hand, keeps versions and allows to restore to a certain point, once your devices are cleaned.

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#3445890 20-Dec-2025 10:34

Handle9:

They removed transcoding from their 2025 DS units because they didn’t want to pay a very minimal fee. They phrased this as making it their “expectation” that client devices would transcode. Of course they didn’t have the same “expectation” that Bee-station client devices would do the same.

Transcoding is available on "consumer" storage, aka the BeeStation Plus 8TB (I am using one, running the built-in Plex server). Assume the feature is not available in Synology prosumer hardware anymore.

If transcoding is required on the server side, better to implement a solution with NAS for storage and a small NUC running something like Proxmox for the service.

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Handle9

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#3446022 20-Dec-2025 15:53

freitasm:

Handle9:

They removed transcoding from their 2025 DS units because they didn’t want to pay a very minimal fee. They phrased this as making it their “expectation” that client devices would transcode. Of course they didn’t have the same “expectation” that Bee-station client devices would do the same.

Transcoding is available on "consumer" storage, aka the BeeStation Plus 8TB (I am using one, running the built-in Plex server). Assume the feature is not available in Synology prosumer hardware anymore.

If transcoding is required on the server side, better to implement a solution with NAS for storage and a small NUC running something like Proxmox for the service.

I don’t see that as “better.”

freitasm

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#3446025 20-Dec-2025 16:01

I didn't claim it was.

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#3446039 20-Dec-2025 18:12

The discussion gave me an idea, and I ordered a 2-bay DXP2800 tonight, replacing the standard 8GB RAM with a 16GB module. That's significantly better than those cheap ARM chip NAS devices, and I'm going to add two 4TB WD red drives that are lying around here unused as spare parts. The manufacturer's firmware will not be used. I will make the device available to reliable, advanced commercial customers as part of our services for exactly 6 months free of charge, and we will administer it remotely. After that, the device will be returned to us in any case (we do not sell hardware), and the customer is free to decide what he would like to purchase next (no NAS, 2-bay, 4-bay, etc.) and what should happen to their data accumulated up to that point.

Thanks! 🙂

Handle9

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#3446089 20-Dec-2025 18:43

It's a shame the Ugreen NAS devices still aren't available globally. The hardware is really nice and they have the right attitude towards their users - if you don't like their OS you can run whatever you like.

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