Synology8 Bay RackStation RS1221+ (Diskless)

An upgrade on an older '+' style Synology box. The previous physical drives transferred over fine and the new PAT rebuilt the DSM without too much hassle. I forgot to delete the Bond setting from the previous Synology box (before backing it up) and thought I'd have to fry the DSM on the RS1221+ in order to clear that setting (moving from 2 ports bonded to 4 ports bonded) but I managed to use the reset and force it to delete and reconfigure. Only one Cat 5 could be plugged in while achieving this reset—not all four—once realised easily fixed. The password reset method isn't well described but otherwise everything is fine. Still running the drives back in on the new box without upgrading the RAM (32GB) or network connection (10Gb). It's nicely built, not over the top, and fits well into the rack. The fan noise has increased considerably over the smaller Synology boxes but not quite as loud as a dedicated server build (though this is only a quarter of the size). A two bay Synology is whisper quiet, a 5 bay had some fan noise but can be drowned out by drive chatter, this 8 bay unit has real fan noise (on it's lowest, 'quiet' setting) and has a presence in the office. Destined for a cupboard anyway but I'd suggest planning for isolation if you like peace and quiet. My last Synology box lasted for over 10 years without any huge issues but doesn't match this for pace of file delivery, build quality (much more metal involved) or simple storage capacity. It doesn't present the fastest preview yet (for really big files) but with plenty of upgrades to come it has the legs to be a powerful performer in a small form factor. It came double boxed and is well protected for transportation. It's a nice unit for those who just need things to work; have large storage needs; don't like constantly rebuilding backup solutions or having multiple drives rolling around. The Synology DSM has many reviews elsewhere. Thumbs up.

Finally pulled the trigger and bought a NAS, synology has many useful features I was looking for - efficient use of the drives, monitoring and utilities, easy and quick upgrading and management of storage pools, UPS integration, ability to run Plex and other server types, replication, SSD caching, and more. The only downside is the loudness of the fans, if this is in the same room as you are. Fans are replaceable with quiet versions, then it’s very quiet. These are designed for server rooms, so noise isn’t a focus for this model understandably. I can see why these are so popular.

One of the best NAS I've owned.just be aware this is one of those rack-mounted NAS. The noise from the fan is very laud. I put this in my basement so I don't hear anything but I know this is not the case for everyone.Otherwise, the build quality is very nice and works perfectly.

This is my first foray in to the world of NAS! Previously its all been direct attached to servers.It was finally time to retire that ancient server and storage array.This NAS was my first choice and I couldn’t be happier. It has done everything I have needed and more.Installation was a breeze. I did upgrade the RAM to 32GB and replaced the fans with Noctuas.Im using the 4 1GB Ethernet ports in a bridge and the throughput is good enough for the images I work with.Synology support is great if you need them and they respond pretty fast.This NAS was worth the price and id definitely buy another Synology product!

So first off I know Synology has gotten a lot of flack because of vendor locking hard drives to their hard drives. But I can confirm you can use third party hard drives (I'm using Seagate) and still get all the full benefits without any weird hacky stuff that was posted on the Linus tech forms. Synology has updated their supported drives list and the hard drives that I purchased work perfectly fine.Secondly, I'm upgrading from a 11+ year-old DS1511+, which has served me well over the years but I was maxing out the amount of hard drive space I could actually put in that device.This is a worthy upgrade. The sucker is blazing fast, it's quiet, and temperature wise. The added bonus is is it goes to my server rack so it looks really nice.The only reason why I'm not giving this five stars is because I attempted to run jellyfin on this device and it does not run well at all, so I'm still using my personal computer as my media server which references all the media data on my Synology device.

Added this synology nas to my home server rack. My server closet never got over 80° F before adding this, but now it regularly hits 90°+. Not totally unexpected, but it generates a bit more heat than I expected.Also the stock fans are a bit loud, consider replacing them with noctuas right out of the gate before you mount. I also added the 10Gbe networking card.

My deskside 19" rack is only 12 inches deep! This Synology fits in the rack perfectly. It's dead silent and after about 6 months of use, has been flawless in operation.This is my second 8-bay Synology and I wish I would have bought this originally instead of the DS series that I bought. Why, you ask? Because this NAS works with the Synology 10gb/s ethernet adapter, which also has two M.2 2280 NVME drive slots. This allows you to use the NVME as write cache. The combination of the NMVE cache and the 10gb/s ethernet will make you forget that this thing is running spinning disks at all.Very fast, very quiet, very trouble free, and for that it has earned my 5 star stamp of approval.