Synology DS423+ 4 Bay Desktop NAS Storage Server

£395 at time of reviewSynology have just announced the DS425+ but I grabbed this one instead, as Synology now lock their NAS systems down to using their own drives (which is incredibly frustrating), plus they cost significantly more if you go for the enterprise data centre drives. I have Seagate ST16000NM002H Exos Enterprise (X24) 16TB SATA Hard Drives, but these are not compatible with the new 2025 systems. The only difference between this 2023 version with the 2025 version is the 2.5Gb ethernet connection and the fact that it forces you to use Synology drives… so these 2023 systems are going to become like hens teeth soon, so I grabbed it while I could (plus it is now on sale!If you’re here then you’ve likely already done your homework about varying NAS systems… I’ve been in the tech business many many years, and while I’m no networking aficionado I know the difference between an RJ45 & an RJ11 ;) but I can say hands down Synology lead the way when it comes to NAS software that is easy to use. If you really really know what you’re doing then you’ll likely grab a different NAS system as Synology are a bit like Apple, you pay extra, but what you get is ease of use… it just works! So if you want something that you can set up in no time yet can still get under the hood and tinker if you want of need too then seriously look no further (I’ve recommended Synology to many of my clients over the years and they’ve always thanked me)I have this particular model at home, I bought it to replace my DS224+ as that only has two bays and I need the extra storage, I have a couple of 16TB Exios drives in it, running in a Raid 1 configuration, so mirrored continually, but I shall add two more 16TB drives bring the total up to 32GB of useable space (64G in total mirrored)Frustratingly this only has two 1G network ports, although for the majority of home users this will be fine, especially if you’re connecting to it over WiFi anyway! But you can always attach a 2.5Gbps adapter (although this is not supported natively by Synology, you’ll need to do a bit of tinkering and installation yourself but there’s easy enough tutorials to follow online). Talking of which, if you haven’t already, check out Space Rex on YouTube, the guy is a Synology guru, what he doesn’t know about Synology systems isn’t worth knowing! NAS Compares is also a good channel, although a lot more technical and mainly a comparison channel (hence the name!)So if you’re looking to have a system to run your Plex or JellyFin library this is great as it has an intel CPU with integrated gfx acceleration, meaning 4K HEVC streaming across your network without the need to transcode, the integrated photos app and mobile apps, means you have your own private iCloud or Google photos library at home for the whole family to share, all with your own private areas for photos, videos, documents and mobile phone or computer back ups, and sharing photo libraries or files with friends and work over the web etc is easy too. Plus if you have your own security cameras etc, then all that footage can be stored locally too, plus running your own home automation using homebridge or hoobs etc is easy to set up and get running tooSome reviewers mention noise… the NAS itself it completely silent, the noisy bit from time to time will be the hard drives, so it will depend on which drives you get, and yes they can click away at times when it’s doing a back up or indexing a load of photos and videos, so don’t expect to leave this on your bedside table ;) but they’re not that noisy, and certainly not as annoying as a high pitch fan… plus you can leave this pretty much anywhere, it’s relatively small, as long as it’s in a ventilated space it will be happy, tucked away behind your sofa, or on top of a book shelf beside your WiFi router you’ll forget it’s even there most of the time. Oh and upgrade the RAM, a 4Gig SIMM should cost around £25-30 (although you can install a 16G SIMM if you think you’ll need it for heavy loads and virtualisations etc although I’ve had 6G in total running in mine at home for the past three months and it’s been plenty)I honestly can’t recommend having a NAS at home enough! for the modern family (or a small home office), it means everyone’s photos and precious memories and files are all stored centrally and easy to back up… and remember, just because it’s running in Raid 1 so mirrored mode, that’s not a back up! Yes it saves you from a hardware fault as you can hot swap out a hard drive should one of them ever fail (highly unlikely if you use server grade drives), but do get a large external hard drive too and back up the whole thing either automatically or manually, then you can keep that drive in your office or at a relatives, so you always have that back up in case disaster strikes or someone breaks in and steals your NAS!Hope my review was helpful

Using 4 x 16TB Ironwolf Pro in Raid 5 which gives us 48TB of storage and redundancy if 1 drive fails.As a family we were looking for a solution to back up precious photos which was not going to cost a fortune over a lifetime. We obviously aren’t using all 48TB yet but looking at £100+ a year for 2TB of iCloud, this was a more cost effective solution in the long run with added benefits.We also use the NAS to play movies and TV shows off Plex, which works great even when watching in another country. We’ve managed to stop our Netflix, Disney etc subscriptions because of this.The Synology operating system seems to work great although we’re probably only using about 10% of it’s capabilities.Our phones backup all photos and videos so we can free up lots of storage and then we can view them across multiple devices, like iCloud. This is pretty good if you are in the Apple ecosystem and resent paying extortionate amounts for a Macbook or iPad with slightly more storage space. We have an iPad with the basic storage but when it’s connected to a network it can access 48TB of additional storage.The only negative I can say is the you won’t want this anywhere that’s quiet. Noise can be an issue and as such, ours lives in the garage out the way.

Great product as always from Synology works well would highly recommend

The DS423+ is a great NAS and should be more than enough for most users, with having the expandability of the 4 drive bays. Synology DSM is still the best NAS operating system and has the most quality apps available of all the competition- This is really what you are paying for with synology's prices.The hardware inside is mediocre at best for the price, but it all works flawlessly and is so user friendly- Synology is the 'Apple' of the NAS world.Its a shame you cant upgrade this model with a faster network card, so you are stuck at 1gbe speeds.Id recommend this over the 'just released' models because you can use any drives with this, where as the newest version forces you to buy Synology's own brand hard drives- very naughty IMO.