After months of frustration over forced hardware choices, Synology responds with flexibility—for most users, anyway.
Photo by Alex Cheung on Unsplash
If you’ve been eyeing a Synology NAS but hesitated at the steep price of their branded hard drives, here’s some good news: Synology is finally backing off from one of its more controversial decisions. As of October 8, with the release of DiskStation Manager (DSM) 7.3, the company announced that its 2025 model-year NAS systems in the Plus, Value, and J-series categories will once again support third-party hard drives.
This is a pretty big deal—especially if you’re someone who’s been shouted at by your NAS interface for daring to use unapproved hardware.
What Changed?
Let’s rewind for a second.
Up until recently, Synology had been doubling down on a policy that required users to install only Synology-validated (read: Synology-branded and more expensive) hard drives in several of its NAS devices. If you didn’t, you risked losing system features, getting bombarded with data safety warnings, or even being locked out of certain performance insights like S.M.A.R.T. data. For many users, especially home lab admins and small business IT folks, this felt like a hard sell.
A NAS that nags you for using drives from Seagate or Western Digital—even when they perform just as well? Not a good look.
The Pushback and the Pivot
Customers didn’t hold back. And it seems like Synology listened, at least partly.
In their announcement, they shared that based on customer feedback (and likely a fair bit of competitive pressure), they’re now allowing non-validated drives for DiskStation models like the DS1525+, DS1825+, DS725+, and others in the same 2025 lineup. That means you’re no longer locked into Synology’s high-priced HAT5300 or HAT5310 hard drives just to get your NAS system to stop complaining.
Photo by Gavin Phillips on Unsplash
To be fair, Synology has defended its original policy by claiming that its drives undergo extra testing and come with firmware tweaks to improve reliability. But let’s be honest: Forcing people to buy expensive hardware when cheaper, equally capable options exist rarely goes over well in the consumer space.
Here’s a quick price comparison to paint the picture:
- Synology HAT5310 8TB: $299
- Seagate Exos 8TB (similar spec): $220
- Synology HAT5300 20TB: $605
- Western Digital Gold 20TB: ~$399
That price gap gets painful fast, especially if you’re trying to fill a 5- or 8-bay NAS and aren’t working with a corporate IT budget.
What’s Still Locked?
Before we celebrate too hard, it’s worth noting that not everything is wide open. For M.2 drive support—used for things like cache pools—Synology will still require that drives be on their hardware compatibility list (HCL). So if you were hoping to drop in a random M.2 SSD for cache acceleration, you might hit a wall.
Photo by Cokile Ceoi on Unsplash
Also, this policy change applies only to the 2025 Plus, Value, and J-series models. Enterprise models like the DS3622xs+ are still sticking to the original rules.
Why This Matters
From a broader perspective, this is a big moment—not just for Synology users but for the NAS space in general. Synology is facing stiffer competition these days, with brands like QNAP and UGREEN offering more flexible and often more affordable systems. Even networking giant Ubiquiti is getting into the NAS game.
By loosening the restrictions, Synology might be trying to win back some of the goodwill—and customers—it lost. A company spokesperson summed it up well: They said the original intention was to “improve system reliability,” but they learned from the community that “flexibility is equally important.”
That’s corporate speak for: “We heard you. And yeah, we may have gone too far.”
Final Thoughts
If you’ve been waiting to upgrade or expand your Synology setup without getting upsold on pricey disks, now might be a good time. Just make sure you’re looking at one of the 2025 models like the DS1525+ or DS725+ and that you’re on DSM 7.3 or later.
The storage world will keep turning, but it’s nice to see a tech company actually change course based on real user feedback, even if only partially. Let’s hope other hardware makers are paying attention.
Keywords: Synology NAS, DSM 7.3, verified drives, third-party hard drives, Synology 2025 models, NAS flexibility, Synology drive restrictions, DS1525+
