I’ve been using Synology for the past year, and during this time it’s become the center of my home computing. I’m still discovering new use cases, so I’ll keep this post updated. Today, I want to share how I ended up with this setup - the how and why. Here are the main things I use my NAS for:

  • Media Server - My Synology stores and serves my entire collection of movies, TV shows, and music. Using Plex, I can stream this content to any device, creating a personalized Netflix-like experience.
  • Usenet / Torrent Client - I have the standard *ARR stack setup for managing my media library. I can’t recommend it enough. This suite of apps is a crown jewel of the entire setup.
  • HomeBridge - HomeBridge allows me to integrate non-HomeKit devices into my Apple HomeKit setup.
  • Time Machine Backup Destination - My Synology serves as a Time Machine backup destination for all my Macs. This is a major improvement over manually connecting external HDDs.
  • DNS Server - I run AdGuard Home on my Synology as a DNS server. Similar to Pi-hole, it blocks ads across all devices on my network. You can read more about it here.
  • Personal Cloud Storage - While I use iCloud for critical documents, my Synology acts as a personal cloud for miscellaneous files. It’s a great way to keep less important documents accessible without cluttering my primary cloud storage.

In the following sections, I’ll dive deeper into this setup, providing a high-level overview and sharing useful resources that have helped me create this system.

The Initial Setup

Storage Pools / Shares / Volumes

The first question I asked myself when setting up the system was “What volume structure should I use?” Initially, I aimed for complete separation between documents, media, and backups. This approach would have resulted in a single storage pool with three separate volumes.

However, I learned that creating separate volumes doesn’t offer significant advantages in this case (if any). It doesn’t provide any real security benefits. Instead, having separate shared folders with properly set up permissions is more than sufficient. So, unless you have a compelling reason to do otherwise, you should default to a single storage pool with a single volume.

95% of users should use a single SHR pool, with a single BTRFS volume. If you need something else, you’re an advanced user with an unusual use case (or just a big nerd who likes to tinker, even when it’s slightly harmful).

Some people make multiple pools for different RAID levels for different uses, or making a separate pool with surveillance-class drives for their cameras. IMO, it’s not worth that level of control, but it’s available. You must make separate pools for HDDs and SSDs.

There’s even less reason to use multiple volumes on the same pool. All of the backup, permissions, quota, etc. management is done at the shared folder level, so there just isn’t much benefit to multiple volumes, unless you’re hitting the 108TB limit and are forced to.

From the synology community on Reddit

Access Control

All of my shared folders use the default permissions, except for docker. The permissions for this directory are described in detail here. The gist of this setup is that the “docker” user has full access to the “docker” shared folder and nothing else. All other users can access anything except the docker folder.

I have three accounts in total:

  • An admin account that I only use when I need to make changes to Synology.
  • My personal account, which I use day-to-day. All of my client devices use it to access documents, media, and backups.
  • The docker account I mentioned earlier.

Setting up Time Machine

Use this video and you should be good to go.

Docker

I started my Docker setup with this guide as part of setting up the *ARR stack. It goes into detail on how to set it up from the ground up. Once you’re done, it should be fairly easy to build on top of it.

I still haven’t gotten around to setting up automation for updating the containers, so I can’t speak on pullio, the solution suggested in the guide above.

Remote Access

With the initial setup done, it’s time to decide how to access your Synology outside of your home network. In my setup, I wanted to balance security and convenience. That’s why I decided against Synology’s Quick Connect and went with Tailscale. The free tier is more than enough for my needs, and this setup is beautifully simple to configure.

I wrote a separate article on how to set up Plex to work with Tailscale. If you want to learn more about the available options for remote access, this video covers the most popular choices.

Backup

I backup my entire system using the built-in Hyper Backup solution. Here’s a tutorial on how to set it up.

I don’t backup media to save space. In the worst-case scenario of two subsequent disk failures, I’ll still have all of my most important documents intact. The media library should be fairly simple to rebuild.

I have a monthly reminder to connect the external HDD and make a backup. You can configure it so that the external disk will be unmounted when the backup is finished. This makes the process easy and hassle-free. I connect the drive, initiate the backup, and detach it the next morning. You could keep it connected, but I prefer to keep my backup offsite. It’s my final safety net when everything else fails.

Resources