Published Apr 29, 2026, 10:01 AM EDT Ayush Pande is a PC hardware and gaming writer. When he's not working on a new article, you can find him with his head stuck inside a PC or tinkering with a server operating system. Besides computing, his interests include spending hours in long RPGs, yelling at his friends in co-op games, and practicing guitar. If you’re planning to move away from the cloud by building a Network-Attached Storage rig, you’ve got a bunch of options to choose from. Synology used to be at the apex of the NAS ecosystem back in the day, and although the company has toned down its anti-consumer tactics a fair bit, there are plenty of other fish in the sea. QNAP is fairly reliable for hardcore enthusiasts, and its proprietary OS is easy enough for beginners. Heck, thanks to XPEnology, you can even try running Synology’s DSM on unsupported hardware, including DIY NAS rigs. Me? I rely on OpenMediaVault to resurrect old machines as reliable NAS units.…