For business it should be all storage. But for home use the best is all-in-one. A home user doesn’t benefit from specialization of equipment, just brings them more headaches managing more stuff. One device that has storage and can also run Plex, Immich, HA in a single package makes the lives much easier for those who have to take care of the IT in the house especially of they’re not “IT people”.

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inigyou 2 hours ago | parent [-]

That isn't a NAS, then. It's a home server.

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jasode 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

>That isn't a NAS, then. It's a home server.

It's just 2 different usages of "NAS" for different contexts.

In a business/enterprise environment, "NAS" is a more constrained definition of a single-purpose rack that only does storage duties.

However, in a home environment, "NAS" is a fuzzier definition to also include running "apps" like Home Assistant, Plex/Jellyfish media, or webcam video analysis. Either in containers or vms. Both the vendors Synology/QNAP/UGREEN and the consumers use "NAS" in this looser definition. If you go out on Google search or Amazon to search for a "home server" to buy, you will get "NAS appliances" as the results. This happens because a NAS in a home usage has plenty of idle CPU leftover to run extra apps that's not strictly just storage. Buying a 2nd computer to run apps just to satisfy the NAS to remain as a "pure" NAS is a waste of money.

Similar situation to "routers". Business/enterprise routers are single purpose. But home routers from the ISP are fuzzier definitions. They also include a DHCP service, a firewall, and a Wi-Fi access point. Maybe the home versions are not "true pure routers" in the official OSI 7-layer sense. Ok, but home users still call them "routers".

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inigyou 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I suppose it's like how nobody ever calls each other on a "phone" any more but we still call them "phones".

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PunchyHamster an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

We just need to backronym the shortcut to make somewhat redundant name of "network attached server"

	▲	inigyou 26 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Just call it a home server. I don't mind too much that a NAS runs file-sharing-oriented software as a bonus feature - if it can run Samba why can't it run Immich? But when you start using it for compute tasks it's not a storage box any more by definition. And that would be a more advanced extra feature whereas the basic functionality of a storage box is always storage.

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close04 4 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

Exactly! But we call it a NAS like we call the general purpose computer in our pockets a “phone”. There is no market for single purpose, exclusively NAS devices outside of enterprise.