Guide: How to circumvent Synology hard drive restrictions

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This guide is submitted by community member User:JamesTDG, and is presented from the perspectives of linked references, with various modifications from Consumer Action Taskforce members.

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Origins

Main article: Synology requiring proprietary-branded drives to be used with its NAS

In early 2025, Synology introduced a requirement for new NAS models moving forward to be used exclusively with their branded hard drives. While at the moment this does not affect any of the company's NAS models before the change, owners of newer NAS models will lose vital functionalities for non-Synology-branded drives, such as lifespan analyses and automatic firmware updates. Additionally, storage pools are restricted for third-party drives and support for third-party drives are either limited or nonexistent.

Guide

Warning: It is possible that this guide can be outdated, notably from a change by Synology. It is advised to the reader to follow this guide at their own risk, since this may unintentionally cause the NAS or the installed hard drives damage.

Some methods are aware of the wiki and are provided as refs here, however due to the sake of limited time, they have yet to be integrated.

HDD DB

This method is recommended to attempt first, as it is the easiest. First, download the zip file from the GitHub page to a folder to your NAS, specifically not inside a M.2. volume.

You can simply drag + drop this file onto your NAS and unzip the file, or alternatively use SSH and input the following commands into the command line:

cd $HOME
wget https://github.com/007revad/Synology_HDD_db/archive/refs/heads/main.zip -O syno_hdd_db.zip
7z x syno_hdd_db.zip
cd Synology_HDD_db-main && ls -ali

Verify that the following files are in the same folder:

• syno_hdd_db.sh
• syno_hdd_vendor_ids.txt
• dtc or the bin folder containing dtc (only required if you have a E10M20-T1, M2D20 or M2D18 in a NAS that does not support them).

Now, you just need to set this script to run after an update, as any update will override the script. You can easily set the script to run via the guide provided by the HDD DB Github page.

Any changes may not be immediately visible, so it is recommended to restart your NAS after the script is first run.

There are additional features this script provides, and necessary troubleshooting so it is advised to further study the GitHub page if you are interested.

Installing DSM on DS925+

Some unsupported drives are also reported to be impossible to run this script, as it is reliant on Synology's DSM operating system. All information has been copied over from a reddit post as of May 6, 2025. It is recommended to check in with the post before following this guide since it will be more up-to-date.

Preparation (steps for DS925+):

1. Save the script on your desktop as skip_syno_hdds.py file
2. Download DS925+ firmware from the Synology site: https://www.synology.com/en-me/support/download/DS925+?version=7.2#system
3. Insert empty disks into the NAS
4. Turn it on and wait a few minutes for it to fully boot
5. Find out the IP address of the NAS in your LAN - either check in your router or scan the network.
6. In the browser, check that on http://<NAS_IP>:5000 you have NAS DSM installation welcome page opening.
7. Leave it on that page without proceeding with the installation.

Using the script:

Warning: This script has been developed with a Linux host in mind, however machines running Windows or MacOS with Python3 installed should also be capable of running this.

1. Run the script as python3 skip_syno_hdds.py <NAS_IP>. For example, if your NAS' IP address is 192.168.1.100, run the script as python3 skip_syno_hdds.py 192.168.1.100
2. Now, refresh the browser page and proceed with DSM installation normally.
3. When asked, give it the .pat file with DSM firmware that you downloaded earlier. (currently it is DSM_DS925+_72806.pat file)
4. After the installation is done, don't try to create the storage pool immediately. Instead, add your disks to the DSM compatibility list using Dave's script or just set support_disk_compatibility="no" in /etc/synoinfo.conf, then you can proceed with pool creation.

Alternative installation

There are also 2 commands you can run to circumvent the script should it be either too cumbersome or no-longer function.

Log into your NAS via telnet with the following command:

http://[ip-address of NAS]:5000/webman/start_telnet.cgi

Now after being logged in via root, input this command:

printf '#!/bin/sh\nexit 0\n' >"/usr/syno/share/get_hcl_invalid_disks.sh"  

Refreshing the web install page should allow for you to now use your incompatible drive with modern Synology NAS software.