Recommended NAS?

[winxi]

(09-02-2013 05:04)Mike48 Wrote:  I wouldn't mind also hearing from a Synology user.

Hi, I'm very satisfied with my Synology NAS. There are various Diskstation (DS) models available and you would surely find one that fits your needs and complies with your list of desired features from your first post.
Generally, Synology NAS's provide a good build quality and offer a great firmware (DSM). You can figure it out yourself with the Synology Live Demo. Synology offers software updates for the firmware as well as for their native packages at a regular basis. The different devices will be supported at least 4 years. This means, if you buy a 2013 model now, you will receive software updates till at least 2017.
You will find a list of recommended HDDs here.

I cannot speak for QNAP or ReadyNAS, but referring to other user reports you won't experience significant disadvantages with either of these three manufacturers (except that at the moment there is not yet an official MinimServer package available for ReadyNAS).

winxi