Honing in on the “recipes” par of your post. I’ve really enjoyed self hosting mealie for those.

Correct. Its just a mesh VPN

I think this may be a your milage may vary thing. I only personally use netbird for remote server management, as I barely consume anything other than streamed music remotely. I host netbird community edition on my server in a VM so the streaming quality isn’t dependent on any tier of service purchased from the company

I’ll recommend netbird as its entirely running on your server, is free, and I found it way easier to set up compared to Tailscale/Headscale

Not running anything myself but am part of a self hosting discord that swears by Netbird because its basically Tailscale but with a bunch more ease of use features apparently

Obviously everything depends on use case. I definitely am a tinkerer and prefer options. I’d never run a jellyfin server off a synology NAS cause… Well cause it can’t transcode very well. So efficiency is less of a concern than processing power.

I get now that my questions was a bit moot, obviously some people will pay a premium for a narrow use case if it brings reliability and ease of use.

I see! Thanks so much for the thoughtful response definitely seems like there’s a use case for people who might be more creatives with a need for storage rather than self-hosting enthusiasts who want to mess around in a homelab.

The prices are still a bit eye watering but you pay for software support for sure.

Is the main appeal of prebuilt NAS cases the aesthetics and the reduction of DIY concerns?

Because they seem to me like overpriced and underpowered computers. Most tech-oriented folks I know have more powerful PCs in a closet somewhere that they could easily convert into a NAS

Edit: some very thoughtful responses thanks y’all! I definitely see the appeal for people who just need something that doesn’t need tinkering or care significantly about power draw and noise.