What is the true story with Synology

Hello,

I'm about to buy my first NAS. After some research, it seems that most Reddit users prefer/recommend Synology over QNap (not to mention Asus or Ugreen).

However, I've come across several complaints about Synology's policies, such as:

• Expensive surveillance camera licenses (only two are included by default, as far as I know).
• Removal of previously available features (someone mentioned having licenses for cameras on a virtualized OS, but that feature is now gone). It looks like Synology "do what they want" with customer grade software and often it is not clustomer friendly.
• High prices for extension units, which are usually not unavailable in the aftermarket.
• Btrfs file system issues - without a UPS, the whole system may crash in case of a power outage.

Considering the price, are Synology products (both software and hardware wise) really worth it? And regarding my biggest concern, is a UPS truly necessary? Although I can afford to spend a few bucks, I'm quite skeptical about investing in a UPS due to the cost and space it requires just to bypass that issue.

Also, I'm not entirely sure if I can use any disk with Synology or if I need to stick with Synology-branded HDDs.

I would love to hear your opinions as Synology users.