Yes it only has one PCIe slot so you can use either a network or M.2 card with it.
The picture shows how you can configure the system if you want to use both.
This is by far the fastest NAS we have had in the lab yet. It beats the other 4-Bay NAS's we have looked at in all tests.
I did not show the others in the charts as they are different configurations, 4 drives in a 4 Bay NAS vs 3 drives in a 5 Bay NAS. I use the configs they send me as at this time I do not have enough drives to setup a full 5 bay NAS. I am getting there tho.
I do have another 4 Bay NAS I am testing right now, that one will have all the other 4 Bay NAS with it.
You write "The DS1517+ handles encryption at 10GbE network speeds with ease also."
It looks to me like the encryption system hits a wall at around 170MB/sec. That's quite a bit less than the unencrypted performance which reaches 630MB/sec.
The DS1517+ does indeed hit around 170MB/s, while the QNAP TS-453A hits 112 MB/s and the DS916+ hits about 113 MB/s with Encryption.
I do not see a need to encrypt movies tho., maybe I am wrong about that ?