In my personal experience and for my personal needs smb has worked best for me even though it feels kinda “bad” because of the windows background. However that also makes it useful, too, as it is compatible with most os’es…

Security setup is easy. Performance good (in my experience better than sshfs but i am sure sshfs transfers are more secure than smb).

Pacino in The Godfather

By the time you can afford it, the car ain’t important…