Case with lots of 3.5 mounting position

[CDR_Xavier]

We are starting off with 4 drives, a supermicro mATX board in a stripped e-machines tower. (for a nas)

The plan is to have at least 8, possibly 12 or more 3.5 inch mounts.

Coolermaster N400 looks okay, with 8 3.5 inch and lots of airflow. However I have a feeling that the 8 is going to be filled up rather quickly, and boot drive eating into the front 5.25 is somewhat suboptimal.

 

LTT a while back showcased the Fractal 7 Define XL, which can hold 18 drives. That's pretty good, but I can't help but wonder if there are other options.

Oh and rack-mount is not the way to go. Well, actually
 

I mean my tower (3D Boxx) is basically a 4U rack mount. So I guess a 4U rackmount will work, I will just remove the rails and the front thing and put it sideways.

[OhioYJ]

I ran the Define R5 for my NAS when I first built it.  Quickly hit the 8 drive limit and searched for something more. Even going rack mount, I didn't found a huge selection that I liked. I ended up going with the Define 7 XL.

 

The Define R5, removed many of the panels to make it flow air freely, and it stayed quite cool. I also modified the front panel to help make sure the front intake fans had no issue breathing:

 

 

Did the same thing on the Define 7 XL as well:

 

 

[manikyath]

i built my own server chassis from scratch just to have as many drive bays as i wanted...

 

especially in recent times it's near impossible to find cases that actually mount lots of drives in ways that are not just an afterthought.

[thrasher_565]

Phanteks  Enthoo Pro 2 has stackable hdd cadys but cost like $20 per candy and get wobbly if to hight.

 

Thermaltake Core V71 also can take a few hdd

 

imo i would jsut get a big case and mout a hdd rack in it. cheaper and more hdd imo

 

Phanteks  Enthoo Pro has 6hdd and 3 5.25 bay

 

moutenmods also has hdd mount to a 120mm fan

 

thrmaltake case could have been a good option but they stopped selling the cadys and flex bay mounts so it be diy /3d print for it...

Edited April 20 by thrasher_565

[daygeckoart]

Silverstone just released one with 8x 3.5" bays plus a 5.25"

https://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Technology-Hot-swappable-Performance-SST-CS382/dp/B0CKTYSZV9/?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_w=vfbFi&content-id=amzn1.sym.dde481d7-92dc-42ce-a703-f1bc175e21c6%3Aamzn1.symc.d10b1e54-47e4-4b2a-b42d-92fe6ebbe579&pf_rd_p=dde481d7-92dc-42ce-a703-f1bc175e21c6&pf_rd_r=MXZ5AMEMHM373CB6C0ED&pd_rd_wg=0wLzt&pd_rd_r=c15d5691-f77d-4fe5-9e95-dec8c538e3cb&ref_=pd_gw_ci_mcx_mr_hp_atf_m

[CDR_Xavier]

10 hours ago, daygeckoart said:

Silverstone just released one with 8x 3.5" bays plus a 5.25"

Well
I am looking at the Cooler Master N400D. It's $80 and it have 7 HDD a floppy and 2 5.25.

I am just feeling like the 7+1 3.5 isnt going to cut it very well. Though if I limit the boot drives to 2.5s, we might be able to pull some stuff off. Like a dual 2.5 in 5.25, and we can still keep a optical.

[thrasher_565]

7 hours ago, CDR_Xavier said:

Well
I am looking at the Cooler Master N400D. It's $80 and it have 7 HDD a floppy and 2 5.25.

I am just feeling like the 7+1 3.5 isnt going to cut it very well. Though if I limit the boot drives to 2.5s, we might be able to pull some stuff off. Like a dual 2.5 in 5.25, and we can still keep a optical.

2.5 can be put any were with Velcro...

[Caroline]

I got a Corsair 760T with the extra drive cages, it was used as server.

 

As is can fit 18 drives (9 per column) but if you get creative you can add five 2.5" drives and maybe 3 more if you make use of the ODD bays, so... 26. There is room for one more cage so you could add it if you wanted, but it'd hit against the ODD bays, but it is doable I believe, by making use of flat power cables and L-shaped SATA... I don't have that one so it's not like I can try, but looking at it, looks like it fits, 29.

 

Though as soon as you stack up 2 cages in the secondary column you can't fit a graphics card. Unless you use a short single fan card, or a very basic one just to have a video out.

 

Now the problem is, how much expansion cards do you need to fit 29 drives? imagine the mess of wires. I only have 9 and it's already hell at the front of the case.

 

If you can score one like mine, used and with the extra bays you have PLENTY of room. This thing is huge.

[CDR_Xavier]

On 4/21/2024 at 9:09 PM, Caroline said:

As is can fit 18 drives (9 per column)

It does look very healthy. Though I imagine you would need to buy a few frames and mount them.

I'll look into it.

 

On 4/20/2024 at 9:46 AM, thrasher_565 said:

imo i would jsut get a big case and mout a hdd rack in it. cheaper and more hdd imo

mobile racks especially decent ones are expensive. Especially SAS compatible ones or high density (3 5.25 to 5 3.5) ones.

Spend $10 more than that and you can get an entire Cooler Master N400D.

 

He has more than two dozen drives, but it's going to be split into at least two nodes, so "as much drive as possible" isnt really the goal here.

 

Right now, we found an e-waste ThermalTake armorer with no side panels and are starting to populate it with drives. Yet to see how the temps manage to keep up.

 

On 4/20/2024 at 6:23 AM, manikyath said:

built my own server chassis

I was just lazy, as it is not my server. But I did find some interesting things on Printables, (3x 5.25 to 4x 3.5 with 120mm mount), so I will probably be trying that out.

 

Even if it's 1 3.5 per 5.25 the Armorer can still fit probably 10 drives with probably one or two spare for ODDs. Thats pretty ok for one node.

 

My only complaint is that most case I encountered only fit a ATX power supply, you cant really extend the width or height of the thing without running into issues (e.g., not fitting in the case)

I'm talking an OEM 1100W ripped out of a Dell Precision 7500 (someone left a crater in the board). The hole pattern is the same ATX, but it's 1/8" more tall and 1/4" more wide than a standard ATX. You would think thats not a issue, things have proven otherwise.

 

 

On 4/21/2024 at 9:09 PM, Caroline said:

29 drives

At that point I will just pick up a used SuperServer for like $300 or so. Sometimes they even come with all the insides (like drive controller).

It's going to be loud, but effective and decently cheap.

 

aha whats this