500mm Cases

enigmo · 15 Jan 2013 at 14:02

Quick question; has anyone ever seen a server case with a SAS backplane and multiple 3.5" bays (16/20) that's only 500mm deep rather than 660mm?

Skidilliplop · 16 Jan 2013 at 10:16

I've seen plenty of 4U cases that are 500 deep. But none that would fit 16-20 drives in.
In fact I don't think I've ever seen a rack mounted server that held 20 drives, surely with that much storage requirement you'd just use a 1U server and external DAS disk tray?
E.G. A Dell DL360 + MD1000?

#Chri5# · 16 Jan 2013 at 10:27

SuperMicro do a few server chassis that take 24 or 36 drives 3.5" HDs

enigmo · 16 Jan 2013 at 11:00

I've seen a few 500mm cases, but yes, none that take that many drives. It's for a lot of storage on a budget

I've seen and like the Norco 4220 and 4224 to put my spares in and rack up with shiny new drives, but when I looked to see if I could find much the same thing just shorter (as it's for home use and so don't need the space for EEB boards) I couldn't find any. It would just be nice to fit that kind of capacity into a network-depth pedestal cab.
And I would go for a separate 1U server and DAS but again there's the issue of cost. I know DAS units typically come up shorter, but the MD1000 is typically £500+ with empty caddies, even second hand. Unless you know different..?

I mean, if it was less then I would definitely consider one.

Skidilliplop · 16 Jan 2013 at 11:06

The MD1000 isn't the only DAS chasis out there. There are cheaper ones that don't carry a Dell badge. I think if you want to put your own hardware in then 1U is going to be easier to source.

Have a look at SGI DAS boxes. They're not flash or pretty but they'll probably do the job. And they're a lot cheaper than the mainstream Dell/HP offerings

enigmo · 16 Jan 2013 at 11:15

Skidilliplop said:
The MD1000 isn't the only DAS chasis out there. There are cheaper ones that don't carry a Dell badge. I think if you want to put your own hardware in then 1U is going to be easier to source.

As in it should be easy to drop my own hardware into a 1U chassis?
Any particular brand of DAS you've seen that's good? The HP ones seem to be even more expensive than the Dells on the 2nd hand market.

Skidilliplop · 16 Jan 2013 at 11:27

There are a lot more short 1U and 1U empty chassis out there than there are bigger ones. Mostly because if you're buying something that big, it's rare you'd not want it to ship ready to use.

I'm not sure how cheap you think you can do this though, £500 for a 16bay chassis with SAS expander is cheap. A 4 bay buffalo drive station USB/eSATA would set you back £300....

enigmo · 16 Jan 2013 at 11:45

Skidilliplop said:
There are a lot more short 1U and 1U empty chassis out there than there are bigger ones. Mostly because if you're buying something that big, it's rare you'd not want it to ship ready to use.

That makes sense...

I'm not sure how cheap you think you can do this though, £500 for a 16bay chassis with SAS expander is cheap. A 4 bay buffalo drive station USB/eSATA would set you back £300....

Having not considered DAS until today, I din't know

£500 was roughly what I was aiming for as a maximum. The ultimate aim is to decommission several home machines into one, and as I already have a SAS HBA, spare CPU and RAM, couple of SAS disks for boot, a few SATA drives spare as well as the dozen or so I would be populating it with when I junk the old machines, I figured an entirely separate all-in-one case like the Norco 4220 seemed good. That approach would be doable on a budget of about £400 for the remaining bits I need, but, if I could get a neater solution for a little more, I would go for it. And in fairness, the Buffalo drive stations, Thecus SOHO NASs, NetGear ReadyNas, Drobos etc are all way overpriced for what they are.