Any 3.5" enclosures with SAS sff8087 cables?

B

brutalizer

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Oct 23, 2010
Messages
1,602
I read this review. It is SAS enclosure with four 2.5" disks into one SAS cable. Very neat.
http://www.servethehome.com/startech-satsas425bk-hot-swap-ssd-4in1-25-525-review/

Then I stumbled on this build.
http://forums.kustompcs.co.uk/showthread.php?p=471793

I was thinking of building a JBOD case with lot of 3.5" disks with separate sff8087 cables. I dont want a single sff8088 with a SAS expander in the case, but individual sff8087 cables.

So my question is, are there any 3.5" enclosures with sff8087 cables similar to the 2.5" case?
 
You can use something like this which would allow you to run 8 drives off 2 8087-8088 cables or you can use a back slot F-F extender like this and just use 8087 cables in your computer and then just 2 8088 cables from your back slot to the enclosure.
 
Yes, I was thinking of precisely that. But that is a bit expensive. Do you know of any 3.5" SAS enclosures? If they are available, I could take a PC chassis and fill it with such enclosures and convert it to a JBOD chassis.
 
Wait, you mean a single-drive 3.5" enclosure that you can wire a SFF-8087 cable to? Why would you want that? A SFF-8087 cable contains 4 channels, you would be wasting 3 channels/drive connections for each port you used from the controller. Are you just looking for a hot-swap SAS rack you can install into a standard PC with 8087 connections? If you are just looking for a large number of SAS hot-swap bays, instead of buying a regular PC and filling it with racks, look at something like the Norco 4224 which will give you 24 SAS/SATA slots and uses SFF-8087 ports for the backplanes. I will also be a lot less money than buying a huge ATX case and filling it with 6 4-in-3 hot swap cubes (which will use sata, not sas cables)
 
Last edited:
mwroobel said:
Istar (RaidAge) hasn't made that in quite a while. My point was that if he is looking for expandability, the Norco would likely be a better option and cost less in the end.
Click to expand...

Everybody should have a Norco! Sadly, Norco's usually don't pass the WAF/GAF test.
 
patrickdk said:
Think he wants one of these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816702005

I have a 8bay storage tower that has two of those in it, works well, but I haven't seen them for sell outside of a complete type system.
Click to expand...
Yes, this exactly what I want!

Then I could take a cheap PC chassis and make a JBOD out of it. There is a JBOD version of the 4224, called DS-24D but it is almost as large as a 4224 and expensive
http://www.norcotek.com/item_detail.php?categoryid=8&modelno=ds-24d

I was thinking of taking a small PC chassis, fill it with 3.5" SAS enclosures and turn it to a cheap version of the SANS Digital TR8X+ (which costs $400):
http://www.sansdigital.com/towerraid-/tr8xplus.html
I would prefer it to have 12-16 disks instead of 8.

So are there any3.5" SAS enclosures that is still sold? I would like to create a small JBOD chassis with sff8088 cables.
 
like this?
GV5bg.jpg



I know that they do not sell with SF8087, since I have 5 in 3 with SATA/SAS connector..

as you posted, check on IStar site, they could have 4 in 3 with SF8087..

....

this is my total spending for Case and 5 in 3:
1) Rosewill ATX tower, $40 with F/S
2) 1 venus 5 in 3 for ~90 including tax at Fry's, the last one.. I planned to bought more at that time
3) 2 IStar 5 in 3 ~$180 (with Newegg coupon) with F/S.
-------------------------------------
total ~$310.

my suggestion:
* to buy 5 in 3 with aluminum handle for durability. after almost 5 years usage... venus 5 in 3 already have 2 broken handles....
* the fan is not quite..... it has high and low speed... lowspeed~2800RPM, I do not need to mention for highspeed RPM :)


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
this is my on going build with two 5 in 3 aluminum handles:
6YyPI.jpg

including with my loyal reborn cube case :D
l6Gep.jpg

SE3016 that I mention before.
 
Last edited:
At work for my servers I wanted to do that as well since I do not have any racks other then network racks (or the borrowed mobile racks I had to give back). Also I can not order norco products from the approved vendor. I thought about the $1200 Supermicro cases like the SC846 TQ-R900B that I can order however after some thought I just went with the supermicro 5in3s CSE-M35T-1 which do not have SFF8087 connectors.
 
Last edited:
cantalup said:
like this?
GV5bg.jpg
Click to expand...
Yes, exactly like this! :) What case is it, and what disk enclosures? It is not JBOD?



I would like to have an external JBOD chassis, that I connect sometimes to my PC to offload data. But, these JBOD chassis are rackmounted (very big and heavy and expensive), or small midtower chassis with 8 disks at max. I would like one JBOD tower chassis with 12-16 disks and SAS cables.

My only option seems to be the SANS Digital TR8X+ for $400 each. I could buy two, but that would be expensive. I therefore toyed with the idea to build one myself. Then I need a cheap PC tower chassis and several 3-to-5 enclosures with SAS cables. Via SAS cables I could connect to my server.

This enclosure would be perfect, but it is for 2.5" disks:
http://www.servethehome.com/startech-satsas425bk-hot-swap-ssd-4in1-25-525-review/

I need a similar one for 3.5" disks. It could hold 4 disks, 6 or 8 disks. I could buy several of them. Anyway if you know of one SAS enclosure, please post it here.



Are there anyone else interested in building a cheap JBOD tower chassis via SAS cables? There should be interest for it? A market, yes?
 
arryo said:
I'm looking for the same solution but don't know how it work. My system has 1 M1015, what exactly should I need to shop so I would be able to connect to a JBOD chasis like this:

http://www.istarusa.com/istarusa/products.php?model=S-9B-JB

or this: http://www.istarusa.com/raidage/products.php?model=DAGE412U40DE-3MS
Click to expand...

Get a slot adapter for that tower and for your PC like http://www.pc-pitstop.com/sas_cables_adapters/AD8788-2.asp and then get sff-8088 cable(s) to run between each and a you can use sff-8087 to sff-8087 for the internal mini-sas to the slot extender on the pc side and a sff-8087 to 4 sata on the enclosure side.
 
Thank you mwroobel for your quick reply.

So for the JBOD chasis I don't need it to have SFF-8088 ports, I just need to buy 2 of these: http://www.pc-pitstop.com/sas_cables_adapters/AD8788-2.asp , 1 for my PC and 1 for my JBOD chasis, and 4 sff-8087 to sff-8087 cables total, is that correct?

Should I have to buy another M1015 since the one i'm using in my PC is already connected to 8 HDDs
 
Well, that particular JBOD chassis is really just a 9 bay ATX style case with no motherboard backplate. It doesn't have any external ports, it is just an blank case. You would need one pair of the slot adapters for each 8 lanes (drives). So for 16 drives you would need 4, etc. You would need 1 SFF-8087 cable for the PC end for each 4 drives, and 1 sff-8087 to 4 SATA breakout for each 4 drives on the enclosure end.
 
ok, I get the picture. So for future expansion it would be better to have 1 SAS expander in the JBOD case, and 2 of the adapters, correct? and of cource, SAS/SATA cables
 
mwroobel said:
It's not connected with anything. You would need to put some kind of connector in one of the backslots.
Click to expand...
I dont understand. Could you please explain? Inside the chassis, I insert each SATA disk. And each SATA disk are connected to the... air? So I need some SAS backplane in the chassis, to connect each SATA disk? And from the backplane goes one sff8087? Every SATA disk is connected to a SAS backplane inside the chassis?



arryo said:
I'm looking for the same solution but don't know how it work. My system has 1 M1015, what exactly should I need to shop so I would be able to connect to a JBOD chasis like this:

http://www.istarusa.com/istarusa/products.php?model=S-9B-JB

or this: http://www.istarusa.com/raidage/products.php?model=DAGE412U40DE-3MS
Click to expand...
Actually, I have looked a bit, but think I will scrap doing it myself. First, you need to buy separate parts, a tower chassis, and several 3.5 enclosures. Each enclosure costs like $80-100 which means if you want three enclosures then the enclosures alone will cost you $240-300. And the tower chassis. And then all work. And cables and what not.

It is much easier and slightly cheaper to just buy the SANS Digital TR8X+ which has 8 disks, and two sas cables. It costs $340 here:
http://www.mwave.com/mwave/SKUSearch.asp?scriteria=AA77956&px=DN

Just to confirm, when I connect this chassis to my PC, I will need two SFF 8088 cables, yes? Between the PC and the chassis there will be SFF8088 cables. Inside the PC there will be SFF8087 cables? Between the PC and the chassis there will be two cables like these:
http://www.pc-pitstop.com/sas_cables_adapters/8888-1M.asp



(I also have one M1015. If I want more than 8 disks, I need to buy another M1015. That sucks because I only want 10-11 disks. I will therefore insert 8 disks into the JBOD chassis, and have the rest of the disks in my server. This way I dont need to buy two M1015)
 
Last edited:
arryo said:
Thank you mwroobel for your quick reply.
Click to expand...
Yes, mwroobel you are always in these threads helping people out. Dont you have work to do? ;)

But, thanks for your help and advice. You have certainly improved my build a lot! :)
 
cantalup said:
like this?
GV5bg.jpg



I know that they do not sell with SF8087, since I have 5 in 3 with SATA/SAS connector..

as you posted, check on IStar site, they could have 4 in 3 with SF8087..

....

this is my total spending for Case and 5 in 3:
1) Rosewill ATX tower, $40 with F/S
2) 1 venus 5 in 3 for ~90 including tax at Fry's, the last one.. I planned to bought more at that time
3) 2 IStar 5 in 3 ~$180 (with Newegg coupon) with F/S.
-------------------------------------
total ~$310.
Click to expand...

I have roughly the same setup, except i am using iStar hotswap for my 5 in 3. I just recently broke a handle, but it still works. Personally the price total came to almost 400, and When i went to go look for a second Rosewill case they were discontinue. and it looks like most of the 9 bay case in the same size were discontinue.
 
brutalizer said:
I dont understand. Could you please explain? Inside the chassis, I insert each SATA disk. And each SATA disk are connected to the... air? So I need some SAS backplane in the chassis, to connect each SATA disk? And from the backplane goes one sff8087? Every SATA disk is connected to a SAS backplane inside the chassis?
Click to expand...

You are free to choose the SAS/SATA backplane of your choice. I simply stated what was neccessary to connect the drives themselves. 99% of the basic SAS/SATA 3, 5 or 5-In-3 5.25" bay hotswap units just use SATA connections on the back, so you would still need exactly what I specced out with or without the removable racks.
 
brutalizer said:
I dont understand. Could you please explain? Inside the chassis, I insert each SATA disk. And each SATA disk are connected to the... air? So I need some SAS backplane in the chassis, to connect each SATA disk? And from the backplane goes one sff8087? Every SATA disk is connected to a SAS backplane inside the chassis?




Actually, I have looked a bit, but think I will scrap doing it myself. First, you need to buy separate parts, a tower chassis, and several 3.5 enclosures. Each enclosure costs like $80-100 which means if you want three enclosures then the enclosures alone will cost you $240-300. And the tower chassis. And then all work. And cables and what not.

It is much easier and slightly cheaper to just buy the SANS Digital TR8X+ which has 8 disks, and two sas cables. It costs $340 here:
http://www.mwave.com/mwave/SKUSearch.asp?scriteria=AA77956&px=DN

Just to confirm, when I connect this chassis to my PC, I will need two SFF 8088 cables, yes? Between the PC and the chassis there will be SFF8088 cables. Inside the PC there will be SFF8087 cables? Between the PC and the chassis there will be two cables like these:
http://www.pc-pitstop.com/sas_cables_adapters/8888-1M.asp



(I also have one M1015. If I want more than 8 disks, I need to buy another M1015. That sucks because I only want 10-11 disks. I will therefore insert 8 disks into the JBOD chassis, and have the rest of the disks in my server. This way I dont need to buy two M1015)
Click to expand...
I would suggest if you want one of those external case, and you were going to buy a New HBA or a Raid, check out the cost different of a HBA that has two 8088. It might be a better option then buying a m1015, an adapter, and then two 8087-8087 cable.

Just remember SAS cable arent cheap by any means.

you could try a lsi 9200-8e
 
Last edited:
midnkight said:
I would suggest if you want one of those external case, and you were going to buy a New HBA or a Raid, check out the cost different of a HBA that has two 8088. It might be a better option then buying a m1015, an adapter, and then two 8087-8087 cable.

Just remember SAS cable arent cheap by any means.

you could try a lsi 9200-8e
Click to expand...

Quite honestly, if you plan on putting at least 15 drives in your box (3 x 5-in-3 racks) when you factor in the costs of a decent tower case, the racks etc you might as well just get a Norco and have room for expansion.
 
I went through this same situation a few months back and decided on using the Sans Digital with the 8087-8088 adapter. Managed to pick it up from the egg for $359 with free shipping. Although pricey, the build quality is great and the chassis is surprisingly very quiet. It does ship with a gaudy blue led fan, but besides that it's been running for five months without any hiccups. For those faced with space constraints it works well. The two 3' 8088 cables are worth at least $75-$100.The only downside is the proprietary PSU which would have to be sourced from Sans Digital once it fails, and the warranty is only for one year. If expandability isn’t an issue, then the Sans Digital should suite your needs well. That being said, I still think that Norco‘s offerings are the best bang for your buck considering how much they cost.

A few pics of the setup.


Enclosure.JPG


Case.JPG


Generic PSU
PSU.JPG


8087-8088 Adapter
8087-8088.JPG
 
Last edited:
How difficult would it be to mod the PSU to a standard one? It is proprietary SANS Digital now.
 
mwroobel said:
You are free to choose the SAS/SATA backplane of your choice. I simply stated what was neccessary to connect the drives themselves. 99% of the basic SAS/SATA 3, 5 or 5-In-3 5.25" bay hotswap units just use SATA connections on the back, so you would still need exactly what I specced out with or without the removable racks.
Click to expand...
Ok, now I get it. So all these SATA disks, would be connected with a... fan break out cable(?) that collects four SATA cables into one SFF 8087 minisas cable. And all these minisas cables are connected to the back of the chassis. And from the back of the chassis, there would be a SFF 8088 connector.

So, if I have 16 SATA disks in a chassis, then I would need four SFF 8087 minisas cables inside the chassis. These four minisas cables would be connected to the back of the chassis. From the back of the chassis there would be four SFF 8088 cables, that I could connect to my pc. My PC would have two IBM M1015 cards, with sff8087 to sff8088 slots.

And in this case, I dont need 3.5" SAS enclosures, because each SATA cable would be collected into a SATA to SAS cable.

Is this correctly understood?
 
By proprietary, I simply meant the on/off function. It's just a rather short SFF PSU with four molex connectors and two 2 pin chipset fan connectors.Nothing special. In theory, any ATX PSU that will fit should work. It's just the on/off function that's the problem. I'm sure you could find a work around though. There's more than enough space to put one of those power control boards under the drive cage. Something like this with a Silver Stone Strider would probably work. Search the forums you'll certainly find others. Or, you could contact Sans Digital directly and ask them about replacement parts before you make a decision.
 
brutalizer said:
Ok, now I get it. So all these SATA disks, would be connected with a... fan break out cable(?) that collects four SATA cables into one SFF 8087 minisas cable. And all these minisas cables are connected to the back of the chassis. And from the back of the chassis, there would be a SFF 8088 connector.

So, if I have 16 SATA disks in a chassis, then I would need four SFF 8087 minisas cables inside the chassis. These four minisas cables would be connected to the back of the chassis. From the back of the chassis there would be four SFF 8088 cables, that I could connect to my pc. My PC would have two IBM M1015 cards, with sff8087 to sff8088 slots.

And in this case, I dont need 3.5" SAS enclosures, because each SATA cable would be collected into a SATA to SAS cable.

Is this correctly understood?
Click to expand...

Exactly
 
brutalizer said:
Ok, now I get it. So all these SATA disks, would be connected with a... fan break out cable(?) that collects four SATA cables into one SFF 8087 minisas cable. And all these minisas cables are connected to the back of the chassis. And from the back of the chassis, there would be a SFF 8088 connector.

So, if I have 16 SATA disks in a chassis, then I would need four SFF 8087 minisas cables inside the chassis. These four minisas cables would be connected to the back of the chassis. From the back of the chassis there would be four SFF 8088 cables, that I could connect to my pc. My PC would have two IBM M1015 cards, with sff8087 to sff8088 slots.

And in this case, I dont need 3.5" SAS enclosures, because each SATA cable would be collected into a SATA to SAS cable.

Is this correctly understood?
Click to expand...

Yes, that is the progression. If you choose to make these drives hot-swap and/or consolidate your available space, then you can add 4-in3 or 5-in-3 racks, or you can plug the SATA ends of the fan-out cable directly to the mounted drives if you choose not to.
 
brutalizer said:
Ok, now I get it. So all these SATA disks, would be connected with a... fan break out cable(?) that collects four SATA cables into one SFF 8087 minisas cable. And all these minisas cables are connected to the back of the chassis. And from the back of the chassis, there would be a SFF 8088 connector.

So, if I have 16 SATA disks in a chassis, then I would need four SFF 8087 minisas cables inside the chassis. These four minisas cables would be connected to the back of the chassis. From the back of the chassis there would be four SFF 8088 cables, that I could connect to my pc. My PC would have two IBM M1015 cards, with sff8087 to sff8088 slots.

And in this case, I dont need 3.5" SAS enclosures, because each SATA cable would be collected into a SATA to SAS cable.

Is this correctly understood?
Click to expand...

Yes. you use forward breakout cables, you cab find them cheap on monoprice.com

some people put a SAS expander in the storage enclosure so that you only need 1x (or 2x) 8088 cable(s) per enclosure.
That way your SAS HBA could drive multiple enclosures.
 
@Plastikman, I dont feel comfortable with SAS expanders, and besides, they are expensive. I rather have a few SFF8088 cables....



Village Idiot said:
By proprietary, I simply meant the on/off function. It's just a rather short SFF PSU with four molex connectors and two 2 pin chipset fan connectors.Nothing special. In theory, any ATX PSU that will fit should work. It's just the on/off function that's the problem. I'm sure you could find a work around though. There's more than enough space to put one of those power control boards under the drive cage. Something like this with a Silver Stone Strider would probably work. Search the forums you'll certainly find others. Or, you could contact Sans Digital directly and ask them about replacement parts before you make a decision.
Click to expand...
I did not understand this. What is an "on/off function"? And your link does not show a ATX PSU? What does it show? I thought I could just replace the proprietary PSU with an ATX PSU and be done? But I need some additional electronics, according to your link?




Village Idiot said:
Exactly
Click to expand...
Ok, in that case, my earlier post is wrong. This is not correct:
brutalizer said:
Actually, I have looked a bit, but think I will scrap doing it myself. First, you need to buy separate parts, a tower chassis, and several 3.5 enclosures. Each enclosure costs like $80-100 which means if you want three enclosures then the enclosures alone will cost you $240-300. And the tower chassis. And then all work. And cables and what not.
Click to expand...
It should be modified to:
"First, you need to buy a tower chassis. I dont need 3.5" disk enclosures. I just put the SATA disks in the tower chassis. Each SATA disk will be connected to a forward breakout cable, it collects four SATA cables to one miniSAS cable:
http://www.monoprice.com/products/p...=10254&cs_id=1025406&p_id=8186&seq=1&format=2

Say I have 16 disks in my tower chassis. Then I need four of those forward breakout cables. These cables will be connected to the backplane of the Tower chassis, so I need two of these:
http://www.pc-pitstop.com/sas_cables_adapters/AD8788-2.asp

My PC holds two IBM M1015, so I can use four SFF8088 cables between my PC and this Tower Chassis.

So I need a tower chassis. I need forward breakout cables. I need backplanes. And I need external SFF8088 cables. I dont need 3.5" SAS enclosures. This might be cheaper than buying a JBOD chassis with SAS."



Is this correctly understood?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top