Whats your opinion on SATA docks?

T

thespeakerbox

Gawd
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Feb 16, 2006
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They are a cool idea, but are they really a good solution for anything? I mean, having the drive exposed like that seems to have some built in risks.
 
I'm thinking of getting one for my WHS. Will make it easy to just grab my backup drive and plug it in to do my weekly backups.
 
It probably couldn't hurt to at least partially cover the drive in a static bag if possible, but I've never had an issue with using bare drives externally. I don't have a dock, I use a Newer Technology USB Universal Drive Adapter. It's immensely useful although it would be cumbersome to use on a regular basis.
 
Newer drives do not feature such weakness being exposed as old drives used to. They can take quite a beating and touching before they show errors or failures.

The external docs are awesome IMO, so are the sled-less drive units, it makes upgrading, changing, and swapping so much easier. What is lame IMO are the sleds which differs from manufacturer to manufacturer, so in order to actually use the drive in another system you have to pull the sled and bolt on a compatible one... time consuming and stupid. With bare drives, they are already standardized which is awesome.
 
I agree with Ockie, the external docks are life savers. I have a Vantec eSATA dock that I use primarily for testing hard drives immediately after purchase before they go int othe system they are destined for. The only quam I have with them is cooling. I've noticed that the drives have a tendency to get fairly hot with no air flow. Nothing outside of limits, just not suitable for ultra long periods of time.
 
I picked up a 4U server chassis that had a 6-drive SATA backplane (dock) for my WHS box, and the backplane works great. If you're looking to pick up a backplane, I've read many excellent reviews of Icy Dock's line of drive bays.
 
I am unsure if you are referring to external or internal, but I have the Vantec Sata docks that allow hot swap (Note, that doesn't mean your hardware allows hot swap). Because my 7200 RPM drives don't have any issues I have never had to use it. When I was using 10k RPM drives though, the hot swap was a life saver, as I had 2 drives go out in 2 years. Pop it out, replace the drive, and pop it back in and your up and rebuilding your array in 5 minutes.
 
andymodem said:
I'm thinking of getting one for my WHS. Will make it easy to just grab my backup drive and plug it in to do my weekly backups.
Click to expand...

Here's what I do...I just drop in one of the drive I rotate off site every week and run the backup on Sunday. Then pop it out Monday morning before I go to work. Works pretty smooth for me. Using the TT Blacx dock.
 
The 8 drives in my fileserver are in hot swap trays as well as the 4 Velociraptors in my Windwos box. I also have a sledless hot swap bay for the single drive in my Windows box. I <3 hot swap, especially for the times I take a drive somewhere with me.
 
Yea, I put 2 of the sledless racks in my old system. Next time Microcenter has them on sale, I am getting 2 more for my new system. The only reason I did not do 1 and 1 is that the model of rack I picked up has flimsy mounting rails that did not like the rails from my Antec 182.

Other than that, they work great, and they will be included in all future systems that I own.

Don
 
I don't know about the sledless stuff, but these things are downright magical. I moved from an external 4 bay NAS to two docking stations after having some raid5 concerns. I intend to get a norco and run WHS when I return to the Midwest. For now though I think I want to fill my last eSata port with another Blacx… Anyone want to buy a Synology CS407e Cubestation?

dirty.jpg


I don't own a desktop currently, so I use these enclosures as a 'manual' raid1, mirroring two drives at a time, its been working wonders. The green power drives run so cool that you don't need any active cooling at all.

The real question is if I get 4 more drives will I qualify for the 10 TB club? :eek:
 
Kettchxxii said:
I don't know about the sledless stuff, but these things are downright magical. I moved from an external 4 bay NAS to two docking stations after having some raid5 concerns. I intend to get a norco and run WHS when I return to the Midwest. For now though I think I want to fill my last eSata port with another Blacx… Anyone want to buy a Synology CS407e Cubestation?

dirty.jpg


I don't own a desktop currently, so I use these enclosures as a 'manual' raid1, mirroring two drives at a time, its been working wonders. The green power drives run so cool that you don't need any active cooling at all.

The real question is if I get 4 more drives will I qualify for the 10 TB club? :eek:
Click to expand...

No offense intended...but that would rank #1 for the most ghetto 10TB system.
 
Kettchxxii said:
I don't know about the sledless stuff, but these things are downright magical. I moved from an external 4 bay NAS to two docking stations after having some raid5 concerns. I intend to get a norco and run WHS when I return to the Midwest. For now though I think I want to fill my last eSata port with another Blacx… Anyone want to buy a Synology CS407e Cubestation?

diry.jpg


I don't own a desktop currently, so I use these enclosures as a 'manual' raid1, mirroring two drives at a time, its been working wonders. The green power drives run so cool that you don't need any active cooling at all.

The real question is if I get 4 more drives will I qualify for the 10 TB club? :eek:
Click to expand...


If you think that is magical, you should checkout the sled-less stuff... man talk about easy peasy.
 
BlacXs are sledless :D I like to think I have the budget storage problem solved. Two Blacx's and a PCexpress card for under 80 dollars. Even have an extra eSata if I can find a better shelving unit! Thats a hell of a lot of attached storage for a laptop :eek:
 
Kettchxxii said:
BlacXs are sledless :D I like to think I have the budget storage problem solved. Two Blacx's and a PCexpress card for under 80 dollars. Even have an extra eSata if I can find a better shelving unit! Thats a hell of a lot of attached storage for a laptop :eek:
Click to expand...

They are sledless docks, I was referring to hot swap 5in3 bay units which are sledless.
 
I like to keep all of my backups in the same place :eek:

The woman worked for an alt weekly newspaper. We have boxes and boxes and boxes of those things... errr, well, we had boxes and boxes. the shelving has since been replaced with some wood blocks.
 
epimetheus said:
I agree with Ockie, the external docks are life savers. I have a Vantec eSATA dock that I use primarily for testing hard drives immediately after purchase before they go int othe system they are destined for. The only quam I have with them is cooling. I've noticed that the drives have a tendency to get fairly hot with no air flow. Nothing outside of limits, just not suitable for ultra long periods of time.
Click to expand...

OT: What testing do you do? I just ordered 6 WD Black drives for my media/file server and am interested in what you do.
 
Kettchxxii said:
I don't know about the sledless stuff, but these things are downright magical. I moved from an external 4 bay NAS to two docking stations after having some raid5 concerns. I intend to get a norco and run WHS when I return to the Midwest. For now though I think I want to fill my last eSata port with another Blacx… Anyone want to buy a Synology CS407e Cubestation?

dirty.jpg


I don't own a desktop currently, so I use these enclosures as a 'manual' raid1, mirroring two drives at a time, its been working wonders. The green power drives run so cool that you don't need any active cooling at all.

The real question is if I get 4 more drives will I qualify for the 10 TB club? :eek:
Click to expand...

The Sledless racks work on the same principle as the BlacX docks, just a little neater.

I am a big fan of the WD GP drives. Even after one of my original 3 came DOA from ZZF. I have recently bought a 4th to use as a storage drive in my new system.

Don
 
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