ITX case with 4 3.5" bays?

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kumquat

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I'm converting my WHS server to FreeNAS and want to move my 4xWD Red drives from an external eSATA RAID 5 enclosure to internal drives for ZFS. The NAS lives in a smallish cabinet (with good airflow) so I'm looking for a small case that can accommodate it.

Mini-ITX mobo, booting from USB, with 4x internal 3.5 drives.

My best options seem to be the Silverstone DS380, but that's on the expensive side, and the Fractal Designs Node 304. I've already got an ATX power supply (Antec VP450) so I can use that. I'd like if the case had USB 3.0 headers, but that's not entirely necessary.

Are there any other options I can consider?
 
heh, I was looking for similar cases for a mini freenas setup and came across this InWin case w/ 4 x 3.5" hot swap bays: http://www.in-win.com.tw/Server/zh/goods.php?cid=144 Similar to the above aktechinc case and the freenas mini server...
Hot swap is nice for replacing drives and doing drive by drive expansion, but you pay extra for that feature...
I've also gone with a small case that had 3 x 5.25" bays and a 5 x 3.5" adapter in it to fit more drives. something like this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811165648 I started doing 5+ drive arrays after this for 4+1 hot spare, but they also make 4 x 3.5" adaptres that fit in 3 x 5.25" bays.

You could look at the Lian Li mini-itx series. Something like the LIAN LI PC-Q25B which can fit 5-7 3.5" drives. I've got a linux file server w/6 x 3.5" drives in that case...

in short, there are options just depends on your cost...
 
kumquat said:
I'm converting my WHS server to FreeNAS and want to move my 4xWD Red drives from an external eSATA RAID 5 enclosure to internal drives for ZFS. The NAS lives in a smallish cabinet (with good airflow) so I'm looking for a small case that can accommodate it.

Mini-ITX mobo, booting from USB, with 4x internal 3.5 drives.

My best options seem to be the Silverstone DS380, but that's on the expensive side, and the Fractal Designs Node 304. I've already got an ATX power supply (Antec VP450) so I can use that. I'd like if the case had USB 3.0 headers, but that's not entirely necessary.

Are there any other options I can consider?
Click to expand...

For a small(ish) enclosure, with a lot of storage space, I would go with the Fractal Design Node 304.

Six 3.5" drive bays available (I would assume you are gonna go with integrated graphics)…
 
Great suggestions, everyone. It looks like the Node 304 has the best combo of size and price. Thanks.
 
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