*Official* Norco data storage products thread

dave99 said:
sounds like something norco would do, one step forward, one step back..lol.
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SirMaster said:
Interesting, yeah I'd like to see the new trays.
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These are the trays that came inserted in mine: (please pardon the shoddy rushed pictures)

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Maybe I am just having a moment of the stupids, but I don't see anything that can slide or fold to close off the airflow.

Oh well, nothing a little duct tape can't fix, through that looks kind of ghetto.

I am going to be using all the bays though. 12 5400rpm reds, and 4 SSD's in the backplane, and one 5400rpm green and an SSD mounted behind the 5.25" bays for a grand total of 13 hard drives and 5 SSD's

The backplane will be connected to two IBM M1015's flashed to IT mode and forwarded to my FreeNAS Guest. It has a single ZFS pool with two 6 x 4TB WD RED RAIDz2 vdev's, a mirrored pair of Samsung 850 Pro's as a SLOG for the ZIL's and (soon) another two Samsung 850 Pro's striped as L2ARC cache devices.

The SSD and 3TB Green behind the 5.25" bays will be connected directly to the on board controller and used for ESXi boot and datastore.

I'm really looking forward to this build like a kid in a candy store. Parts can't get here fast enough! :D
 
Also, do you guys label your caddy's?

I've been doing this for some time so that I can quickly find the right serial number if something fails

Like this on my HP server:

14955155820_1a9a119568_b.jpg


Seeing how the Norco caddies are slotted for airflow, I'm concerned about blocking them though. Any thoughts on this? Would blocking one of the slots on each tray with a label cause any problems?
 
Zarathustra[H];1041070150 said:
Also, do you guys label your caddy's?

I've been doing this for some time so that I can quickly find the right serial number if something fails

Like this on my HP server:

14955155820_1a9a119568_b.jpg


Seeing how the Norco caddies are slotted for airflow, I'm concerned about blocking them though. Any thoughts on this? Would blocking one of the slots on each tray with a label cause any problems?
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Hey - I think it's great that you are labeling them like this.

What I would do instead is decrease the font size on the labels so it is like 1/4 that size.. eg: put 4x labels on one that size and then cut them down. You don't need to be able to read the serial from the other side of the room.. make it as small as you can while still being able to read it without a magnifying glass...
 
So I finally got all my parts and got around to installing everything in the Norco.

Love the Norco 4216 (now that I'm almost done), but it wasn't without its problems.

This thing should seriously come with a "sharp edges" warning label. Wound up wiping blood off of the motherboard :p

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I haven't cut myself on a case since the mid 90's!

Also discovered that the back metal plate was bent between the PSU PCIe slots and rear fans. (no apparent damage to shipping box, so I'm guessing it must be a manufacturing defect). I tried to bend it back, but it is pretty stiff. This resulted in a tight fitting PSU, one of the rear 80mm fans not working (replaced it with one of the center fans for now, as I ordered the 120mm center bracket) the plastic fan cover on said fan being broken, and the I/O shield not fitting fantastically.

I would return it for a new one, but I put parts in it from my old server, and I need to minimize downtime. (well, that and I have a few hours invested in this install now.) I'm in talks with Amazon for a partial refund :p I mean, it works just fine now that I've replaced the fan (though the center fans are not the same, and louder than the rear ones), the problems are only cosmetic in nature if you spend time looking at the rear of the case which I will rarely do :p

I was surprised at the way the PCIe blanks were attached. It was very difficult to remove them in order to install cards without damaging the thin strips of metal between them. PCIe cards were also difficult to install, and requires some bending of the metal plate towards the bottom in order to fit in. This may be due to the bend in the back of the case though...

Anyway, the job is mostly finished, and I am pretty happy with it, now that I no longer need to stick my hands in there. Certainly beats the hell out of my old pre-built HP DL180G6 server (the jet engine)

It's running with ESXi 5.5U2 installed now, and one guest (pfSense) just running to test things (and to give me my internet back)

Plan on finishing the job and taking pictures tonight!

Curious thing I noticed was that most drives light up the power LED when inserted in the backplane, but my Samsung 850 Pro's (L2ARC) light up the green (presumably activity) light as well. At first I thought it was an SSD thing, as my 12 WD spinners didn't do this, but then when I installed my Intel S3700 (SLOG/ZIL) it didn't do it either.

Right now I'm hoping it's just a difference in how the drive firmware reports activity (I remember old ATAPI CDROM's used to light up the activity light permanently until booted) and will solve itself, and isn't an indication of a bigger problem.


MarkL said:
What I would do instead is decrease the font size on the labels so it is like 1/4 that size.. eg: put 4x labels on one that size and then cut them down. You don't need to be able to read the serial from the other side of the room.. make it as small as you can while still being able to read it without a magnifying glass...
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yeah, I know. I was just being lazy and didn't want to cut the labels from my Dymo. (the standard size is 1/2" wide) Thanks for the suggestion though (and done)
 
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Zarathustra[H];1041102024 said:
Curious thing I noticed was that most drives light up the power LED when inserted in the backplane, but my Samsung 850 Pro's (L2ARC) light up the green (presumably activity) light as well. At first I thought it was an SSD thing, as my 12 WD spinners didn't do this, but then when I installed my Intel S3700 (SLOG/ZIL) it didn't do it either.

Right now I'm hoping it's just a difference in how the drive firmware reports activity (I remember old ATAPI CDROM's used to light up the activity light permanently until booted) and will solve itself, and isn't an indication of a bigger problem.
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I've got the same thing with a sandisk v300, the activity light seems to work in reverse ie it's solid on when idle. No problem with some vertex 3s but must try some of the 840s I've got. Must be something to do with how the drive responds and how the backplane detects activity.
 
bmh.01 said:
I've got the same thing with a sandisk v300, the activity light seems to work in reverse ie it's solid on when idle. No problem with some vertex 3s but must try some of the 840s I've got. Must be something to do with how the drive responds and how the backplane detects activity.
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Good to know I'm not the only one.

Yeah, my Samsung 850 Pro's do this, but my Intel s3700's do not. Interesting.
 
Anyway, as promised, here's a couple of pictures of my build.

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Please disregard the ghetto wire management and duct tape. I was in a rush to finish the job (the server also serves as my MythTV Backend, and my mother-in-law to be wanted to watch the news...)

I will get back in there and clean it up some time soon :p
 
Zarathustra[H];1041070150 said:
Also, do you guys label your caddy's?

I've been doing this for some time so that I can quickly find the right serial number if something fails

Like this on my HP server:
*snip*

Seeing how the Norco caddies are slotted for airflow, I'm concerned about blocking them though. Any thoughts on this? Would blocking one of the slots on each tray with a label cause any problems?
Click to expand...

I would be a bit worried as some drives can run hot. I just label by tray number and have a spreadsheet of the serial numbers. Mine is a Supermicro though. But same idea.



In my case the numbers came with the case, not sure of Norco does the same.
 
Red Squirrel said:
I would be a bit worried as some drives can run hot. I just label by tray number and have a spreadsheet of the serial numbers. Mine is a Supermicro though. But same idea.



In my case the numbers came with the case, not sure of Norco does the same.
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Good idea, to have a separate reference.

I've taken care to use thin strips to not block airflow on the Norco, (as seen below) but just printing out numbers and then keeping track of the serial numbers in a spreadsheet probably would have been easier...

15268538436_a8ac02e4ed_b.jpg
 
Do you really need the serial number in big ass letters?

Just get a laser printer and print a small label to be stuck next to the opening knob. Check this, disk type, WWN, serial and warranty status in Courier New 5pt:

tray.jpg
 
TCM2 said:
Do you really need the serial number in big ass letters?

Just get a laser printer and print a small label to be stuck next to the opening knob. Check this, disk type, WWN, serial and warranty status in Courier New 5pt:

tray.jpg
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Yeah, I didn't have any sticky printer labels handy, so I used my Dymo label printer, and it only seems to be able to print long strings of text. Haven't found a line break. In my first pic of the HP server I just covered the handle in big letters, on the Norco I printed the smallest label size and trimmed down the labels to fit one bar on the caddy without obstructing airflow (at least SIG ificantly)
 
To be true, these aren't sticky labels either. It's normal paper with double-sided tape on the back and clear tape on top - self-made glossy labels if you will.
 
Does anyone know where I can get some additional motherboard standoffs for my Norco 4220? I need 3 more to fully support my ATX motherboard. I was hoping to use standoffs I had sitting around from past builds, but these Norco ones are taller and have a larger thread diameter to screw into the case.

I've e-mailed Norco support, but not knowing how long it will take to hear back from them, I'm looking for other options. This is the only thing holding up my build at this point.
 
Anyone know where I can get replacement backplanes for a Norco RPC-4224? I have two that no longer work.

Thanks
 
Khadgar said:
Does anyone know where I can get some additional motherboard standoffs for my Norco 4220? I need 3 more to fully support my ATX motherboard. I was hoping to use standoffs I had sitting around from past builds, but these Norco ones are taller and have a larger thread diameter to screw into the case.

I've e-mailed Norco support, but not knowing how long it will take to hear back from them, I'm looking for other options. This is the only thing holding up my build at this point.
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Did they not come with your case?

Mine came with a bag with a bunch of different hardware.
 
I'm looking for a replacement 2.5" OS hard drive brackets for a old version RPC-4220. NORCO says they don't have them in stock and the new dual 2.5" bracket they sell that attaches to the side does not fit the old version of the 4220.

V7XPaL9.jpg
 
leeto said:
I'm looking for a replacement 2.5" OS hard drive brackets for a old version RPC-4220. NORCO says they don't have them in stock and the new dual 2.5" bracket they sell that attaches to the side does not fit the old version of the 4220.

V7XPaL9.jpg
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:D
 
Zarathustra[H];1041398604 said:
I find I often have a hard time getting the regular green stuff off, when I need toove the drives. The outdoor stuff must be impossible!
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You could try the refill strips for 3M command adhesive products. They are meant to mount hooks to the wall that you can release by pulling on the tab, but the refill strips should work as double-sided tape that you can release (I say should because I have not actually tried it).
 
Khadgar said:
Does anyone know where I can get some additional motherboard standoffs for my Norco 4220? I need 3 more to fully support my ATX motherboard. I was hoping to use standoffs I had sitting around from past builds, but these Norco ones are taller and have a larger thread diameter to screw into the case.

I've e-mailed Norco support, but not knowing how long it will take to hear back from them, I'm looking for other options. This is the only thing holding up my build at this point.
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Did you manage to get some standoffs from Norco? I cannot find a source for those anywhere else. I think they have a 8-32 thread to screw into the case but accept a 6-32 thread to screw into.
 
That looks almost exactly like a QNAP NAS. I know, I have their TVS-671 unit. That looks a lot like their 8-bay unit, with the LCD of course. Given the overlap and outright piracy on the part of many Chinese vendors it could just as easily be a copy.
 
are these guys out of business or what?

they have literally no presence on amazon or newegg.

and on newegg.ca a 4224 is over 1000 dollarydoos.
 
Master_shake_ said:
are these guys out of business or what?

they have literally no presence on amazon or newegg.

and on newegg.ca a 4224 is over 1000 dollarydoos.
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Looks like they still exist, judging by their website (though it does have an expired certificate...)

The impression I get is that they were never really focused on consumers, and that they sell more in bulk to larger companies. Could be wrong though.

That said, since i built my server around my Norco I have changed my approach. It was a lot of case for the money, but I have since demoted it to backup server duty.

These days I have been buying used Supermicro servers instead. My SuperMicro CSE-846 has been great to me, after a small mod to allow for larger (quieter) fans. Much higher quality than Norco products, even when used.
 
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