TLDR: If you were building a NAS for 8 HDDs and 1 SSD today, what case would you use?

I’m going to be rebuilding my system soon (currently using an old PowerEdge T610) using one of my other older (R5 1600) systems and I’ve basically hit a road block on picking a case.

I’ve got 8 HDDs that need to fit in the system after it’s rebuilt (plus at least one SSD) so I’m kinda limited in that regard.

The rest of the system is planned out (mostly because I’m reusing old parts) it’s just the case I’m stuck on.

I’m wanting to avoid rack mounting currently mostly due to space (and wanting to keep it under $200)

I was thinking maybe the Fractal Design Define R5, the Fractal Design Node 804, or the Phanteks Enthoo Pro 2 but I’m open to suggestions.

  • lemmyvore@feddit.nlEnglish
    17·
    10 months ago

    Fractal Design, definitely. The model I’m using is no longer made but they have very good ones today too. Look into the Define and Meshify lines. They have models that can utilize the full height of the case for HDD/SSD slots with openings on both sides for maximum ease of cable routing.

    The Define 7 or Meshify 2 is most likely what you want. They only come with 6 HDD brackets included but you can buy more and they have slots for up to 11.

    The R5 is another good choice, I like those brackets more, but it’s not so flexible as the others I mentioned, and the 5.25" bays will most likely go unused and just take up space.

    Don’t get the Node 804, it’s much larger than it seems (check out yt videos) and is cramped and hard to work in.

    • LufyCZ@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      10 months ago

      The R5 is amazing, though yeah the 5.25" bays are kinda a waste.

      I found a thingy though that fits into the bay and houses 6 2.5" SSDs, it’s pretty cool!

      • lemmyvore@feddit.nlEnglish
        2·
        10 months ago

        Yeah I expect acting as SSD bays could become popular in the future if SSD prices drop low enough. Although they might be M.2 bays by then.

        I have a bunch of old 60 GB 2.5" SSDs around but they’re so small it’s not worth bothering to set up an array of them. Plus they’re more useful individually for stuff like upgrading an old laptop, portable USB storage or installing Windows the one time in three years I need it.

        In the meantime I’ve liberated the 2x HDD cage from a Define C Mini’s shroud and mounted it on the floor in a fan slot.

    • Gormadt@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      I’ve currently got the Meshify C (not the 2) for my main gaming rig and I’ve dug it the whole time I’ve had it; looking at the drive mounting for the Meshify 2 makes me really want it for sure as that looks really convenient

      The more I looked at the Node 804 since I made this post the less I liked it

      NGL I wish their North line of cases had more slots for HDDs

    • Gormadt@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPEnglish
      2·
      10 months ago

      18 HDDs into it plus 5 SSDs

      Sweating intensifies

      That’s a lot of drives, I’ll have to look into that one for sure

      • NarrativeBear@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        10 months ago

        I run TrueNAS myself in this case. I have two v-devs of 8 drives each in raid 2.

        Both v-devs have a extra spare each. 4 SSDs are used for quick read and write and the 5th SSD for os boot.

        • JGrffn@lemmy.worldEnglish
          3·
          10 months ago

          How’s performance on that setup? I own the case and am looking to do the exact same vdev setup this next year, but am wondering if the wider vdevs negatively impact performance in any noticeable way. Also wondering if 128gb of ram is too little for that kind of setup with 20tb drives, I feel like I might have to find out the hard way…

          • NarrativeBear@lemmy.worldEnglish
            3·
            10 months ago

            Performance is great IMO, I store all my Plex media on this setup as a network share and never have any issues or slowdowns. I only use the setup as a strict NAS nothing else.

            I started with 9 drives at 12tb first, about 3 years later (mid this year) i added the second vdev to my main pool. 9 drives 20tb each.

            V-devs do not require to be the same size between v-devs, but they do require to have the same amount of drives in each.

            I have unraid and proxmox setups on other machines running independently. Plex and other software for example all access my TrueNAS over the network.

            For the TrueNAS system IMO you don’t need much “horsepower”. I run it on a 12 year old motherboard, 12gb ram and a 60gb SSD to boot. Nothing special at all. Unraid and proxmox on the other hand is where I spend the money on ram and processing power.

            My Network is gigabit and I get full speed on network transfers, looking to do 10gb in the future, but that would require 10gb NIC’s in all my PC’s and new network switches. Don’t see it effecting my TrueNAS sytem setup. Besides your network transfer is only as fast as the read/write of the drives.

  • charles@lemmy.caEnglish
    7·
    10 months ago

    Highly recommend cases by Fractal.

    For self hosting I’d recommend either one of the Meshify 2 or Define 7, depending on local price and your specific needs. I personally went with the Meshify 2 XL and was blown away by the quality of the case. It’s built well and allows for a variety of configurations. It also makes maintenance very easy as the filters and side panels can all be removed without any tool to handle dust build up.

  • Lunch@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    10 months ago

    Fractal seems far superior at least in the budget range. Personally just bought a R5 second-hand for roughly 40euros. Totally worth it imo 😁

  • turkishmonky@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    10 months ago

    I’m using a NetApp ds4246 to hold 24 drives, and it’s glorious - embrace the rack mount life. Although my computers themselves are all HP Prodesk minis, which are tiny and amazing, 1 u high and can fit two across on a shelf.

    • Dalraz@lemmy.caEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      I have been looking to do this as well, I’m just not 100% sure how it all connects together. Do you have the disk shelf connect to a server with lots of sas cards?

      • turkishmonky@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        You just need one it mode hba sas controller with an external out, and probably a conversion cable from 8088 to netapp’s 8436.

        You can daisy chain shelves if needed, and I think you can use a second sas card for active failover but I haven’t tried it.

        • Dalraz@lemmy.caEnglish
          1·
          10 months ago

          Oh, i thought a single sas port could only do 8 sata drives. Interesting

  • lemmyng@lemmy.caEnglish
    4·
    10 months ago

    I used a Fractal Design case for a home server in the past. Pretty happy with them.

  • hperrin@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    10 months ago

    I’m using a Fractal Meshify 2. It’s big, but I highly recommend it. It can hold 11 HDDs. I’ve only got 6 in mine, and it’s quite roomy.

  • Sup3rlativ3@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    10 months ago

    So I recently went through all of this headache. I started really wanting hotswap that didn’t look like it was from the 90’s. I also needed like 8 drives capacity which rules a lot of the popular cases out.

    I thought about it for a while and I don’t really touch the drives at all on any of my previous Nas builds so that meant I didn’t need hotswap.

    Eventually I decided that rather than try to hide the case away I would make it a feature of my living room and I went with the tower 500 and I really love it and everyone that has gone over has mentioned how cool it looks

    • phrogpilot73@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      10 months ago

      That looks an awful lot like what I have. I’m using the Lian Li PC-D600. I think I’ve managed to get my hands on one of the last ones in the wild. They aren’t even available used on eBay anymore.

      What I like most about it (and the Tower 500 that you linked) is that the motherboard is on one side, and the drives are on the other. Keeping the drives cool is easy, I just upgraded the fans on my SATA backplanes and the case, and even under load the drives run very cool.

      You can have this case when you pry it from my cold dead fingers.

  • Codilingus@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    3·
    10 months ago

    I know you said you’re against rack mounting, but JUST in case:

    I love the look and tidiness of a nice rack mount system. So I got a Chenbro 4U case. It’s perfect for reusing my old components, and it has a standard size area on the front to install a hot swap HDD cage.

  • dan@upvote.auEnglish
    3·
    10 months ago

    I really like the Node 804 even though the design is quite old - probably close to ten years old now. Fractal Design are still manufacturing it, which is rare for case designs that old.

    I recently built a NAS using an 804. I had to fit mine into my server closet which isn’t deep enough to fit a regular PC case, so the 804 fit my use case well.

    I’ve only got three drives in it (2 x 20TB Seagate Exos X20 for data and 1 x 14TB WD Purple Pro for security cameras) but I wanted the ability to expand in the future, and I wanted to use a Micro ATX motherboard rather than a smaller one.

    A Noctua NH-D15 fits fine, even though the spec sheet says it won’t fit.

  • SayCyberOnceMore@feddit.ukEnglish
    2·
    10 months ago

    I have both Fractal Design and SilverStone cases… love them… but the internal layout is not 100% of the consideration

    Have a think about airflow and cabling… some of them have weird air flow designs and if you’re putting the machine inside something, or next to something, then that can make more impact on day-to-day use.

    For example, I have a Node 304 (not enough drive space for you) because it fits nicely inside Ikea shelving. But the front air flow under the front bezel did mean I keep that machine near the front of the shelf, not pushed back.

    And also consider hotswap drive bay caddies that fit smaller drives into large drive bays. Sometimes these have weird power connections, but if you don’t have them do you have enough PSU leads? So, are they absolutely essential? Possibly. Possibly not…

    Maybe not the answer you were lookong for, but those are my main considerations now…