I am currently running a FreeBSD system on an old Dell Optiplex 790 (i3 2100) that has been upgraded a bit.
It has 16G of ram, and 5 hard drives: 1TiB SATA SSD, where the OS itself is installed, using UFS+/FFS filesystem.
The other 4 are 3TiB SAS drives, connected to an LSI 9300 HBA, and are in a ZFS raidz1 configuration.
I would prefer to stick with FreeBSD, but would also consider TrueNAS Core (also FreeBSD based).
Here’s the problem. The 5 hard drives don’t quite fit into the case. The side panel won’t close completely due to the SAS connectors being slightly larger than the original SATA connectors the case was designed for.
My budget is sub $300.
I’ve seen a few 2U and 4U servers on eBay that seem to fit the bill. My concern is that energy usage would be significantly higher than it is now.
Any suggestions for alternative ideas that keep my existing storage would be much appreciated.
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I have a 8 sas drive ITX NAS. The one and only case that I found suitable is the Jonsbo N3 as it has a sata/sas back panel. It fits all of that in a small size so it is great.
It fits your price (not if you have to buy an itx motherboard tho) but it’s hard to find, even harder on second hand market.
(For the hardware inside it I went to used consumer hardware, like asus itx MB, intel 10500t and ddr4 non ec, for the same reason as you).
I just bought one recently. There’s a bunch of listings on AliExpress. Shipping took a while, obviously, and if you’re in the US, good fucking luck. But the case itself is solid. A little weirdly laid out, but I suppose that’s typical of ITX cases.
I got mine from my local eBay as 100% of the server is built on used hardware auctions.
The case took ages to find, mostly why it took me one year to build this server but I wasn’t in a hurry.
That’s about the way I was leaning, to just get a bigger case, but the problem is, the current system is mATX, so I would need all new internals, and then, as you say, that goes quite a bit over my current budget.
I’ll keep looking. Thanks.
Which Dell Optiplex 790 case do you have?
https://i.dell.com/sites/doccontent/shared-content/data-sheets/en/Documents/optiplex-790-customer-brochure.pdfIf one of the larger maybe you can fit a cage? F.e. https://www.amazon.com/Stainless-Computer-Driver-Adapter-Bracket/dp/B0CJ3GC791/137-8170395-5395953
It is the larger (relatively speaking. It’s still small compared to my and my daughter’s machines) mini tower.
But I’m not sure I can fit that cage. There’s room for 2 5.25" drives, and that cage looks to be the size of 3 of them stacked atop each other.
But thanks for the suggestions.
There are also smaller cages, such as https://www.amazon.com/dp/B019LS5UVU?psc=1, if that helps. :)
It really doesn’t, honestly. I currently have two of the hard drives mounted in 5.25 to 3.5 adapters where that cage would go, and two of the others are the ones that won’t quite fit, so I’d have to move both of them to make it close properly.
It really does look like I need a different case to put it all in.
The maybe something like Fractal Design Define 7, if your Dell parts fit in a standard case.
They aren’t cheap but I really enjoy working in them and how dust free and quiet they stay. Just beware; they’re huge and heavy.ATX (Motherboard compatibility E-ATX (max 285 mm) / ATX / mATX / mITX):
https://www.newegg.com/black-fractal-design-define-7-atx-mid-tower/p/N82E16811352109
E-ATX (Motherboard compatibility E-ATX / ATX / mATX / mITX / EE-ATX / SSI-CEB / SSI-EEB):
https://www.newegg.com/black-fractal-design-define-7-xl-atx-full-tower/p/N82E16811352118
Yeah, I’ve been looking at those as well.
I was also considering something more like this, and moving the drives out of the server and I to just an enclosure.
I’m just not sure how energy hungry it would be if I only filled 4 out of 24 bays.
Here’s some non-official stats regarding the DS2246 24 bay system, I imagine you can use them as ballpark figures for the DS212C:
I happen to have one in my garage and a kill-w-watt type device, so here is my non scientific and non official data for you:
At 240V with one PSU:
140W with 24 x 450 GB SAS drives
56W with 2 x 450 GB SAS drives
46W with zero drives
56db sound from 1m with NIOSH SLM on iPhone 8 Plus110V tends to be approx 10% more power consumption, but I can’t test that at home (spousal approval was not forthcoming for a stepdown to use US power tools…)
Hope this helps!https://old.reddit.com/r/netapp/comments/czpbw1/ds2246_idle_power_consumption/ez0kbh2/
That’s actually a lot better than I was expecting. Thanks for the info!