Yet another computer part recommendation thread - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: blueskull
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 19, 2017, 01:41:18 am
content: Hi all. I know this is yet another computer part recommendation thread... Please bear with me.I'm looking for a 4-bay 2.5'' hard drive box that can do hardware RAID5 in USB3.0/USB3/1 interface.I know there is Drobo mini, but it only supports up to 9.5mm HDDs, while I need 15mm HDD support.I know there are a number of Chinese 2-bay ones, but I need 4-bay support. 2-bay forces me to use RAID1 for any redundancy, which is not economical.I know there are a number of 3.5'' ones, but I need something that is quiet and low power, besides 2.5'' drives seek faster and tend to live longer.I know Akitio has a 4-bay 2.5'' RAID, but that supports only Type C thunderbolt, not USB. While my laptop supports Thunderbolt 3, my desktop doesn't.I intend to use it as video repo for my projects. I film short tech videos. My current 1TB SSD is running out of space, and I want to invest on something that can hold much more data.I plan to fit 4 Seagate 5TB 2.5'' drives in, and form a 15TB RAID5 array.Thanks.

author: john_c
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 19, 2017, 02:31:53 am
content: Here's something that works, physically:https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817999022Then there's the problem of an interface. Would 2x dual raid arrays work for your purposes?

author: NiHaoMike
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 19, 2017, 04:58:02 am
content: In my experience, 2.5" hard drives have always been substantially slower and more expensive than their 3.5" counterparts. For the price premium, get a pair of 3.5" drives instead and set them to RAID 1. Overall cost would likely be lower than using 2.5" drives in RAID 5.BTW, for a good deal on hard drives, Best Buy has 8TB WD Red for $180 each. (The deal comes and goes.)

author: john_c
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 19, 2017, 05:20:54 am
content: Oh here we go, an interface:http://www.ebay.com/itm/162264304157It appears as though it may have a connector for a cable like this one:http://www.ebay.com/itm/322008876689Alternatively, find one of those dual-ended USB cables, and wire it to the SATA power end of a Molex to SATA power adapter. The SATA power connector on the drive bay does not need 12V (yellow) in the case of 2.5" drives.

author: Tom45
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 19, 2017, 01:08:52 pm
content: I have two 5 slot DRobo units with ethernet interface. Note that they have a proprietary "BeyondRAID", not RAID 5. They are quite nice though.I use Western Digital drives and some years ago one of them failed. Messages and a blinking red light told me which one to replace. Pulled the bad one and put another drive in without any interruption in service. Western Digital replaced the failed drive under warranty.You don't need to start with max capacity. You can expand capacity on the fly by adding another drive to an empty slot, or if no empty slot, remove the smallest drive and replace it with something larger. Again, that can be done on the fly with no interruption in service.The Ethernet interface isn't as fast but I use mine for backups so that isn't a problem for me. I would choose a different model if planning to use it as you describe.You should widen your search to 3.5" units as there are hot swap carriers that let you plug a 2.5" drive into a 3.5" drive box.

author: rdl
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 19, 2017, 02:42:14 pm
content: I would probably assemble a small system running FreeNAS with ZFS. Cheap, reliable and flexible.