4 Drive RAID Box

[goobee]

I am looking for a 4 drive RAID box to house the library for my HTPC. Requirements are low cost, esata interface, RAID 5 and will power down with the HTPC. So far, the ones I've run across will power down the drives but the RAID box PSU continues to run.

Does such an animal exist? Recommendations will be appreciated.

 

[yinan]

I have used these before, and they aren't that fast. You will want a NAS box you access over the network.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

AFAIK, they have a separate PSU and are pretty stupid, so chances are, no, there aren't likely going to be any that will power on/off with the computer, unless they're powered from the computer somehow.

 

[goobee]

@Dave: Yeah, that's what I've seen thus far. They just sit there powered on while your PC slumbers in sleep mode.

@yinan: The NAS units will sit there powered on 24/7 as well. I want something that will power itself down completely when not needed.

I was hoping for a more elegant solution than having to manually turn a device on and off.

 

[nk215]

NAS when in sleep/spin down mode uses very little power.

You can DIY. You can install one of the sata expander in an enclosure the run the sata cable and power cable from he main box to it. It will take up one sata port in your main comp.

 

[goobee]

That would only work for 1 drive though. My objective is 4 drives in RAID 5.

 

[mv2devnull]

There are "master&slaves" extension leads. When the master sockets power draw goes down, the slaves cut off and when the device on master is "started", the power to to the slaves is restored too.

But ask yourself, is it ok for a RAID-5 to lose power?

 

[nk215]

That would only work for 1 drive though. My objective is 4 drives in RAID 5.

You didn't read what I said.

Search for:

SATA to 5x SATA port multiplier hardware RAID0/1/3/5/10/SPAN/CLONE and JBOD Controller
by DATOptic Inc

for example, that'll do what you want. You'll get up to 5 drives in RAID5 and will use one SATA port in your main case. The Controller can be mounted in an external case along with your 5 HDDs.

http://www.amazon.com/multiplier-ha...=UTF8&qid=1442424409&sr=8-1&keywords=DATOptic

 

[goobee]

Hey thanks for the ideas guys. It appears Synology NAS can hibernate and wake up on demand. Not cheap but they are supposedly reliable and appear to have the features I need.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Hey thanks for the ideas guys. It appears Synology NAS can hibernate and wake up on demand. Not cheap but they are supposedly reliable and appear to have the features I need.

Wakeup cycle on most NAS boxes is pretty sloooow.

Also, there are some things local storage can do that network storage can't, and they're slower.

Plus, NAS in hibernation mode will probably use more power as the drive enclosure with the drives spun down. (It's a computer.)

Anyway, it's not like Synology is a bad product, but getting NAS when you want DAS is almost as bad as getting DAS when you want NAS.

 

[goobee]

Google is my friend. It appears there are DAS units that completely power down in sleep mode:

FAQ:

(1) My Mobius RAID unit shuts off automatically when not in use. Why?

If there is no HDD access for 30 minutes, the RAID will go to sleep to save power. The LEDs, drives and fans will turn off. As soon as you access the drive, it will wake up. NOTE: JBOD does not support auto sleep mode.

https://oyendigital.com/hard-drives/store/3R5-EB3-M.html