Question ATX, E-ATX NAS Case with Rapid Front Panel HDD/SDD Removal?

chane

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Apr 18, 2010
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I'm having these guys build me a cool and quiet NAS to be placed in the corner of my living room.
https://www.steigerdynamics.com/productcart/pc/configurePrd.asp?idproduct=1765

But as I don’t plan on having total data storage off-site (cloud based) any time soon, in the event of fire or other sudden disasters, I’d want a case that allows rapid front panel removal of all drives needed to rebuild the NAS. Are there any case brands who offer ATX and/or E-ATX cases with this important safety feature?
 

mindless1

Diamond Member
Aug 11, 2001
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How many drives are you talking about? If my home is burning down, I'd just grab the whole NAS, I mean how big does it need to be unless you have a boatload of drives?

I'm also a bit confused about what you have linked. It's a page to configure a workstation with a starting price of $1749 and goes up from there. That seems on the expensive side for just personal storage that isn't even important enough for an off-site backup (how about mirrored to HDDs you put in a safety deposit box instead of a cloud, or a tape backup and you just grab the tape(s) ?)

Are you getting a raid card or onboard raid with these desktop motherboards and what raid level? Sorry that I'm drifting off topic a bit. 3.5" HDDs or 2.5" SSDs or ?? You can get slide out sleds for 5.25" bays and then any case with a sufficient # of 5.25" bays would work. Many (most) cases have 5.25" bay covers that just pop off if they aren't, or you take out, screws holding the front bezel faceplates on so they are just friction fit, or with cases that don't have a snap off bezel due to the bezel being held on with screws, can take the screws out of the whole bezel, or cut off friction tabs if present, and take the whole bezel off for access, and use whatever is needed for a flat surface interface to hold the bezel on instead of the original screws or friction tabs, for example velcro, or magnets epoxied onto the bezel (if a steel front walled case).

Have you mentioned this to the company you linked, asking what they'd do? You deserve a bit of customer service for the price you'd be (arguably, over-) paying for a mere NAS.

What if you took part of the budget and instead got some USB external HDDs that you keep offline except when making backups to them, then can just grab those to bugout if that day ever comes? I still don't think I'd want to rely on physically being there and able to grab drives to take with me in the event of a site disaster/whatever, but if that was the plan, then the external USB enclosures will at least offer a minimal level of protection more than bare drives would... unless they are SSDs which are inherently more rugged than HDDs.

Further, for your static data (stays the same over long periods of time), you might not need the redundancy of RAID for that data, with the backup copy being on the offline USB HDDs and only raid the drives with frequently changing data. Remember that when you pull drives in a raid array, if they are not just mirrored, you may need the same raid controller to rebuild the array and/or put that data back online to access, while having it on USB external HDDs is about as universal and quick/easy a way to access it as reasonably possible, besides the much slower and less controllable, cloud storage option.
 
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Red Squirrel

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May 24, 2003
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www.anyf.ca
Have cold storage backups either to hard drives, or tapes, in event of fire, grab the box that has the backups stored inside. Nothing to unplug or mess with, and you probably should have cold storage backups at minimum anyway even if it's not off site.
 
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Shmee

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What OS do you plan on running? You could just do your own build, and run TrueNAS scale, or another OS of your choice. As for cases and drive bays, you could get a case with a bunch of 5.25" ODD bays, and install HDD/SSD hot swap cages in them. They look something like this: https://www.newegg.com/athena-power-bp-tla3141sas12-other/p/N82E16816119046 note this model takes a mini SAS connection, so you would need a SAS card.
 

chane

Member
Apr 18, 2010
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Have cold storage backups either to hard drives, or tapes, in event of fire, grab the box that has the backups stored inside. Nothing to unplug or mess with, and you probably should have cold storage backups at minimum anyway even if it's not off site.
Thank you for this! It makes good sense to have an online and offline NAS. The offline NAS cold stores my video and audio files-which, of course, don't get updated-but also stores all of my document files, some of which do and don't get updated.

The only drawback is that I'd want the offline NAS to have ECC RAM like the online NAS will, to better insure against bit errors. BUT as all of my PCs have ECC RAM would I even need for the offline NAS to have a Xeon processor and ECC supporting motherboard?

It seems to conceded that BTRFS is more user friendly for dummies to maintain than ZFS, and I am not looking to deal with any user interface that requires typing code into a command prompt. That's why I wanted Steiger-who also builds NAS as ultra quiet as the HTPC they built for me-the make the NAS file system pretty dummy proof.
How many drives are you talking about? If my home is burning down, I'd just grab the whole NAS, I mean how big does it need to be unless you have a boatload of drives?

I'm also a bit confused about what you have linked. It's a page to configure a workstation with a starting price of $1749 and goes up from there. That seems on the expensive side for just personal storage that isn't even important enough for an off-site backup (how about mirrored to HDDs you put in a safety deposit box instead of a cloud, or a tape backup and you just grab the tape(s) ?)

Are you getting a raid card or onboard raid with these desktop motherboards and what raid level? Sorry that I'm drifting off topic a bit. 3.5" HDDs or 2.5" SSDs or ?? You can get slide out sleds for 5.25" bays and then any case with a sufficient # of 5.25" bays would work. Many (most) cases have 5.25" bay covers that just pop off if they aren't, or you take out, screws holding the front bezel faceplates on so they are just friction fit, or with cases that don't have a snap off bezel due to the bezel being held on with screws, can take the screws out of the whole bezel, or cut off friction tabs if present, and take the whole bezel off for access, and use whatever is needed for a flat surface interface to hold the bezel on instead of the original screws or friction tabs, for example velcro, or magnets epoxied onto the bezel (if a steel front walled case).

Have you mentioned this to the company you linked, asking what they'd do? You deserve a bit of customer service for the price you'd be (arguably, over-) paying for a mere NAS.

What if you took part of the budget and instead got some USB external HDDs that you keep offline except when making backups to them, then can just grab those to bugout if that day ever comes? I still don't think I'd want to rely on physically being there and able to grab drives to take with me in the event of a site disaster/whatever, but if that was the plan, then the external USB enclosures will at least offer a minimal level of protection more than bare drives would... unless they are SSDs which are inherently more rugged than HDDs.

Further, for your static data (stays the same over long periods of time), you might not need the redundancy of RAID for that data, with the backup copy being on the offline USB HDDs and only raid the drives with frequently changing data. Remember that when you pull drives in a raid array, if they are not just mirrored, you may need the same raid controller to rebuild the array and/or put that data back online to access, while having it on USB external HDDs is about as universal and quick/easy a way to access it as reasonably possible, besides the much slower and less controllable, cloud storage option.
How many drives I suppose depends on the RAID, which would have some number of mirrored drives, But I read even mirrored RAID is not as safe as measures employed to data loss from bit rot-though which I'm hoping that Steiger or maybe these local guys can automate as much as possible for this dummy. https://noelnetworksupport.com/
What OS do you plan on running? You could just do your own build, and run TrueNAS scale, or another OS of your choice. As for cases and drive bays, you could get a case with a bunch of 5.25" ODD bays, and install HDD/SSD hot swap cages in them. They look something like this: https://www.newegg.com/athena-power-bp-tla3141sas12-other/p/N82E16816119046 note this model takes a mini SAS connection, so you would need a SAS card.
My other big concern is NAS fan noise, BUT I just learned today that I can keep the online NAS (Steiger built) and offline cold storage NAS (Qnap or Synology NAS built by Noel Networks?) in another room. And that data can be accessed either by utlizing the existing house wired RG cable system by using these adapters https://www.asus.com/us/networking-iot-servers/wired-networking/wired-adapters/ma-25/ , OR connecting both NAS to a wireless router and adding transceiver cards to the pcs. Any speed or other risks with these connection options?

Total storage capacity for both online and cold storage NAS may be between 5GB and 8GB.
 
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Shmee

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Why not just use wired CAT 7 ethernet cables?
 

chane

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Apr 18, 2010
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Why not just use wired CAT 7 ethernet cables?
Because my apartment came with the RG coax cable system installed throughout the place. What would be the point of hiring someone to replace it with CAT cable? Unless you mean a direct CAT cable connection from NAS to PC. That might be okay with the online NAS, as Steiger would use an E-ATX case and large low rev fans to minimize noise. But with all of those drives the NAS might still be too noisy to keep it close by. Thus, I'd have to place it in a far corner of my living room, diagonally opposite the corner with my chair. So I'd have to run CAT cable along the perimeter of my room, possibly too close the speaker and subwoofer magnets.
 
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chane

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Apr 18, 2010
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Please reply to my wireless vs. RG cable/CAT cable converted vs. direct NAS to PC via CAT cable questions.
 

aigomorla

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Unless you mean a direct CAT cable connection from NAS to PC.
i think thats what he means... But i think he more implies... you use a switch in the middle.
So NAS -> Switch -> PC's.

I would NEVER run a NAS on wifi.. NEVER.
Then again... i would NEVER run a server tied to a NAS on anything but 10gbe. Clients, are ok on 1gbe / 2.5gbe. But all my main servers which are tied to my NAS are all done on 10gbe.

Theres a whole book of difference between sending data at 125MB/s vs 500-600MB/s , especially if your dealing with file sizes in large GB, like unedited photo files, or untouched RAW's from Blue Ray rips.

Also i would never trust a custom gaming rig company to build me a NAS.
Its like going to get a Peterbuilt done at a Formula One shop.

I suggest you look at TrueNAS for a one software / hardware solution if you need a NAS, and not go though a custom gaming PC company.
TrueNAS Mini might fit your situation better, and will probably be cheaper overall if you can get them on sale on amazon.

like this guy

it has the hotswap + low power + 8 drives + ECC. They go on sale too, so i would keep an eye on them.

Total storage capacity for both online and cold storage NAS may be between 5GB and 8GB.

WHAT?

GB and not TB?

Just Multipool flash drive that. If you cold storaged 8GB on 20 USB drives, in 20 different locations thoughout the house, im sure 1 would survive even a fire, unless your house got orbital nuked.
 
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mindless1

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If you're going to do a NAS over wifi, you can save about $1500 by just getting some old PC, throw a new PSU in and a decent wifi card, raid card if not built into mobo. You don't at ALL need modern CPU performance or several GB of memory for performance that low.

However I wouldn't even bother building a network attached NAS with less than 1Gb wired. Might as well just hook it straight up to a host PC over USB and network share/something if it's going to be that slow, and then you also avoid paying the power bill for another system running (24/7?).

I'm starting to think that the best cost-effective option for you, considering everything, is to just get a couple USB external HDDs attached to your existing PC. Disaster happens, you just grab them in their enclosures and run for the hills. :) Bonus, only leave one running and leave the 2nd as offline storage that you use an app to sync with the other one on a schedule.
 

bigboxes

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Apr 6, 2002
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Thank you for this! It makes good sense to have an online and offline NAS. The offline NAS cold stores my video and audio files-which, of course, don't get updated-but also stores all of my document files, some of which do and don't get updated.

The only drawback is that I'd want the offline NAS to have ECC RAM like the online NAS will, to better insure against bit errors. BUT as all of my PCs have ECC RAM would I even need for the offline NAS to have a Xeon processor and ECC supporting motherboard?

It seems to conceded that BTRFS is more user friendly for dummies to maintain than ZFS, and I am not looking to deal with any user interface that requires typing code into a command prompt. That's why I wanted Steiger-who also builds NAS as ultra quiet as the HTPC they built for me-the make the NAS file system pretty dummy proof.

How many drives I suppose depends on the RAID, which would have some number of mirrored drives, But I read even mirrored RAID is not as safe as measures employed to data loss from bit rot-though which I'm hoping that Steiger or maybe these local guys can automate as much as possible for this dummy. https://noelnetworksupport.com/

My other big concern is NAS fan noise, BUT I just learned today that I can keep the online NAS (Steiger built) and offline cold storage NAS (Qnap or Synology NAS built by Noel Networks?) in another room. And that data can be accessed either by utlizing the existing house wired RG cable system by using these adapters https://www.asus.com/us/networking-iot-servers/wired-networking/wired-adapters/ma-25/ , OR connecting both NAS to a wireless router and adding transceiver cards to the pcs. Any speed or other risks with these connection options?

Total storage capacity for both online and cold storage NAS may be between 5GB and 8GB.
cold storage

8LftLYol.jpg

yTOjpsdl.jpg
 
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aigomorla

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cold storage

8LftLYol.jpg

yTOjpsdl.jpg

except if he's dealing with 6-8GB... Gigabytes.. not Terabites... you can do that with flash drives, which have far better shock protection.
 

Shmee

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except if he's dealing with 6-8GB... Gigabytes.. not Terabites... you can do that with flash drives, which have far better shock protection.
I would assume he meant TB.

But in any case, flash drives could work for several GB, but I might be worried about varying flash quality, and data retention of flash that is powered off for a long time.
 

Fallen Kell

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Even if he meant TB, 6-8TB is still well under the size of single disks now (which have hit 30TB). Cold storage could be done via an external USB disk(s).