Case transplant

[Lemodular]

I just aquirred an old PowerEdge 400SC w/o any dics or documentations. The old MS Server 2003 will not boot past "searching for network" or something like that. I am assuming it is looking to reconncet with all the clients/workstations.

What I would like to do is to wipe the drive clean and install XP Pro and set it up as a shared server (It's essentially a NAS). My concern is that if I wipe it clean, I will not have all the drivers required for the chipset, controllers, video and other onboard stuff. Through the service tag (JN83951), I was able to determined that it is running on an Intel 875P chipset and has a hardware(PCI?) RAID controller, it also has 2 onboard SATA ports.

Because the case design of the DELL, I am restricted to the 2 installed HDDs, however, I would like to add additional HDD since I want to make this a NAS. This is why I'm doing a case transplant. I do not anticipate any problems with just the physical move, but the main question then really is about the OS and drivers.

oh, and do you think this is a good idea in general for a NAS?

 

[funkymatt]

the older dell's mounting holes dont always line up and they sometimes had proprietary PSU mounts. May want to check this before you get too deep into it.
You may want to look into 5 1/4" > 3.5" converter rails.

 

[Lemodular]

looks like the antec case has the mounting holes for the Dell MB. The reason I want to use the Antec case is ....well, a better case with 2 120mm fans, one in the back and one in the front blowing right at the drives. It also has (5) 3.5 drive bays with rubber gromets mounts. It also has (5) 5.25 bays and 2 more 3.5 for floppies. Nice cool and queit case.

I see one problem that may or may not prevent me from this transplant; the Dell's front control is wired through a circuit board that also powers the USB port (which are covered up by the fascia)....and that circuit board is connected to the MB with a 33 pins ribbon. The Antec's front panel connection is the standard multi strand connection. I don't really know anyway around this. There may be a way to do this but I don't know how.

I am affraid the the Dell does not have sufficient cooling or air movement for a multi-drive (maybe 5) system.

BTW, the old MB presently in the Antec case is an ASUS CUSL2-C w/ a PIII and about 1G of ram.

 

[RebateMonger]

Moving the Dell 400SC motherboard is a lot of work. I own six 400SCs.

There's a web site (or used to be a web site) devoted to Dell server (used to be called Poweredge Forum) and there was discussion of such things. And, yeah, adding more drives is not easy. One company made a two-drive frame that fit into a corner of the 400SC. Wiring diagrams for the proprietary connectors and cables were also on that web site.

Personally, I'd just buy a new case and motherboard with more expandability.

One other thing - about 25% of Dell 400SC motherboards have defective power capacitors that will fail within two years of constant use.

There's no problem finding Dell drivers for XP on the 400SC. I've had XP on several of my 400SCs. You can also use Dell 8300 drivers, as the motherboard is almost identical.

If you ask nicely, Dell MAY send you re-install CDs for Server 2003 (assuming that it's Dell OEM-installed orginally).