1U or 1.5U multiple 5.25" drive enclosure: where to buy?

[etc6849]

I was thinking about using an esata port multiplier to add multiple optical drives to my HTPC, probably something like this:
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16816215291

or this:

http://www.amazon.co...ords=AD5SARPM-E

I'd like a black 1U case with a front on/off switch that can fit 2 or 3 5.25" drives. The fans don't have to be ultra quiet as the enclosure will only be on when I'm doing certain tasks.

I found these, but since pricing is not listed, I'm going to assume they are above my $100 price limit:
http://www.pdetechno...t_enclosure.pdf

Also, since the tech documents for my motherboard do not say if the esata port supports port multiplying, should I go with this:
http://www.addonics.com/products/ad5hpmreu.php

 

[rsw686]

1U is 1.75" and a 5.25" drive bay is 3.25" so you need a 2U case. Are you sure to don't want 3.5" drive bays. There are a bunch of 1U cases that will fit 2 or 3 hot swap drives.

 

[Waynedb]

1U is 1.75" and a 5.25" drive bay is 3.25" so you need a 2U case. Are you sure to don't want 3.5" drive bays. There are a bunch of 1U cases that will fit 2 or 3 hot swap drives.

Slimline optical drives will fit in a 1U case, I have not seen any 1U cases with more than one optical drive bay but there might be some out there.

 

[etc6849]

Thanks RSW and Wayne. I was hoping to find an open bay type 1U enclosure that would just let me set two optical drives side by side.

However, I like the idea about the 2U case as I could have room for hard drives in the future along with two optical drives now. Any suggestions of one that can handle two 5.25" blu-ray drives along with 4-6 internal hard drives. To keep costs low, I don't need hot swappable NAS storage, just some sort of internal hard drive cages that are cooled.

Also, if you know of any SAS combo set that supports SAS multiple lanes externally, please advise. The idea is I'd use an PCI-e 8x slot and install the card in my PC, then use some sort of SAS cable to go to this new enclosure. The ready built one's like this seem to be $500 and up, so if you know of a cheap method, I'm all ears

 

[etc6849]

Forgot to mention that all I need is JBOD, not RAID.

 

[Waynedb]

Norco makes some inexpennsive cases that might work, most cases I have seen still only have 1 5.25 drive bay. Sometimes it is pretty easy to modify a case with a nibbler and some pop rivets to fit anything you want.

 

[etc6849]

Thanks Wayne! I think I'll set a price alert (camelegg.com) for another Rosewill server case. I bought one on black Friday for $64.98 including free shipping. The case is actually very nice for the price and is heavy duty.

http://www.newegg.co...N82E16811147154
http://camelegg.com/...N82E16811147154

You're definitely right, one has to modify a case or pay $$$ to have one custom built. I think I'd rather have a larger case to add more hard drives in the future. It seems Highpoint makes a few affordable external JBOD controllers that can handle 16 drives. It maybe wiser to wait and save up for something like this as eventually I'll want more HD space too.
http://www.highpoint...J200-Series.htm

PS: here's a great article on how to build your own external storage chasis:
http://www.servethehome.com/external-sassata-disk-chassis-wiring-part-1/

 

[pete_c]

Here I did a custom job with an 8 slot beta NAS box case and used an Asus Mini-ITX and an IBM-1015 SATA III cross flashed to base LSL firmware PCiE card providing me with 14 SATA ports.

It is a very compact hot swap drive set up. Its very quiet. I do have a 1U 4 drive hot swap headless server running an embedded OS that works well but is very loud.

I changed the configuration a bit for the PCiE card off setting a bit and it is mounted on a bracket now. The power supply actually went out on it a couple of weeks ago and I had to just replace it. It ran for less than one year.

 

[tmbrown97]

I did some searching last night before passing out - I found one or two decent <$100 2-bay 5.25" enclosures that were 1U, and I found a few that were 2U and had room for 2 5.25" drives, one slim-dvd, and one 3.5". I'll have to grab the links when I'm back at that computer.