mexicanmike

DOWNLOADING NOW!!! Edit: Damn I just realized I need to get a life. I am like 2 minutes behind tom posting this...and its friday night.

This is the one I bought: Custom Xeon Dual Core 1.86GHz 8GB DDR2 Internal 160 IDE 24 Bay SATA Server. Total w/ shipping to FL was $292. You can view my signature link for pictures & more details on my customization of it... but yes, shipping was just under $100... it is very heavy. This is the older one that was available. If new buyers are lucky the super micro ones are the ones they got in. The supermicro ones use 2 larger PSU's that are quieter and easier to mod for a standard PSU. The AIC case based one above is a fantastic unit for the price, if you can tolerate more lengthy modding, or the sound of the 20mm fan whining. I bought two of the above units, they run great. I also bought 6 of the supermicros. All of them run great, but are loud. I have a isolated space for them, so for me it is not a factor. Tamsolutions was great to deal with, but they do not have the supply currently to meet the demand generated by various internet forums(I dont talk to them, litlgi74 would know more). Be patient, as they seem to get various additional units at regular intervals.

Yea, the super micro units without the trays, or really any of them without the trays, aren't really a deal. The trays cost too much too replace. If you were buying 5 or 6, and not stripping them down, it would be useful. Even then, if the innards fail, the hardware is so outdated you are better off just redoing the internals.

I did find the rails for these units. They were however overpriced from all the sources, and they were no exactly smooth ball bearing rails or anything. I have one of the units on a shelf inside my racks. The other one I have placed on "Shelf Like Rails". These shelf like rails are similar to Apple RAID rails.

The 2U servers are a steal, but def not as modifiable as the original 4U units. With the 4U servers you were looking at 120MM fans, and a standard desktop PSU. This set-up could be made to operate at very low volume levels, comparable to a Desktop. With the 2u unit it is more difficult, because most of the PSU with enough power to drive all the 3.5inch drives, in a 2u form factor, will be much louder. Most 2u PSU's are designed for enterprise solutions, where server rooms are used, and noise is not a factor. The Stock PSU's on either of these units could be modified to run quite, but you would need to get new fans, and the fans for 1u PSU's are generally 20mm which means they run at high RPM's and are LOUD. I have a few of the 4U units, and have not modified them at all, as I keep them in a rack in my garage. Happy to see so many people are finding these servers to be useful.

I will be next week when I get it. Looks like my initial report was false. This unit does recognize with unraid 4.7 without issue. I will try to test with 5.0rc8, but if it works with 4.7, I imagine we are good to go. I have 6 HDD;s hooked up in a N40L and will report back as I transfer data from my other n40l.

Has anyone used this in a n40l yet? Using unraid, did it require the script?

10 minutes??? You aren't trying hard enough.

For the price of the 5N. Get a HP N40L and add two drives to the optical bay area. Still under the price of a 5N. The only feature that is nice on the drobo is the dual disk redundancy. Bad part on that is though, if 3 drives fail, your are completely hosed. VS unraid, you just lose the data on the failed drives. Although, if you let 3 drives fail on the drobo, you deserve it. Drobo would also be a lot harder if the enclosure dies. In the past, if the firmware version on your failed one was old, and they sent you a replacement with new firmware, your data was hosed. I owned one of the older ones, USB/Firewire model, and it was complete trash. I am curious to try the mini though, as it looks interesting. No doubt the addition of thunderbolt and the Msata made it faster.

They had the drive for 89.99 on black friday. Yeah, I know. Like I said, I was on the edge, the price on the drive was the straw that broke my back.

They ran this same price for the N40L this morning, and offered a 3TB 7200 RPM seagate at 89.99 if purchased together. I was holding out, and this pushed me over the edge. I don't need the 3TB, but I guess i wanted the N40L anyway.

This deal is on new egg for anyone who reads this and was wondering.

Have to second on the HP N40L. Currently I am running this and have a useable capacity of 15TB. 4 3TB drives in the stock bays, 2 in ODD area and a 2.5inch drive as the cache drive.

Yea……If these are EMC specific drive with the appropriate sleds, firmware ext, they are going to be worth way more to someone looking for EMC spec'ed drives. I mean the initial price of 50 for 2TB is great, but you can resell some of the EMC stuff for 5-10x that, easily.

Dang, just about the same price I paid for my hitachi's before the flooding. Prices are coming back down, but know I think I will wait for the 4TB drives.