Well I isolated my troubles to a failed backplane.  I am also seeing issues on another as well.  Purchasing the Norco 4224 with it's attractive price seemed like a good idea, but I am quickly starting to second guess my decision because of the issues.

 

I went to NewEgg and found the above case approx 1600.00...  Expensive but I have invested a lot in this build already and to have issues because of a 400 case is crazy.

 

Does anyone have any experience with the Supermicro Cases?

 

1. The Norco is quiet, I replace all the fans with Noctuas and honestly, I could stand right in front of it and barely hear the server.  It appears the SM case has a bunch of smaller fans that are usually very loud.  How loud is the server?

 

2. The above unit comes with 2 ps so I'd have a back up in case of a failure.

 

3. The Norco only has spots for 24 drives with out some additional hardware in the box, I like SM box because I can put a full 24 drives in the array and have the cache drive for a total of 25 drives.

 

Any thought on this case vs the Norco.  I'll have to have new driveplanes sent to me from Norco but QA on their boxes seems poor and I hate to entrust my data to their poor build.

 

Thanks,

Tony

[...]I like SM box because I can put a full 24 drives in the array and have the cache drive for a total of 25 drives.

 

...the SM case you are referring to can hold 36 +1 drives...for 24 drives you'll want the SM846 sister model instead 

Yes, I had originally thought it was a good idea to use 36 drive model to add extra space for the 25th drive but now I see that the SM846 allows you to use +1 as well.

 

I have scoured the internet and it does not appear many people use the Supermicro cases.  My main concern is the fan noise as this is in a closet at the back of my HT...  If it is too loud we'll be able to hear it thru the closed door!

..I have no experience with these cases.

 

I also find it hard to choose the right case with combined backplane. Information is somehow confusing (support for SAS/S-ATA and JBOD, RAID configs).

It appears that the cases feature a single, large backplane including expander, where in comparison the NORCO features a number of smaller backplanes (driving 4 disks each).

So, even if quality seems lower...replacement - if not under warranty - is cheaper..I'd rather order an extra, spare backplane with the NORCO and go for that.

I have several SuperMIcro cases.  They were made to install in a rack in a datacenter, where there is really no concern for how much noise they put out.  Yes, they are loud.  I was able to replace all the fans in mine, making them somewhat quieter, but I was not willing to negatively affect the cooling.  Large masses of hard drives require lots of airflow.