I am interested in a small (physical size, not capacity) and quiet build that would work in small/home office.  My brother is an electrician and could use an unRAID system but doesn't know it yet.    Any pics of an especially small build?  Thanks,  Kevin (unRAID 4.7, 2 TB, Pentium something CPU, I forgot, 1 GB RAM)

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=11585.0

6 drive bays is more (capacity and cost) than my brother needs.  i had in mind something smaller ... 3 bays max and a case about 2/3rds that size.  thanks, though.

 

6 drive bays is more (capacity and cost) than my brother needs.  i had in mind something smaller ... 3 bays max and a case about 2/3rds that size.  thanks, though.

 

It has 4 bays as standard. And is a very good price. Good luck finding something smaller!

+1 for the N40L...the case is only approx. 14litres in volume.

 

I doubt you will find a smaller build unless you are willing to run on 2.5" drives.

 

Edit: like this...approx 10litres, for 3x2.5" drives: http://www.lian-li.com/v2/en/product/product06.php?pr_index=607&cl_index=1&sc_index=0&ss_index=0&g=f

Here's one I came across yesterday ! ! ... http://imgur.com/a/95amP  ... trying to find the thread about it .. looking

 

 

edit .. d'oh .. it is here on this site ... http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=16622.msg152330#msg152330 ..

If you're using unRAID with 1, 2 or 3 drives, you are doing it wrong.

 

unRAID on less than 4 drives is a waste of time/money IMO. Even 4 is a bit low. I have 9 drives attached to my Microserver and I'm happy to reduce that to 6 high-capacity drives. But certainly not 2.5" drives.

If you're using unRAID with 1, 2 or 3 drives, you are doing it wrong.

 

unRAID on less than 4 drives is a waste of time/money IMO. Even 4 is a bit low. I have 9 drives attached to my Microserver and I'm happy to reduce that to 6 high-capacity drives. But certainly not 2.5" drives.

Sorry but you can't do storage / backup wrong with unraid. That's it's beauty. It can be used in so many ways.

 

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The HP Microservers are great for small home office setups.  4 3.5" drives. Good Cost, Very Quiet. Affordable now.

They go on sale with Rebates at least once a month on newegg.

Nothing to build. Just buy drives (comes with 1 250GB).

 

If you want to get fancy you can purchase the remote management card, then you can use IPMI to manage it from another machine. (Although that adds over $75 to the cost).

 

If you need more drives, you can add a PCIe eSATA card that is port multiplier capable then get any of the 4x3 or 5x3 external units.

 

What I did with mine was use ICY DOCK MB971SP-B DuoSwap 5.25" Hot-Swap Drive Caddy for 2.5" and 3.5" SATA HD/SSD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817994143

 

for the top bay, ran an SATA cable inside. This allows me to pop a drive in or out for backups or other bulk loads.

 

Another choice could be the SYBA SY-MRA55006 5.25" Dual Bay Mobile Rack for both 2.5" and 3.25" SATA HDD, Plus 2 USB 3.0 Port

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817998184

 

I also use the SANS DIGITAL TR4UTBPN 4Bay USB 3.0 / eSATA Hardware RAID 5 Tower RAID Enclosure (no eSATA card bundled) for additional drives that I can add or remove when needed.  But that's going further then the initial request.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111149

 

So far I highly recommend one of the N40L/N54L machines.  It may not be the smallest build, but when you get it on sale and with the rebate, it's the most cost effective build I've seen so far.  4x3tb drives gets you 9TB

I have an N40L that i have and use only for Crashplan backups.  It works a treat and is very very good for that purpose.  It sits there, stays on 24/7 and backs up any computers I tell it to.

If you want to get fancy you can purchase the remote management card, then you can use IPMI to manage it from another machine. (Although that adds over $75 to the cost).

And is a waist of money as far as I'm concerned.  I bought one and it worked for a day or so.  Now I get kicked out to the logon screen whenever I try the KVM function or try to change the network settings.  I even flashed the latest firmware but it didn't help.  For a while I couldn't even bring up the logon screen - had to remove the card from the box.  Just unpluging the power didn't work - at least not with a 1 minute duration anyway.  I thought the firmware flash would fix it since it reset the settings back to defaults but no go.  I may try again since it has been out of the case now for a couple of weeks to a month but I don't hold out much hope.

Sorry but you can't do storage / backup wrong with unraid. That's it's beauty. It can be used in so many ways.

 

Sent from my SGH-I727R using Tapatalk 2

unRAID with 1 drive is doing it wrong.

unRAID with 2 drives is doing it wrong.

unRAID with 3 drives is almost doing it wrong.

 

There you go, that's 3 ways of doing it wrong!   

unRAID with 1 drive is doing it wrong.

unRAID with 2 drives is doing it wrong.

unRAID with 3 drives is almost doing it wrong.

 

There you go, that's 3 ways of doing it wrong!   

 

Getting off the track here.. but i honestly dont think it's doing it wrong. maybe not using the main feature.. but not really doing it wrong.

 

someone can use unRAID with 1 drive if they don't need data protection but need quick NAS solution.

All they need would be unraid flash drive, and a pc.

without any much setup, they've got themselves a simple NAS solution.

 

They can expand their NAS by adding another. so unRAID with 2 drives there..

 

If they want to protect their data with the parity drive, then they can add the parity drive..

 

 

Not every data needs protection.

i think a LOT can be done with 3 drive (1 parity & 2 data) unRAID system.  This would be good for a small office/business where they work with spreadsheets and word processing files almost exclusively.  i MAY build one of these and surprise my electrician brother with it. 

A two drive system can be useful - either for drive-spanning, or for real-time backup/parity for one disk.

 

To say a one drive system is not useful would be to dismiss all the single drive proprietary/commercial NAS offerings.  My unRAID system fulfils the role (and much more) for which I first installed a Qnap NAS box - that turned out to be too inflexible and short of power.

heh, when I needed a quick nas to share some files, I put a flash key in one of my cheapo dell D630's, booted up and wala!!! nas in a box.

 

Since these laptops go really cheap these days, you can do allot with the extended dock and some HDD carriers. Frankly, The N54L is the easiest way to go.

 

Here's one I came across yesterday ! ! ... http://imgur.com/a/95amP  ... trying to find the thread about it .. looking

 

 

edit .. d'oh .. it is here on this site ... http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=16622.msg152330#msg152330 ..

 

At first I was sort of sorry I brought it up .. but now I am GLAD I did .. amazing .. the breadth applications for Unraid ! !  From minimalist to mega .. amazing