October 14, 20205 yr Looking for some recommendations on HDD placement and, or cooling for my newly repurposed tower. Current build: Fractal Define S tower ASUS ROG MAXIMUS VIII HERO LGA1151 Intel i7-6700K (Noctua 140mm CPU cooler) 500 GB SSD M.2 3 x 10 TB HDD I recently installed Unraid on my box and added 1 x 10 TB HDD to start and used the existing SSD as the cache drive. For Prime Day I grabbed 2 x 10 TB HDDs, and I am currently pre-clearing the drives and temps increased to about 55 degrees C at 10% into the first read. So I changed the fan configuration in the BIOS to up the intake 3-pin fans to “Turbo” which keeps them around 75% speed on DC. They are hovering around 45 degrees C while pre-clearing now. I am hoping for some recommendations on either moving the HDDs, changing the fans, or getting a new case all together if needed. The intended drive placement seems least desirable, but I’m not sure if there are better options out there for this case. I originally water-cooled the system which is why I have it. I wouldn’t mind grabbing three 140mm Noctua fans or something like that if anyone thought that would be a good solution. Fractal also makes a HDD cage accessory, but I’m not sure if it’s compatible or mod-able to fit my case. I’ve included a couple of potato-quality pictures to help visualize.
October 16, 20205 yr On 10/14/2020 at 11:27 PM, Callisto said: I am hoping for some recommendations on either moving the HDDs, changing the fans, or getting a new case all together if needed. The intended drive placement seems least desirable, but I’m not sure if there are better options out there for this case. I originally water-cooled the system which is why I have it. I wouldn’t mind grabbing three 140mm Noctua fans or something like that if anyone thought that would be a good solution. Fractal also makes a HDD cage accessory, but I’m not sure if it’s compatible or mod-able to fit my case. In my opinion, the mounting of those drives is unsuitable for continuous operation. Location is fine for a game drive with intermittant access but when you have the drive spinning for 18hr+ during partity or rebuild they will get warm, possibly too warm on a hot summer day. To keep the case, you would need to fabricate brackets and then fix the drives in the path of the air from the front fans, side on to the fan is fine, as that doesn't impact the air flow to the rest of the case. By the time you have bought and fitted something, you could be a good way to a new case. A case such as the Antec P101s or the fractal design R6 (and others) allow you to mount multiple drives behind the front fans. My current unraid build is in a P101s and I have the FD R6 as my watercooled main PC though a front radiator isn't compatible with keeping the drive bays. (still a top 280/360 possible). I was going to get a second R6, however the P101s has 8 x expansion slots which means I can use a double slot card in my end PCI-E plus it came with more fans and was less expensive. Edited October 16, 20205 yr by Decto
October 16, 20205 yr Author Appreciate the reply! I ended up ordering a Fractal Design Define 7 with a solid side panel. The storage configuration should be what I need to keep it cool and allow for easier expansion going forward. Cheers!
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