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MediaSonic ProRaid boxes


chef

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chef

Hi!

 

I have bought three Media Sonic ProRaid boxes for my setup.

 

For reasons which involved a nessessary hard drive space upgrade, but nowhere to put new drives.

 

They work well, but the fan on them is super loud.

 

My question would be with regards to cooling a hard drive enclosure.

 

Have any of you guys ever used one of the raid enclosures without the fan cooling the drives??

 

How hot is too hot?

 

I'd like to disconnect the fans so it is quiet.

Edited by chef
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Jdiesel

5400 or 7200 rpm drives?

 

I find most 5400rpm drives don't put out a lot of heat unless your are working them hard continuously 

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PenkethBoy

if the drives get hotter than 45c - start to worry as you will shorten their life - see manufacturer specs for acceptable temps

 

i thry and keep mine in the mid to high 30's

 

and simply you do need a fan with multiple disks in close proximity otherwise they will heat soak etc

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CBers

I have bought three Media Sonic ProRaid boxes for my setup.

 

They work well, but the fan on them is super loud.

 

My question would be with regards to cooling a hard drive enclosure.

 

Have any of you guys ever used one of the raid enclosures without the fan cooling the drives??

 

How hot is too hot?

 

I have the IcyBox equivalent and yes, you do have to run the fans as the do heat soak as @@PenkethBoy says.

 

Luckily, my box is with my servers in the server cabinet in the loft, so I don't hear them :D

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chef

Good to know guys thanks! 

 

Perhaps Noctua has fans that I could replace them with. 

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Jdiesel

Can't go wrong with Noctua fans.

 

On a semi-related note I just replaced the two 80mm fans in my iNuke NU4-6000 amplifier yesterday with some Arctic Cooling F8 fans and it went from jet engine loud to silent will still moving a decent amount of air.

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Guest asrequested

I have a few of those Arctic fans. I used one in my pfsense, build. I've replaced almost every fan in my system. Mostly noctua. 25+ fans, six feet from my tv, and I can whisper and hear myself.

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kgschlosser

The only fans you should use are the Noctua SSO Bearing fans. I have 4 HTPC's,  2 Servers (one of which has a 10 drive Raid 6 array)  2 24 port managed switches, console, KVM switcher, 5000 watt APC, 4 Batteries that size out to 12"tall x 19" wide x 27" deep, 240 to 120 step down,Harman Kardon AVR. HD Home Run. Cisco VPN Rounter, Cisco Cable Modem, Vera,. I know there are a bunch of other things I am missing. But it is all jammed into a 72" tall 19" wide rack that is pushed back into what used to be a coat closet. so maybe 2'6" wide by 36" deep. I ducted a fresh air source into the back of the closet. and all of the fans blow out the front of the rack. so a hot isle essentially.

 

I changed all of the fans out in every single component to the Noctua fans. 4 years now of 24/7/365 never being powered down for anything more then maybe a reboot. not a single fan has gone bad. they are all spinning at speed. and I will tell you what I can sit and still enjoy watching a movie with this thing being 4 feet away from where i sit. the fan noise from it is less then what my Epson projector makes.

 

 

The really cool thing about these fans is that there is no conventional bearing in them to go bad. there is no contact point per say. the rotor is suspended on oil. so no point of friction. no vibration. less noise. smoother operation and they also move the same amount of air as a fan of equal size turning 30-40% faster. the oldest one i have is going on 10 years old.

 

 

change out the fans to something slower turning and watch your HDD's temp 50c is when damage will occur.

 

Depending on the chasis for the drives you might have enough room to remove the 40mm vortec fans that are in there and replace them with 2 120 mm slower spinning fans. might also be hearing the fans from the Power Supply. if they used a 1U PS which is common they size the thing for the load instead of how loud the fans will be when they rev up. investigate that portion of it. and if that is the case then get a new PS that is 60% larger then what is needed. this way the thing won't get as hot.

Edited by kgschlosser
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kgschlosser

It seems to be an issue with this boxes. it's an 80mm cheap fan that is in there. the problem is it is only 20mm thick. a standard fan is 25 mm. and that 5 mm will make it so that the case cannot be closed.

 

I do not know if you can fit in a larger fan. say a 92 mm Noctua makes on that is 14mm thick and moves 50m/3 at 17dB/A  NF-A9x14 PWM Now this is a PWM fan. and you would have to contact Noctua to find out if there is a way to get this bugger going without the PWM connected. You can also go by route of their NF-A4x20 FLX. This is a 3 wire fan. 40mmx20mm so you would need 4 of them. But at 14db/A and moving 9.4m/3 each. it's defiantly something that will work. The 40mm fans also come with y cables. and they have the 2 pin micro adapter. so you shouldn't have an issue getting all 4 going with the parts they supply.. You might want to take a piece of sheet steel. and cut it to an 80mm square and drill out the mounting holes as well as the holes for the air. I had to do almost the same thing with my 3U server chassis. it had 4 80 mm fans and i put in 2 120 mm fans. i sent the pictures of the piece i made to the chassis manufacturer . and now the company makes and sells the exact same part.

 

 

 
 
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Jdiesel

Mount the fan on the outside of the case. You can throw a fan guard on it if you want. You might need to drill a small hole in the case if there is no way to run the wire back into the case though.

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chef

Yeah finding fans 20mm is becoming problematic. Looks like I'll mount the ones in the outside of each of the cases.

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chef

OH NO! I swapped out drives and I lost one :(

 

Sooo sad :( I'll be ripping for a week straight.. Just so sad...

Edited by chef
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CBers

OH NO! I swapped out drives and I lost one :(

 

 

Did you look under the sofa :)

 

 

 

 

Sorry, just trying to lift your spirits Chef.

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kgschlosser

OH NO! I swapped out drives and I lost one :(

 

Sooo sad :( I'll be ripping for a week straight.. Just so sad...

 

 

That really stinks. I am always fearful of that when i have had a drive go south. I have only had one fail thus far. But I have migrated the raid to a new drive set twice. which is always a nerve racking thing. some day i will build a mirrored server. then i won't have to worry. Hell i don't even like rebooting the server.

 

When do electronics break? When they won't power on, So if you never shut it off it won't break. LOL.

 

 

also with the raid boxes you should have quite a few freed up SATA ports. time to go and get a grip of BD/DVD drives. will speed up the process a whole lot.

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