large storage server recommendations

[Korneel]

hi brain trust;

i already went through a lot of the forum but can't seem to find an answer.. hope for some good recommendations;

I currently run a Synology DS3615XS with 1 expansion bay, 2X 12 disks in RAID 6, so 2 different arrays, around 200 TB in total. 

i need to move away from the Synology and with all the consumer unfriendly stuff that has been going on, i want to move to a different system. I have already invested into hexos and bought a perpetual license. while it would be nice to have the NAS run additional software in the future, for now being a SMB is enough for me. I run all my dockers on a different MS-01 from Minisforum that has all the processing power i need. 

so, what am i looking for?

i am looking for a storage server. ideally rack mountable with half-depth, quiet and simple. if possible 24 disks so i can expand.. i would need at least 200tb as a starting storage pool and be able to expand later on. I was hoping ubiqity would release an enterprise version of their NAS since it does everything I need, is cheap and super simple but alas.. 

while i can figure out most of it, it's the chassis that has me scratching my head.. 

does anyone have any recommendations?

[stringtrain]

Aren't you better off buying a disk shelf for your server rack? Those will hold 12 or 24 3.5in drives. You can often find them used for reasonably cheap prices, often pre-populated with old drives. This isn't bad, because even if the drives aren't useful to you, the sleds are. You can always on-sell old drives if you want. You can use SAS or SATA drives in a disk shelf, just don't mix them, stick to one type of drive per shelf.

For commercial use disk shelves always plug in to a controller unit that acts as the brains of the NAS, controlling the dozens of drives for the network. You don't need that tho. Home rack folks will often just use a PC with a HBA card with external ports (eg. SFF-8088 ports on a HBA card from LSI), and connect that to the disk shelves with SAS cables. Or you could buy the rackmount control unit used too. They aren't much, and if you want to upgrade from SAS (3Gbps) to SAS2 (6Gbps) or SAS3 (12Gbps) controllers, then they're modular upgrades.

The biggest drawback is probably noise from all of those drives working and fans to keep the HDDs and PSUs cool. Seeing as you're already going with rackmount tho, I guess that noise isn't a concern in your setup.

caveat: I haven't done this myself. I researched it and ended up passing because I can't manage the noise in my living situation. Otherwise, it's easily the cheapest and cleanest way to 100TB+ storage levels so long as you buy used gear. Need more storage later? Add another disk shelf to your rack.

Edited 3 hours ago by stringtrain