Using old case for multi-disk NAS? Can it be quiet?

[tenzip]

I was hoping to use this old full size tower case for a NAS to go in a bedroom closet. Very sturdy, 18ga. steel, it has lots of room as you can see.

I will use one 5.25" bay for a CD/DVD ROM, and the rest of the space can go for suspending HDD. I may end up with 8-12 HDD in total.

My questions is, can this case be quiet enough for a bedroom server? It is quite stiff, but I could line the side panels and cap with something like dynamat, or use something like truck bed liner to paint them to try to deaden them further.

I do not plan to use the removable lower drive cage, all that space can be used for drive suspension. In fact, the "front" end of the slide-out mobo tray could be cut off, regaining about an inch side to side, and the drives could be turned 90 degrees, so the connections would face you as you open the case.

[HFat]

can this case be quiet enough for a bedroom server?

That's subjective (can you quantify your goal or at least describe it qualitatively?) but most people would rather put a server with lots of drives elsewhere.

[tenzip]

can this case be quiet enough for a bedroom server?

That's subjective (can you quantify your goal or at least describe it qualitatively?) but most people would rather put a server with lots of drives elsewhere.

Yes, it is subjective. What in human experience isn't?

One thing to know, we live next to what has become a major traffic artery. The ambient at our house is not at the low end of the ambient scale. So, this doesn't need to be an "inaudible at 1m in the anechoic chamber" build.

What I want is something that doesn't sound like a server in a rack at work. A gentle whooshing/whirring would be fine. Even with lots of drives, suspending them all should chop down their noise. I think the newer drives are amazingly quiet already, even mounted in the standard, bolted to the case way.

What I'm asking is if this case is capable of being quiet with modifications for fans, drive suspension, deadening, etc., or if I should give it to the Goodwill computer store and buy a brand new case with quiet thinking in the design? The case is "quiet" as it sits, it doesn't seem to have any loose parts that would make noise or vibrate, it's very sturdy. I suspect it can be quiet, with some time spent modifying it, but I don't want to spend that time, and discover it was doomed before I started. I'd rather spend the money than the rest of the summer trying to beat it into submission, and still having a rattletrap.

Opening the existing fan grilles, creating a suspension system for all the drives, deadening the case panels, buying quiet fans, buying a quiet HSF, using a video card with no fan, these are all things I'm willing to do.

I'm in no particular rush to do the job, I don't have any deadlines. But it is going to happen, and it would be nice to have something that the wife won't complain about at night. Happy wife, happy life.

I guess at the end, what I'm asking is, are there any glaringly obvious defects with this case that would make it a poor choice to start with? Or should I start buying parts, and get the tools out? That's the way I'm leaning, unless there's something you folks know and I don't. (That's why I'm here, after all!)

[jhhoffma]

Are you actually planning on using that PII or do you have something else in mind to power the server?

I've made attempts to convert old heavy-gauge steel cases to file servers. What usually ends up happening is that it's just easier to spend $50 on a newer case (like an Antec 300) and throw another $30 at dampening material (Peel & Seal and headliner foam). You can get just as much storage space in a smaller package and they are built with freer airflow in mind, for a lot less effort.

Definitely the old cases need some work to get the intake air at an acceptable level, and many of them (like the one you have there) are meant to funnel most of the exhaust (from lower power components) through the PSU. Not really a suitable option for modern components.

In the end, it's like any custom project: you could probably get it to do what you want, but it's going to take quite a bit of work. So you just need to think about what you're willing to put into it.

[tenzip]

Are you actually planning on using that PII or do you have something else in mind to power the server?

-snip-

In the end, it's like any custom project: you could probably get it to do what you want, but it's going to take quite a bit of work. So you just need to think about what you're willing to put into it.

The PII was what was in it when I ripped the guts out. I slapped it back in there to illustrate how much room there is.

I think, unless someone comes along in the next week or thereabouts and says "No! That will be bad for x reason!", that I'll start ordering parts and plan to use it.

I want to put in a middling powerful processor, one that's easy to cool, but can handle transcoding .flac to .ogg on-the-fly to several streams simultaneously without choking, as well as other duties. Nothing too onerous. A small boatload of RAM, probably 8GB to start, and probably start with 4-6TB of storage right off. Basically, this will take over media server duties that my Dell Precision laptop is currently burdened with. And so it's stuck in its dock, so the family can access their music.

I get a sort of perverse pleasure in "sleepers", things that look like an old dried-up piece of poo, but perform at a high level. It would be fun to show someone "my storage server", and it's this old, yellowing beast, with a PII sticker on the front. And then I tell them it's got 12TB of storage, and is simultaneously transcoding and streaming .flac to .ogg to several people at once, and so on.