I’m looking for a compact case that I can put hot swap bays into. The goal is to have an mATX mobo with 5x3.5" and 6x2.5" hot swap bays.
To get that many hot swap bays required 4x5.25" external bays. The only cases I can find with that many bays are huge.
Closest I have found so far:
It’s so close, literally half a bay away!
Any ideas?
have you found anything else that is closer? if not? honestly, i would probably just dremel out the last half bay and send it.
No luck so far. I keep looking on eBay for older server cases that might work, but they tend to be huge.
I was thinking of making a custom case, but I’ve never done it before. As you say, modding an existing one would probably be easier.
I was looking at those old CD duplicator tower systems. None of them at mATX or ITX, but might be hackable. Cooling tends to be very poor too.
Aye, something like that would be ideal. I’ve been looking at NAS cases with some 3.5" hot swap bays and a 5.25" bay.
I suppose you could just get one with 3.5" bays and use adapters for 2.5" drives, but it won’t be so compact.
Been looking for something similar, but finding anything with 5.25" bays these days is difficult. This Silverstone case might be close, but the 4 bays aren’t contiguous and it is big enough for an ATX board (and/or rack mounting, apparently).
https://www.silverstonetek.com/en/product/info/computer-chassis/GD07/
Given that weirdness, how many bays are your adapters going to use? 1 for the 2.5" drives and 3 for the 3.5" drives, I assume?
Maybe this will do
The problem is that you need 3x5.25" half height bays to fit a 5x3.5" hot swap bays.
So they have to be 3 together. Then you can get 6x2.5" drives in a single 5.25" bay.
So ideally you want 4x5.25" bays, with at least 3 of them in one block. Or some 3.5" bays and a single 5.25" bay.
I’m actually reconsidering the mATX requirement. There are some cheap but good ITX boards available from Topdon that are ideal for a NAS. The CPU isn’t super fast but it’s enough (it actually performs quite similarly to my current Xeon based server/NAS), and it’s decently speced while also being low power.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005342831551.html
2xNVMe (but only PCIe3x1)
PCIe3x1 slot
6xSATA 6Gbps ports
3x2.5Gb ethernet (2xIntel and 1xRealtek)
It’s also got a console port, just a shame that Windows Bitlocker doesn’t support entering the password over serial. But you can admin the BIOS and a suitable Linux system with only an RS232 connection. Ethernet/wireless RS232 servers are a lot cheaper than KVMs.
Depth is very short even by 19" standards. But yeah, depth on 19" stuff just doesn’t qualify as “compact” 
I prefer:
Additional depth for a row of 120mm fans. Otherwise similar 6x5.25" front but in 3U instead of 4U
And half the price
There are some little ITX cases on AliExpress that are about the right size…
If they removed the power supply and replaced it with some drive bays (use a PicoPSU) that would be ideal.
This one caught my eye too. 3.5" hot swap bays built in. If they replaced them with 5.25" bays, or even just put a 5.25" bay above them, that would be great. Remove the PUU and put the motherboard vertically in that space.
Just tripped over this one – 7 external bays, mini itx. It’s kind of a deep case, though, as it would have to be. There’s also apparently a 5-bay one (s-915), but frankly that one looks even more cooling compromised than this one does.
Wow, that looks ideal! Thanks Molly.
The door appears to be screwed on, so could be removed to improve airflow.
It says it is an ITX case, but it looks like a full size ATX board will fit. Certainly an mATX board. You would just need to relocate the PSU, or fit a smaller one. I was thinking of using a PicoPSU anyway, as they are more efficient.
The 5 bay one looks really nice too. I’ll have to do some measurements.
The only issue is that they don’t seem to sell them in Europe or Japan. I could import one, it won’t be cheap… It’s the best option so far though.
Was going to suggest
But it looks like you found what you are looking for
Yes, that does look good too. Thanks for the suggestion, because I’m still kinda looking due to having trouble getting the iStarUSA one.
I found another one, although it’s rather large.
At least it’s available though. I only found one place in the US where I can order the iStarUSA one that does international shipping, and it’s on back-order there.
I also found this old thing on eBay: Mid Tower ATX Case - 4x 5.25 and 2x 3.5 bay + Arctic PWM P12 Fan | eBay
Bargain price and 4x5.25" bays. I used to see those back in the day, and they really are built down to a price. Cheap, thin metal with lots of sharp edges. They rattle a lot too.
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