Home rack to put gear in

I am planning to move to home from office to reduce overhead of my business. Currently monthly cost of office is around 800 USD and as I became a single employee the large space is no longer needed.
But Japanese houses are small and I would really like to save some space.
What I thought was those half depth audio 19 inch racks. Having my router, firewall, file server, UPS and even my single workstation housed in such would mean serious space savings and that would mean all the cable mess is behind the rack unit next to me.
I could potentially draw a single USB-C cable from the unit to my display and then use the USB hub in my display to plug in what I need.
Currently my server is Thinkstation S30 with four HDDs using FreeNAS.
It would be awesome if I could convert this into 19 inch case. I dont know if thats possible due to that mobo being somewhat proprietary form factor I guess.
Then my PC is standard Lian Li case. I could probably just shove that in empty space in the rack somehow keeping it in the case.
Because neither the floor or very limited desk space are ideal places to put it in.

Umm. the case is already 19 inches. according to the Lenovo website, it’s dimensions are 6.9" x 19.0" x 18.8"
(175 mm x 483 mm x 478 mm)
Unless you have a different model than this one?

If it is currently in a rack mount, you could try to buy the case secondhand off ebay, or maybe see if you can buy just a case through Lenovo directly.

Here is the case for sale in Italy SCOCCA CHASSIS CABINET LENOVO THINKSTATION S30 VUOTO CASE ASSEMBLATO WORKSTATION | eBay

With some hunting you might be able to find one in a country close to where you live.

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That is exactly my model.
Fascinating, indeed 19 inches.
I can get rid of the handle I think.
My question at this point, is that okay to mount sideways to rack? I guess harddrives dont mind and I dont have any optical drive in it.

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Your only concern would be airflow. So long as the vents are not blocked, it should be fine. If you are laying it on it’s side, I would try to lay it so the motherboard is closest to the ground. This way the heat-sink will be pulled toward the motherboard by gravity.

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Great. I wonder which size rack to get. And also consider selling the Lian Li and get a rack PC ATX case.
Could anyone recommend one?

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I am not up-to-date on server rack types. maybe post some pictures of the items you want to put into the rack, and list exactly what types they are, that way people could suggest things better. (of course blur out any personal details from pictures)

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Regarding handle removal. If you are going to take a saw to the case, take all the components out first. Because it will spread metal shavings and the high-speed vibration of the case while you are removing the handle could damage components. I destroyed an old tube-radio that way when I was a kid, I was attempting to add holes for an extra cooling fan, and while drilling holes in the case I ended up destroying the radio by accident.

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I think the handle can be removed as I have seen same machines without it in the office.

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I did find instructions for how to remove the front panel. If the handle can be removed, there may be screws you can get to by taking that off. (I thought initially you might need to cut it off, but there could be a much easier method too - it’s worth checking.)

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Thank you so much for digging this out.

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It didn’t look like anyone else was hopping in with suggestions. So I thought I would do what I could. I am happy to assist with trying to find an appropriate style case for your other hardware, but I would need to know more about what was going into it, shapes and sizes of the various bits of hardware.

Really it’s going to be about finding a box that can hold the hardware and will fit the space you have in mind for it.

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I will be sending pictures of the gear later as I get to my soon to be ex-office.

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When you do, I suggest updating the first post in the thread, that way anyone hopping in will see more exactly what you need.

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