I’m looking at moving my current nas to a bigger/silent enclosure what chassis are out there for reasonable prices preferably ones that can fit 12+ hard drives. what would you guys recommend?
The Define 7 XL from Fractal can hold 18 hdd’s (though Linus crammed a lot more in one).
It’s got sound dampening, baffled air intake etc, so it should be quiet. 12+ Hdd’s will cause some noise though 
while the define 7 xl is a very good option (i do remember seeing linus build that system a couple of weeks ago) I was originally eyeing the older rosewill server style cases due to them coming with the trays and is a rack style case.
rack mount
I don’t know what part of the world you live in, but if you’re in Europe, then servercase.co.uk have a lot of good options
Like this 24 bay with a packplane.
I currently have my nas housed in a HP DL380e g8 chassis with the extra 2 hdd expander on the back. While the chassis is very good its like having a jet engine. I am looking to quieten things up a little while also expanding on scalability
YES SOMETHING LIKE THAT! But…if they offer it in the U.S…
personally a san/nas is how i keep everything separate but i can see you need something NOT jet engine so i take my leave and watch what people suggest
Bad luck my dude. It doesn’t look like they offer shipping to the us, and logic case has no distributor in the us…
Your best bet might be hitting up ebay, for maybe a disc shelve or a used server.
Or maybe look into istarusa. They also make rack cases.
ok since finding/obtaining a chassis to meet my needs is proven difficult what about obtaining backplanes?
Just as a suggestion, Logic Case is like Norco in the US
https://www.newegg.com/norco-rpc-4224/p/N82E16811219038 But it’s a bit steep for a cheap chassis. Might search around for Norco/Logic case, or check the website for distributors?
I would say go for a more expensive case like Super Micro; I have 2 cases by logic case, and they were affordable, but not as solid. I modded them lightly though, because I don’t mind effing up a cheap case
A place that might be not shipping from China:
But I don’t know availability, and would recommend getting the optional fan wall, and rail kit (iirc, it is a wide case- barely squeezes into a normal 19” rack)
The define 7 would probably be better though, in most ways, and easier to handle
If you have older full towers with many 5.25" drive bays:
Both of these are pretty awesome solutions:
FlexCage MB975SP-B R1
Tray-less 5 Bay 3.5" SATA Hard Drive Hot Swap Backplane Cage in 3x External 5.25" Bay
https://www.icydock.com/goods.php?id=242
flexiDOCK MB830SP-B
Tray-less 3 Bay Removable 3.5-inch SATA/SAS Hard Drive Docking Enclosure in 2 x 5.25-inch External Bays (w/ Cables)
https://www.icydock.com/goods.php?id=300
FYI, I do not recommend Norco. The backplanes tend to die. Which means days of scrubs and ZFS dropping disks and reporting errors until you figure out what the hell is going on, followed by either burning money on a replacement, or going used enterprise like you should have the first time.
The supermicro cse-846 off of eBay is a good go to if you have big storage needs. Just make sure the backplane is SAS2, not first gen. There are all sorts of options, so pay attention to if whatever is listed has psu’s or other things along with it.
The fans are screamers, so if you need it quieter then you can remove the center fan panel and snug in 3 wide 120mm fans.
In my primary machine I have these doubled up for decent static pressure, they make a soft whoosh of air, and don’t drive me insane when I’m working in the garage. They are also way more affordable than Noctua: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07HC782D5/
Pro tip: the backplane has three built in fan headers.
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