Expansion Help

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jimihemmy

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Maybe someone can help me out.....

I have an Antec SLK2650-BQE case, 2 Optical drives, 3 HDD and trying to install #4. My 3 HDD are in the removable drive cage along with Floppy Drive.

Does anyone know if I can install HDD #4 in one of the 5.25 in bays (I have 2 empty) and what can I use to do it? The drive bays use drive rails. Can I use the drive rails on a 3.5 to 5.25 adaptor cage? Will the HDD (200GB) be stable with that?

I have tried to install all 4 HDD (40,80,160,200) in the removable cage (removed Floppy) and its a VERY tight fit, plus the front covers for the Floppy slots interfere with the drive so I cannot even reinstall the front cover properly.....

I would like to be able to get all of these in this case, even if I could move the Floppy to one of the 5.25 bays, but I haven't been able to locate a front 5.25 plate to surround the Floppy front with.

Any recommendations or advice would be greatly appreciated before I go the easy route and just get a (another) new case.....I bought this to expand the previous case I had.......

And just to clear all the facts, the 40GB HDD will only be in it until I decide to buy a new MB to install in my old case. That will become by experiment computer eventually and the 40GB HDD will run on that one....

thanks in advance and sorry to be long winded :crazy:
 
jimihemmy
Maybe someone can help me out.....

I have an Antec SLK2650-BQE case, 2 Optical drives, 3 HDD and trying to install #4. My 3 HDD are in the removable drive cage along with Floppy Drive.

Does anyone know if I can install HDD #4 in one of the 5.25 in bays (I have 2 empty) and what can I use to do it? The drive bays use drive rails. Can I use the drive rails on a 3.5 to 5.25 adaptor cage? Will the HDD (200GB) be stable with that?

I have tried to install all 4 HDD (40,80,160,200) in the removable cage (removed Floppy) and its a VERY tight fit, plus the front covers for the Floppy slots interfere with the drive so I cannot even reinstall the front cover properly.....

I would like to be able to get all of these in this case, even if I could move the Floppy to one of the 5.25 bays, but I haven't been able to locate a front 5.25 plate to surround the Floppy front with.

Any recommendations or advice would be greatly appreciated before I go the easy route and just get a (another) new case.....I bought this to expand the previous case I had.......

And just to clear all the facts, the 40GB HDD will only be in it until I decide to buy a new MB to install in my old case. That will become by experiment computer eventually and the 40GB HDD will run on that one....

thanks in advance and sorry to be long winded :crazy:
Click to expand...

Sliderails will work on 3.5 to 5 1/4 adapters.. Been there, done that...

Are you telling me you're running 3 harddrives and a floppy in a 4 piece 3.5 unit cage ?... How long have you been doing so, and have you given cooling any thoughts ?... Not good... Better move one of the harddrives into the other unused 5 1/4 bay...
 
Flerbizky
Sliderails will work on 3.5 to 5 1/4 adapters.. Been there, done that...

Are you telling me you're running 3 harddrives and a floppy in a 4 piece 3.5 unit cage ?... How long have you been doing so, and have you given cooling any thoughts ?... Not good... Better move one of the harddrives into the other unused 5 1/4 bay...
Click to expand...

cool, I'll try the side rails then....
and yes, I'm running the 4 HDD's in the 4 piece cage but have only done so since I installed the 4th last night. I figured it wasn't a good idea to keep it that way, that's why I'm looking for a solution to move 1 (and maybe 2) of the drives into the empty 5.25 bays I have.

thanks for the insight 👍 ...gonna pick up some rails tonight
 
ROAD_DOGG33J
I installed my SATA Seagate using a thing with a fan. The instructions weren't great but I figured it out. You don't have to use the fan.

Here it is:
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=35-150-008&depa=0
Click to expand...
I was thinking of getting some kind of bay fan too. I don't (haven't yet at least) have any cooling problems and I don't want to start to have them now.

Does it work well for you? Imay pick up something like that.
 
i try not to keep hard drives all cramped up together with no airflow, they tend to suffer heat soak and die prematurely. i have one of my drives below the floppy, with an empty bay above and below it, and one drive in a 5.25" bay with some adapter rails

if you want to cool a hard drive, get one of the coolers with a heatsink AND fan, heatsinks do little on their own, and i've found just a fan blowing on a hard drive is also of very little benefit, but better than nothing

why do you need four hard drives? just get one or two big ones
 
jimihemmy
I was thinking of getting some kind of bay fan too. I don't (haven't yet at least) have any cooling problems and I don't want to start to have them now.

Does it work well for you? Imay pick up something like that.
Click to expand...

The brackets worked as they should have. The fan did make the HD cooler to the touch. I guess the space it had, could've also helped. The fan has that filter on the front, so I have to wipe the dust with my finger about every 3 days. For the price, I think it's a pretty good deal.
 
Super Jamie
i try not to keep hard drives all cramped up together with no airflow, they tend to suffer heat soak and die prematurely. i have one of my drives below the floppy, with an empty bay above and below it, and one drive in a 5.25" bay with some adapter rails

if you want to cool a hard drive, get one of the coolers with a heatsink AND fan, heatsinks do little on their own, and i've found just a fan blowing on a hard drive is also of very little benefit, but better than nothing

why do you need four hard drives? just get one or two big ones
Click to expand...

I need 4 hard drives to keep up with demand for space for downloading and archiving live music. I have a extensive live music collection which can be seen at http://www.geocities.com/waxisthebest1/ (which does not include the updated list I have for it).

In the live music trading world, alot of people are now using BitTorrent and it is easier to archive and be ready to help out someone who wasn't able to get the whole show before it died out. It also helps keep my share ratio up 👍

I also have 4 because with this cable connection, I seem to be downloading faster than I can listen to the show and/or burn it. On top of all of that, I need space for video. I have lots of video (VHS) that I want to convert to DVD eventually and I need space.

I know, if I could be a little more efficient, I wouldn't have to do all of this, but with wife and 2 kids, time is hard to come by these days.....
I will be replacing the 40 GB drive with my new 200GB (net gain 160) and saving it for m project computer leaving me with 3 in this box.

_______________________________________

on the news front, I have purchased a Antec HD cooler and will be moving my 200GB into a 5.25 bay after I make it my boot drive (when I finish typing). For those interested, it can be seen at http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=75011

Thanks all for the help, will update tomorrow.....
 
yes, you can put another hard drive in the 5.25" bay with an adapter. Oh, and by the way, you're just asking for premature hard drive failure with that setup.
 
small update....

I'm going to get another HD cooler today and move the 160 and 200 into 5.25 bays w/ the coolers, make the 80 my boot drive after I copy the 40 onto it. So in the end, I'll have to drives and 2 HDD w/ coolers in the 5.25 bays, the 80 and Floppy in the cage and take out the 40. I should be alright after that......

thanks to everyone for the help
 
that's alot better, your high usage drives are in a larger bay with at least more airspace around them, and your other drive is on its own with space around it. congratulations, you just gave your hard drives probably double their potential lifespan :)

if you can, maybe use rounded drive cables and setup a fan at the back of your case (or get a drive bay cooler if you have a spare 5.25) to extract the hot air
 
Well I've completed the move.....the 160 and 200 in 5.25 bays w/ coolers, 40+80 in cage for the moment. But I hit a snag.....

While copying the boot drive (40) to the 80, my computer restarted...now when I boot up, I get to the blue screen in XP where you would pick your profile, only no profiles show up (I only have 1 as it is). It just hangs there with show the XP thing where my profile should be to click on.

What should I do? I tried unplugging the 80, and boot with just the 40, didn't work. Should I just reinstall XP on the 80 since it's already blank? Is there another solution that can get me to my desktop?
All drives are Maxtor and I've run the MaxBlast on boot but when done, I still stuck at the profile screen.... :(
 
You also have the option of converting these drives to firewire or USB. It'll take them outside of your PC and put them into a much cooler environment without sacrificing their performance. Plus you can just turn them off to conserve power when you don't need them 👍
 
emad
It'll take them outside of your PC and put them into a much cooler environment without sacrificing their performance.
Click to expand...

Yes and no... whether it's cooler or not depends on what kind of enclosure you put them in. Put them in one of the stupid fanless enclosures that so many people use and it'll be like putting them in an EZ-Bake oven... :yuck:

My experience with firewire and USB2 is that they're both far slower than IDE and SATA... yes they're 400 and 480Mbps, which should be fast enough for today's hard drives (mostly), but there's a certain amount of overhead too... I can do some benchmarks using USB 2.0, IDE, and SATA later on if you like (I've got Maxtor drives of the same model and approximately the same date of mfr. on all 3 interfaces) but I've found that USB 2.0 in particular is much slower than an internal drive. Firewire, although it should be slower, is actually faster (at least subjectively).
 
Geeky1
My experience with firewire and USB2 is that they're both far slower than IDE and SATA...
Click to expand...

bloody oath. a usb2 hard drive is data storage for something that doesn't need to be fast, only relocateable. like a backup, or transporting appz/porn/mp3s/divx between your friends houses. you wouldn't, say, burn a dvd off one
 
This is true. If you're just doing backups onto them, and you're not like me and don't require that everything be done right ****ing now, it won't be a problem. But my USB2 enclosure is slow enough (even for backups) that I'm seriously considering a SATA PCMCIA card and SATA external enclosure for the laptop instead... However, like I said, I expect everything (including backups) to be done right ****ing now. :lol:
 

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