12 Jan
2006
12 Jan
'06
11:53 p.m.
Hello all,
Regarding the recent talk about using hard drive carriers (in order to
reduce the number of machines in your environment, etc.), has me wanting to
invest in a few.
Is there a specific brand anyone uses?
I have one drive carrier I purchased years ago (at a local mom & pop
computer store for something like $15) -- a cheap, no-name brand (can't
even find a brand name on it). The drive connector in the tray is flimsy,
it is a pain in the a** to get the drive in and out of the tray, and it
just generally doesn't give me a real cozy feeling of sturdiness when using it.
So I ask, are there specific brands of these carriers people use? Where do
y'all purchase them?
Regards,
-Eric
12 Jan
12 Jan
11:20 p.m.
Hello all,
Regarding the recent talk about using hard drive carriers (in order to
reduce the number of machines in your environment, etc.), has me wanting to
invest in a few.
Is there a specific brand anyone uses?
I have one drive carrier I purchased years ago (at a local mom & pop
computer store for something like $15) -- a cheap, no-name brand (can't
even find a brand name on it). The drive connector in the tray is flimsy,
it is a pain in the a** to get the drive in and out of the tray, and it
just generally doesn't give me a real cozy feeling of sturdiness when using it.
So I ask, are there specific brands of these carriers people use? Where do
y'all purchase them?
The ones I use are fairly generic from a company called "SNT".
They go in a 5.25" bay, and hold a 3.5" drive. They use a 50-pin
Telco connector (Looks like a Centronics parallel connecter but longer)
to connect the carrier (data and power) to the bay. I've had a little
trouble with the connectors but they work OK if you keep them clean).
The carriers themselves are sturdy enough I've probably got about 30
of them, some of which are more than 10 years old and have not had a
single one fail (I tried another brand once and the handle broke off in the
first week - this one had a removable "panel" in the face which made the
structure of the front quite weak).
I generally use the ones without a fan (less to fail) - they come with
metal covers for the top and bottom which essentially block cooling to
the drive - I take these off and toss them so the drive is exposed to
cabinet air like a non-carrier installation. I find the drives run noticably
cooler if you do this.
The drives screw into the carriers, however I have modified three of
my carriers by mounting retaining "beams" across the bottom, so that
the drive can just sit into the carrier without having to screw it in. (Also
reenforced the data & power cables so they won't break after repeated
insertion/removal - this lets me have a whole slew of less frequently
used drives which I can easily "drop in" to a machine without having
to take it apart.
The ones I have use a key to insert/remove the drive which is a bit of
a pain. You can bypass the power switch and avoid having to use the
key, however this forfeits "hot plugging" (which I never do anyway),
but the key also slides in a physical retainer which keeps the drive
from accidently being removed - so I continue to use
the keys (I just
have them all over my office and lab). According to the boxes they
come in, there is also a version which uses a button to release the
drive instead of a key, however I have not found any of these...
Regards,
Dave
--
dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com Collector of vintage computing equipment:
http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html
13 Jan
13 Jan
11:21 a.m.
On 1/13/2006 at 7:15 AM Dave Dunfield wrote:
> Is there a specific brand anyone uses?
I've got a bunch that I'm not able to use any more, both in IDE and in
SCSI-1 configurations.
The problem is that ultra-IDE (80 conductor) cables don't work with these
things, which means that if I use one, I take a performance hit.
I've got a bunch (probably 10) that I'll sell for a buck the each +
shipping. Buyer takes the lot--I don't want to spend my Saturday making up
individual packages.
Cheers,
Chuck
9:40 a.m.
On 1/13/2006 at 7:15 AM Dave Dunfield wrote:
FWIW, the SNT ones are "somewhat compatible" between the old (40 pin
cable) and the new ATA-100 carriers. You can put an old carrier into a new
socket, and it works as long as the drive is not ATA-100 - if the drive is ATA-100,
then the 40-pin cable inside the carrier causes errors, because the system
detects an 80-pin cable to the mainboard and tries to use ATA-100.
A new carrier always works in an old socket (obviously you don't get ATA-100
in this case).
Dave
--
dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com Collector of vintage computing equipment:
http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html
> Is there a specific brand anyone uses?
I've got a bunch that I'm not able to use any more, both in IDE and in
SCSI-1 configurations.
The problem is that ultra-IDE (80 conductor) cables don't work with these
things, which means that if I use one, I take a performance hit.
I've got a bunch (probably 10) that I'll sell for a buck the each +
shipping. Buyer takes the lot--I don't want to spend my Saturday making up
individual packages.
2:12 p.m.
On 1/13/2006 at 5:35 PM Dave Dunfield wrote:
then the 40-pin cable inside the carrier causes errors,
because the system
detects an 80-pin cable to the mainboard and tries to use ATA-100.
A new carrier always works in an old socket (obviously you don't get
ATA-100 in this case).
Yeah, pretty much my experience. I've even tried tying the ATA-100 detect
pin to ground, but then I come up with data errors--the connectors and PCB
and associated glarp on the tray probably represent too much of an
impedance "bump" for successful ATA-100 transfers.
Cheers,
Chuck
12 Jan
12 Jan
11:20 p.m.
Hello all,
Regarding the recent talk about using hard drive carriers (in order to
reduce the number of machines in your environment, etc.), has me wanting to
invest in a few.
Is there a specific brand anyone uses?
I have one drive carrier I purchased years ago (at a local mom & pop
computer store for something like $15) -- a cheap, no-name brand (can't
even find a brand name on it). The drive connector in the tray is flimsy,
it is a pain in the a** to get the drive in and out of the tray, and it
just generally doesn't give me a real cozy feeling of sturdiness when using it.
So I ask, are there specific brands of these carriers people use? Where do
y'all purchase them?
The ones I use are fairly generic from a company called "SNT".
They go in a 5.25" bay, and hold a 3.5" drive. They use a 50-pin
Telco connector (Looks like a Centronics parallel connecter but longer)
to connect the carrier (data and power) to the bay. I've had a little
trouble with the connectors but they work OK if you keep them clean).
The carriers themselves are sturdy enough I've probably got about 30
of them, some of which are more than 10 years old and have not had a
single one fail (I tried another brand once and the handle broke off in the
first week - this one had a removable "panel" in the face which made the
structure of the front quite weak).
I generally use the ones without a fan (less to fail) - they come with
metal covers for the top and bottom which essentially block cooling to
the drive - I take these off and toss them so the drive is exposed to
cabinet air like a non-carrier installation. I find the drives run noticably
cooler if you do this.
The drives screw into the carriers, however I have modified three of
my carriers by mounting retaining "beams" across the bottom, so that
the drive can just sit into the carrier without having to screw it in. (Also
reenforced the data & power cables so they won't break after repeated
insertion/removal - this lets me have a whole slew of less frequently
used drives which I can easily "drop in" to a machine without having
to take it apart.
The ones I have use a key to insert/remove the drive which is a bit of
a pain. You can bypass the power switch and avoid having to use the
key, however this forfeits "hot plugging" (which I never do anyway),
but the key also slides in a physical retainer which keeps the drive
from accidently being removed - so I continue to use
the keys (I just
have them all over my office and lab). According to the boxes they
come in, there is also a version which uses a button to release the
drive instead of a key, however I have not found any of these...
Regards,
Dave
--
dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com Collector of vintage computing equipment:
http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html
13 Jan
13 Jan
12:06 p.m.
Is there a specific brand anyone uses?
I just use whatever the local PC "Chop Shop" has for sale. Luckily I was
able to get a nice supply of 50-pin SCSI ones when they were still somewhat
common. They're the main thing I use, as I use them on my PDP-11's.
These days something to consider is how well they'll allow cooling of the
drives, this tends to mean going with a more expensive model. Plus as has
been pointed out, if you're using newer EIDE drives (ATA/66 or better) you
need the newer trays that support them.
I do have a couple PC's that use the EIDE trays, one of which is in storage,
the other doesn't really need them as all I've done with it for the past
year or so is run Debian a couple times.
Zane
6919
days inactive
6919
days old
6 comments
4 participants
participants (4)
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cclist＠sydex.com -
dave04a＠dunfield.com -
elf＠ucsd.edu -
healyzh＠aracnet.com