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Cheap Rackmount Enclosures/Systems?
Posted by
Cliff
on Tue Jan 25, 2000 06:24 AM
from the racks-for-the-home? dept.
from the racks-for-the-home? dept.
gasp asks: "At work, our computer rooms use high-end rackmount systems. At home, I use the '8 year-old folding table piled high with computers held together by daisy-chained power-strip rat-nest' system. I find plenty of ATX and AT style midtower cases for about $30, but I haven't found any simple rackmount cases for less than about $200. Does somebody make the equivalent of a midtower-size case turned sideways with a couple of 19" rackmount brackets? It sure would be nice to find an affordable solution for home." Man, with four and soon to be five boxes sitting in my living room, I sure could use something like this!
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Try the Music Industry (Score:4)
Target Market is High-End (Score:5)
Most of the reason the cheapest rackmount case out
there is the Antec 4U IPC rack (ipc 3480 with
pp303x 300watt power supply, $239 at McGlen Micro,
here [mcglen.com] is the target market: servers.
People who are buying a server and putting it
in colo don't mind spending a couple hundred extra
dollars to get a high-quality case; they usually
go in high-vibration, high RF environments and
thus need to be substantially more durable than
desktop/tower cases. Additionally, they
generally have dust/cooling requirements which
are substantial -- adding 6 fans to a system
raises the price. Rackmount cases are all-metal,
just like the best desktop cases, rather than
plastic; plastic would disintegrate rapidly in
a datacenter.
The ATX/rackmount form factor is rather complex
to engineer, compared to a desktop or tower case;
it has to support a lot of weight. There are
some tower case with rails conversion kits, like
for the macintosh minitowers, but those are
rather specialty. They also tend to come with
higher-end power supplies, something which also
adds to the cost, and locking doors over drive
bays.
Also, the number of units of rackmount case sold
is much lower than desktop and minitower, raising
the price.
If you want cheap racking, I'd suggest using rack
shelves and putting minitowers in, or using
wire shelves and regular minitowers. Most of
the beowulf systems out there use shelves and
minitowers, rather than racks, for cost reasons.
Unless you're going in a facility with existing
19" racking, there's no reason to do racks.
Stainless steel wire shelving looks almost as
sexy as 19" racks, and can actually fit more
machines per unit volume than 4U rackmount boxes.
The shelving itself is cheaper, too.
Additionally, if you're putting a machine in colo,
the prices are usually such that spending $500
on one of the 2U cases rather than a cheap 4U
case will pay off in the long run. It's for
this reason that Yahoo originally designed their
2U high custom case -- they have thousands of
machines in colo, and when you pay $50-150/U/month, saving 2U per machine adds up
quick! People are even going to 1U now; there's
allegedly a Compaq DS10 in 1U rather than 3U on
the way, which I plan to buy in quantity for colo
use.
Re:What about the wiring? (Score:3)
{
It depends on the cases/system you have. We have several IBM Netfinity 5000s in a 19" rack here and they come with a cabling fixture on the rear. (ie you attach your cables in there, make sure they are long enough and then you're off.)
Fiddling around with them is no problem either. The mounted cases are sitting on rails so you can slide them in and out of the rack and the server case can be opened at the top. (Just slide out the server, remove the top and you got the innards of your machine right in front of you
As I said, it all depends on the system you're using. With a little keyboard/mouse/screen switching system and lots of looooong cables you can easily put multiple servers in there and still be able to use them normally. (Of course the prices for such solutions can rise sky-high
}
Rackmount shmackmount. (Score:5)
One such solution is to buy a rack frame (by the way, a standard rack is 19" wide. and racks are measured in Units, 1U being approximately 1 3/4" tall, the average component size is 3U, like tape decks, amplifiers, etc.), get some flat rack pans, and simply place your ATX cases on the pans, you can fit 3 towers side-by side.
With the frame, rails and pans, depending on the height you need, this will end up costing you (sans puters) about 100-200 bucks.
If you're cheap like me, you'll go to Sam's/Office Depot and buy a set of adjustable steel shelves and put all your crap on them, organize to your heart's content. I think they go for the outrageous price of $20, no additional equipment needed. I have 3 towers, 2 cable modems, a hi-fi system, printer, and other assorted crap (omniview) sitting on the shelves, flanked by two smallish computer desks. It's neat, organized, and impresses the hell out of your non-nerdish friends (although they will probably leave with the feeling that you are a mega-geek with way too much free time) without spending a small fortune on enterprise-class gear. I mean, we ARE talking about home stuff here.
doc
LinuxToday has a great article on this (Score:4)
CS 440 1U Rack Mount Chasis $268
Intel CA810 Motherboard $119
Intel Celeron 466 MHZ processor $85
Single Port Adapter $20
64 MB DIMM $80
13 MB Hard Drive $125
CD Rom and Floppy add $75 (Optional) -0-
Total $697
It also has links of where to buy all the stuff. Interesting article too.
Re:Here's a model for $165. (Score:3)
Hmm, you leave out the musicians from your "end users" set.
Most musicians have rackmounted gear: PA Amp, EQ's, Effects, Signal Processors, Midi Synth, power conditioner. It's extremely nice to have the computer on the same rack.
>What's the goal... coolness or organization..
Having your equipment in one piece when it arrives. If you've ever had otherwise, you know the value of that.
For the "end user" who already has some rackmounted equipment, which is far more commonplace than you seem to think, it makes a lot of sense to have everything on the rack, and not have some stuff on the rack, and other stuff that has to be lugged around, put on a table, shipped in a separate crate, etc.
The "living room" comment that you made seems to imply that everybody who is on a budget is also merely a hobbyist, with trivial needs. Believe me, there are many professionals who are also on a budget, yet have real needs for certain things; rackmouted equipment being one of them.