K7 8 Bay NAS Case, Computer Enclosures Compatible Micro-ATX Mini-ITX Motherboard, 3 x Fans, 8 x 2.5/3.5" Tray, Network Attached Storage Server for Home(Diskless)

This is a great case and not just "for the price." There's a lot to like here. The case takes both mATX and Mini-ITX motherboards.The drive trays can be a bit finicky to get clipped into place, but what plastic drives trays aren't, and how often are you really going to be removing/adding hard drives? Don't force the tray in and you won't break anything. The drive trays have mounting holes for both 3.5" and 2.5" drives. Drive trays have a blue light for power and a green light for activity.The 2-compartment design keeps the heat from the hard drives from washing over your motherboard and ensures the air pulled over the drives has a straight shot out of the case. I have 8, 7200-rpm drives and after 48 straight hours of file copying, temps were all b/t 47C and 51C. They idle at around 44C. Those are not bad temps at all for eight, 7200-prm disks crammed together in a quiet case.The fans the case comes with are not horrible. They are completely acceptable for stock fans. In fact, I bought 80mm Noctua Redux and 60mm Redux fans to replace all of them. The stock 80mms are actually not as noisy. The Redux fans have a bit of a high-pitched whine to them, which is more annoying to me than the hum of the stock fans. The 60mm Noctua is quieter and moves the same air as the stock 60mm fan, so that got swapped out.Due to the small upper compartment, and the good exhaust ventilation design, a single, quiet 60mm fan is sufficient to keep the CPU reasonably cool. If you don't mind fan noise, put a high-speed fan in there and you could keep a higher-wattage CPU fairly cool.I have a SuperMicro A2SDi-8C+ motherboard (Atom C3758 CPU) in this case and the CPU idles at 45C and never breaks 50C even under load. That's with the tiny 40mm fan that comes stock on the MB CPU HSF. You could fit approximately a 1U-height or other low-profile CPU HSF in here, so you might be able to keep a more powerful CPU reasonably cool (but noisy). I wouldn't put a 150W+ CPU in this case though.The case is SUPER-EASY to build in. The PSU (Flex format) lives in the lower compartment, so there's nothing in the MB area but the 60mm fan.There are some small gotchas that you need to be aware of. Most Flex PSUs don't have really long cables. You will need an ATX 24-pin, and CPU 12v 8-pin extension cables b/c most ATX/12V MB sockets are the side of the MB opposite of where the PSU mounts in the bottom compartment. I'd like to see these extensions included with the case, even if they upped the price by $10. It's likely that 90%+ of users will need these extensions and it can be a real bummer finishing up your new build only to realize you have to wait another few days for the cables you didn't know you needed to arrive b/c your PSU cables are 2" too short.There are no SSD mounting locations in the MB tray, but there is space along the sides of the compartment to mount SSDs with double-sided tape, which is what I have done. It's not likely you'll be moving this case around, so double-sided tape on SSDs that weigh like 1 ounce works just fine. I have 2 SSDs mounted and could fit in a third without too much hassle.Using 20TB hard drives, you could have 160TB of storage in a case the size of a large shoebox. That's just nuts. FANTASTIC CASE and highly recommended.

I bought this case to build my own NAS. I wanted something similar to a Synology device but with much more RAM and a higher end CPU for running Docker containers and VMs.Overall the case is nice. It's an older style though (i.e. not at all modular and it has 4-pin molex connectors for the two disk arrays). There's very limited space in the top third of the case where the motherboard goes, so I had to use a low profile CPU cooler. I used the Thermaltake CLP0556-B and it just barely fit.Unsurprisingly the case is very tight. It requires a Flex ATX power supply (I used the Apevia ITX-PFC500W). Because of where the modular power cables go on that PSU it would only mount in one direction. And in that direction it pressed up against the drive cages. So it isn't completely flush and is mounted at a very slight angle.And because Flex ATX PSUs have short cables, I needed to order an EPS 4+4 extension cable to reach the CPU power connector on the mobo I use (Asus Prime B365M-A).Another caveat is that the three stock fans are very loud. I replaced them with 2 x 92mm and 1 x 60mm Noctua fans and it made a big difference.So in conclusion, I am happy with the purchase. But I obviously needed to do a lot of work to get it to work for me.

I wanted to downsize from 2 x Rosewill server cases to a 2 x 8-bay NAS cases (NAS + DAS configuration), and these fit the bill. Overall, I've been extremely pleased with them. Since U-NAS cases are impossible to find now, this makes a great alternative.Pros:- Pretty well built...didn't find anything too flimsy or didn't align properly...screws on the back (that secure the lid) can take some finagling but overall still go in each time- It has many more PCIE slots for a Micro ATX motherboard that U-NAS doesn't- Anti-vibration pads on the feet are a nice touch and help reduce some wear on the hard drives- Comes with adapter for Flex ATX power supply...probably best to use a Flex ATX PSU anyway but it can definitely fit a 1U PSU (used a Supermicro PWS-351-1H in NAS and Enhance ENP-7025B in DAS)- Can comfortably fit a 2U height heatsink/cooler- Outside of installing the SATA cables and Molex power cables, it's pretty easy to work inCons:- Really wish it had 2 x 120mm fans instead of 2 x 92mm fans..the temperature in my closet where these are stored is around 26C (79F) on average and that can equal out to about 36C for all my hard drives (ranging anywhere from 33C to 40C)...not perfect but definitely acceptable...this is even after I replaced both of the original fans with Noctua NF-A9's and are running at nearly full speed (move lots of air while still relatively quiet)- PCIE slots are half-height so that does limit what cards you can install- LED colors would be better if they were the same across the entire case (just seems weird to have a mix of green and blue)- It's not as visually appealing as a U-NAS case...at least it doesn't have an ugly logo situated on the front though- You're likely going to need some extension cables (Molex, EPS, and 24pin, 4pin fan)Conclusion: Its Pros definitely outweigh its Cons. I'd definitely recommend this case to anyone looking for a little NAS that is relatively quiet and doesn't take up much space.