External Hard Drive Boxes (Page 2): Try putting the hard drive on a large metal sheet or table this will dissipate the heat. The old "Cigaret proof" Formica table tops had a sheet of...

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

Try putting the hard drive on a large metal sheet or table this will dissipate the heat. The old "Cigaret proof" Formica table tops had a sheet of copper under the paternities paper. The copper sheet dissipated the heat over a larger aria so it did not mark the Formica.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

docerz wrote:

Have you considered a NAS? Synology, QNAP, etc. m... (show quote)

I have a Synology NAS, but I was looking someplace to put two or more drives for storing different files, rather than just backup. It is a convenient was to access files from different computers. I'm not very good at dealing with the NAS box, though. When I have to connect another computer, it's always hit or miss, and I'm always surprised when it works. I have a pair of WD Red drives in it, 3TB, and I backup six folder to that and two externals.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Picture Taker wrote:

Try putting the hard drive on a large metal sheet or table this will dissipate the heat. The old "Cigaret proof" Formica table tops had a sheet of copper under the paternities paper. The copper sheet dissipated the heat over a larger aria so it did not mark the Formica.

I have an old YottMaster (great name

) aluminum box that holds four drives, but I'd be satisfied putting two in there. I plan to put a large fan in the rear and improvise some kind of heat sink for the top. I probably have some old heat sinks in the garage, and I could put a fan or two on top of them. This will be a FrankenDriveBox.

An option on the old Land Rovers was a second top placed a few inches above the standard top to keep people cool in hot climates. This could turn into an interesting project.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

OlinBost wrote:

snicker.... I have a 120V cooling fan out of a data center cabinet or maybe you could use an old attic fan.... snicker

I saw one on Amazon (I think) that costs $1,198, and runs on 400 volts. That must for government purchase.

rfmaude41 Loc: Lancaster, Texas (DFW area)

jerryc41 wrote:

Funny. Not even Google could find that brand. "JBOD stands for Just a Bunch of Disks and typically is defined as a collection of disk drives."

Here's a nice one.

"Low cost does not mean lacking in features!"

https://www.neweggbusiness.com/product/product.aspx?item=9siv1ds7b38522

Using Google "------- disk enclosures", got about several dozen "hits" for each.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

nicksr1125 wrote:

I have a 4 bay drive box that I ordered from Amazon a couple years ago. It currently has only 1 drive plugged in and even with heavy read/write activity, it only gets warm. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07H11KXCL/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I have a double and a single like that. I also have a couple that lie down flat. I bought one that had a fan, and I thought that would be great. The fan didn't make a bit of difference. It was a small fan placed on the bottom of the case. We all know how hot air falls.

I use those docks for copying to/from drives. Very convenient.

One thing I need, but is not available, is a docking station (called an enclosure) for an M.2 drive. I bought it in 2016, and it's too outdated for anyone to make an enclosure for it. It's SATA, and the new ones are NVMe and something else. Even with something as new as the M.2, there are conflicting standards. I did a Chat with Newegg, and she couldn't tell me if they had anything that would work - "too technical." She said I should contact the manufacturer.

cjc2 Loc: Hellertown PA

I'm a big Synology NAS fan and that's what I use for most of my storage. Once you get the hang of it, they are very easy to work with. I also have a LaCie dual drive device attached directly to my PP computer. The ONLY things on my internal drive (an SSD) are OS and applications. All of my storage is in RAID 1. Best of luck.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

cjc2 wrote:

I'm a big Synology NAS fan and that's what I use for most of my storage. Once you get the hang of it, they are very easy to work with. I also have a LaCie dual drive device attached directly to my PP computer. The ONLY things on my internal drive (an SSD) are OS and applications. All of my storage is in RAID 1. Best of luck.

No data on the computer - interesting. That's too "virtual" for me.

I'm going to be working with this old aluminum drive box to make sure it stays cool. I'm going to put fans and heat sinks on top.