Friday, September 28th 2012
Icy Dock Introduces MB996SP-6SB Backplane Cage
The 5.25" device bay has been a long standard in computer history. It started from the 90s legacy industrial PC cases all the way to today's Micro ATX cases. The 5.25" bay has been widely used for optical drives such as DVD and Blue-ray, or with even a single 3.5" hard drive with mobile rack. However, it is almost impossible to use a single 5.25" bay to create complex RAID storage until the MB996SP-6SB Full Metal 6 x 2.5" SATA Hard Drive & SSD Backplane.
Utilizing the standard 5.25" bay form factor, the compact design allows the enclosure to be used in various applications, catering to a wide audience. The MB996SP-6SB excels for use in advanced RAID applications such as building dual RAID 5 arrays or high performance 4 drives in RAID 0 plus RAID 1 array for back up, all in a single 5.25" device bay. The MB996SP-6SB is extremely useful for powerful small servers, gaming rigs, home servers or HTPC's due to its high capacity and space saving design. It is also perfect for users who needs non-RAID JBOD storage and save different contents in different drive locations. It supports wide-range of applications which is the true value of the MB996SP-6SB.
Rock Solid Construction
Making sure your drives or expensive SSDs are in good hands and last as much as possible is carefully considered to any build and design. The MB996SP-6SB is capable of holding up in the various environments, with the heavy duty full metal construction in the entirety of the body and its smaller components.
The metal material used grants heat dissipation transfer from the hard drives to the backplane cage. Lastly, Anti-Vibration Technology (AVT) and EMI grounding are used to ensure a stable environment for the hard drives or SSD's used, dramatically improving reliability.
Absolute Control of your 2.5" hard drive or SSD
Bringing more utility your hard drives or SSDs, LED's are installed into the front of the mobile rack to provide individual drive status information at all times. Active Power Technology (APT) allows each LED and the cooling fan to be active only when a hard drive is inserted into the same bay of the enclosure.
A 40mm cooling fan is placed directly at the center of the rear panel, providing equivalent airflow throughout the entire cage. Depending on your needs, you may need the fan to be at a higher speed, or completely off for silent operation, and so a 3-Mode Fan Speed Control has been added to flexible in various situations.
Using the EZ Slide Micro trays makes drive interchangeability and maintenance completely hassle free. For drive security, the Eagle-hook lock system on the tray makes sure your hard drives will not eject when not needed. The trays are also designed to accommodate 7mm to 9.5mm height hard drive and SSD, creating a 2.5" hot swap bay for any standard SATA hard drives and SSDs.
Key Features:
Utilizing the standard 5.25" bay form factor, the compact design allows the enclosure to be used in various applications, catering to a wide audience. The MB996SP-6SB excels for use in advanced RAID applications such as building dual RAID 5 arrays or high performance 4 drives in RAID 0 plus RAID 1 array for back up, all in a single 5.25" device bay. The MB996SP-6SB is extremely useful for powerful small servers, gaming rigs, home servers or HTPC's due to its high capacity and space saving design. It is also perfect for users who needs non-RAID JBOD storage and save different contents in different drive locations. It supports wide-range of applications which is the true value of the MB996SP-6SB.
Making sure your drives or expensive SSDs are in good hands and last as much as possible is carefully considered to any build and design. The MB996SP-6SB is capable of holding up in the various environments, with the heavy duty full metal construction in the entirety of the body and its smaller components.
The metal material used grants heat dissipation transfer from the hard drives to the backplane cage. Lastly, Anti-Vibration Technology (AVT) and EMI grounding are used to ensure a stable environment for the hard drives or SSD's used, dramatically improving reliability.
Absolute Control of your 2.5" hard drive or SSD
Bringing more utility your hard drives or SSDs, LED's are installed into the front of the mobile rack to provide individual drive status information at all times. Active Power Technology (APT) allows each LED and the cooling fan to be active only when a hard drive is inserted into the same bay of the enclosure.
A 40mm cooling fan is placed directly at the center of the rear panel, providing equivalent airflow throughout the entire cage. Depending on your needs, you may need the fan to be at a higher speed, or completely off for silent operation, and so a 3-Mode Fan Speed Control has been added to flexible in various situations.
Using the EZ Slide Micro trays makes drive interchangeability and maintenance completely hassle free. For drive security, the Eagle-hook lock system on the tray makes sure your hard drives will not eject when not needed. The trays are also designed to accommodate 7mm to 9.5mm height hard drive and SSD, creating a 2.5" hot swap bay for any standard SATA hard drives and SSDs.
Key Features:
- Fits 6 x 7mm to 9.5mm 2.5" SATA hard drives or SSD's in a single 5.25" bay for high performance RAID applications.
- Full Metal construction with aluminum body, to protect your drives.
- Anti-Vibration Technology (AVT) - creates a safe environment for hard drives or SSDs.
- Active Power Technology (APT) - individual led & cooling fan only powers up if there is a drive installed in the bay.
- 3-Mode Fan Speed Control - adjust cooling settings (High, Low, or Off) for your specific needs.
- Eagle-hook lock system keeps drives secured within the enclosure.
- Switch between 4-pin and 15-pin power connection with included adapter.
- Removable tray system for easy maintenance.
- Supports SATA 6Gbps and hot swap.
17 Comments on Icy Dock Introduces MB996SP-6SB Backplane Cage
EDIT: Newegg has them in stock, $99.99. ICY DOCK MB996SP-6SB Full Metal 6 x 2.5” SAT...
The one comment on Newegg mentioned that 90 degree SATA cables look like they would be a problem. Likely not a big deal to most. Also, seems the power adapters are *not* included.
Typical for these kinds of devices. And this one looks real nice.
But I don't know how much current these drives consume...so it's just a thought
Assuming only using the 12v power, it indeed might be a stretch with 6x 15,000RPM drives pulling close to 10w each.
Still sexy though. Any info on prices or am I blind?
EDIT: Oh here it is:
Hmm for some serious RAID it is stupid idea. They should create 2U backplane for 12x 2.5" drives. It would be possible to mount 1 or 2 80mm fans for proper cooling.
There is no such thing as quiet 40mm fan. All of those work like little hairdryers, making your life miserable. 40mm fans are good used as pencil sharpeners, not for cooling.
some peoples HTPC might only have enough room for 1 optical drive.
However I a 12x2.5 varient should be made available but then again if you are gonna purchase 12 laptop hard drives then that would be not only a waste of time but also a waste of money, given the price you are going to pay you could buy 2 512GB Samsung SSDs to raid and they would probably give you better performance then any raid setup will give you not to mention, less noise, less power consumption and less reason to buy a RAID or SATA expansion card so you can hook up more hard drives to your PC.
Secondly, who says it has to be used specifically for raid??Maybe with some careful undervolting, noise might be acceptable. but then again it probably wouldnt move much air. All the more reason to fill it with SSDs