I'm looking for some suggestions as to where to find half depth cases that can take mATX / ATX motherboards. Preferably cases designed around the AMD 939 in mind (as opposed to P4 as I seem to only be finding).

The ONLY case I've found so far is the Queenservers RM130, which looks very promicing - but again only RackSurf seem to have them in stock (and we all know how they can be at times). Anyone got some suggestions for cases / places to buy them (please NOT mini-ITX)? (only after Case [and PSU is optional])

EDIT: Just saw ACME have some half depth cases - might pop to thier shop next time I'm in Sov.

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There are limited models of motherboard that fit in the Acme 135 chassis.

You might also have cooling problems as there is not a lot of room in any half u chassis.

Queenservers claim that that 1u will run a P4 3.8 at no more than 60C, and with AMD ouputting less heat I dont think it would go above 60 .. however, a case designed specially for amd 939 layout would be nice (that case is optimised to P4).

And I'm not doing this to save space, I'm just generally "in love" with the look of that case!

http://www.pcicase.co.uk/

These guys did us some 1U 1/2 depth cases simmilar to the RackSurf ones. They look alot nicer than the racksurf ones.

Not sure if they are on their website, and you'll have to call the for pricing.

Have you taken a look at the Acme ACM136's they have the IO Ports on the front which is quite useful when sort servers are next to / near long ones


Matt.

Get in touch with Sentral Systems (used to be Flexiserv) http://www.sentralsystems.com/. Mike O'Connor is sometimes on the forum.

They manufacture 1U 1/2 depth servers quite inexpensively. You may find that you are not saving much money by building yourself and you will be saving yourself the hassle of sourcing the cases. We have a couple and cooling doesn't seem to be too much of an issue though they do get warm to touch. The cases are aluminium so act has a huge heat sink.

A more expensive alternative would be Supermicro system built around an MF case such as http://www.supermicro.com/products/s...S-5015M-MF.cfm. We have a couple of these and rate them highly.

Best regards.

Originally Posted by BSD

Queenservers claim that that 1u will run a P4 3.8 at no more than 60C, and with AMD ouputting less heat I dont think it would go above 60 .. however, a case designed specially for amd 939 layout would be nice (that case is optimised to P4).

And I'm not doing this to save space, I'm just generally "in love" with the look of that case!

My queenserver ran a 3.6ghz P4 at 85 degrees 100% throttling. AMD would be a better idea in queenservers from my experiences

The Queenserver 130 is a pretty good chassis to be fair, we use a fair few of them for our dual core AMD 64's.

The pcicase 1/2U chassis is not suitable for back2back unless you have a 1000mm or deeper cage, you wont fit a pair of them in either 800 or 900mm racks unfortunately where as the 130 *just* about fits.

I would advise going for a 1U barebones unit and go down the dual CPU, dual core route as that will effectively give you the same power in 1U, will probably save you a little power for the sacrifice of a little more outlay upfront.

It also means you don’t have to deal with racksurf which on its own its worth it!

May I ask why?
I doubt your going to be putting 80 servers in a rack due to cooling and power limitations, so cant really see the attraction, unless you have really short racks or want to use the rear of the rack for storage..

Dave, you'd be surprised how far 16amps will go when you use the right hardware!

We've a couple, but I personally dont like them. They won't mount without rails as they're too heavy even with a single disk in, and try to bend the rack posts. So you either rest them on a shelf, which wastes the U below... or rail mount them which stops them going back to back, or stack them on top of each other which makes removing any of the other impossible.

So you may as well have 1U full depth servers on rails!

Originally Posted by aXeR

Dave, you'd be surprised how far 16amps will go when you use the right hardware!

16 amps / 80 servers = 0.2amps per server, plus room for surges? :emote_bow
Im very impressed if anybody can get this without it being a rack full of old Cobalts.

I guess if you have alot of large towers etc in your rack and only a few U spare space you could use some half depths to make the most use of remaining power.

I must admit I do have a couple Queenserver 130, I think I must have got some knock offs though as the ones I got have no space to mount a hard drive.... Also I dont see how you can put them back to back anyway when the power socket is in such a poor location. If they made a half depth case where everything you needed was on the front I think that would be more useful..

@ Dave, the power outlet is on the side and thus doesn’t interfere with the back?
@ Rob, I wasn't suggesting putting 80 servers in a rack, that’s ludicrous :P

Originally Posted by SynergyWorks

We've a couple, but I personally dont like them. They won't mount without rails as they're too heavy even with a single disk in, and try to bend the rack posts. So you either rest them on a shelf, which wastes the U below... or rail mount them which stops them going back to back, or stack them on top of each other which makes removing any of the other impossible.

So you may as well have 1U full depth servers on rails!

Well, I have some half depth rails (and know where to get rails that are of an exact length). So can put rails back to back (held with screws) and that should support the servers.

But I too was wandering about how rackmounting these would work - I guess it wont be back to back but will be with 1/2?U difference (using full rails).