StarTech.com 4-Bay Mobile Rack Backplane - Trayless Hot Swap Mobile Rack Backplane for 3.5in SAS II/SATA III - 6 Gbps HDD (HSB4SATSASBA)

I was slightly nervous about using these but I had an old tower case and an old server motherboard and wanted to create my own NAS so thought I'd give these a go. The worry was that the drives would be too cramped and run hot. Iniitally I ran 2 of these with four drives (2 per enclosure with a central gap) over a period of a month and monitored the temps. The drives ran consistently between 28 & 31 C. Then I loaded the final two and ran with all 6 ever since. Over two years these have run with the drives consistently between 28 & 31. Each drive has its own temp. and it's actually the drive, not the position as I tried swapping a couple round after a year to see if it made a difference. Under periods of really heavy load for an hour or more, one or two disks rise a degree then settle back. So enclosures and fans do what they are supposed to. Although slightly fiddly to fit 6 drives in two of these it wasn't hard.

First off, the first one I received was faulty. The power led on the top tray was intermittent. It was replaced promptly however. The replacement unit works a treat though. The drive activity led feeds are taken from the sata cable via the supplied cables. This is like all the Startech equipment I have bought, well made and works. Update My 2020, one fan has failed. Easy to replace.

Both HDD bays work as intended but it does not fit flush with the front of my 5.25" drive bays(see picture) which every other device I have ever installed did. The internal fan is also annoyingly loud, I decided to remove this which is easy to do. If security is in mind the locking function is just an Allen bit, while great for accidental opening of the bay security is a zero. Other than those small issues of which the last one doesn't effect me I would highly recommend this drive bay over the cheaper alternatives on Amazon.

I originally bought two of these to enable easy swapping of drives in a backup server. They have worked flawlessly since then, running 24/7 for over a year. The build is robust and swapping out drives is very easy. I later added one to my desktop PC because I have a 24TB drive that runs very hot, but the built in fans in this enclosure also cool the drives far more than any case fan. Since moving the drive to the enclosure I have had no problem with overheating. So, great for swapping drives but also great for cooling drives.

I've had one of these '4 drives in 3 bays' backplanes in my main PC for nearly 3 years now and it has performed absolutely flawlessly. It gives me 3 extra drives that tend to stay in the machine (2 are redundant daily incremental backups using Retrospect) and one bay that I use for weekly full backups in a archive sequence or import/export to any 3.5" drive. I agree with the other review on the UK site that it would be nice if less than 4 power connectors were needed, but I didn't find it a problem using splitters. Just about to buy the 3 drive 2 bay equivalent for another machine build!

Delivered in 7 days to north of Sweden which is good. I like the the design. 3 Sata connections and 2 power connections, after connecting it worked without problem no drivers needed. There's 2 dip switches for fan high/low led lights on/off. The fan seems good quality in low mode I can hardly hear it over pcs fans(I got a new PC 2015/16) HDDs holds good temp., I've pc on 24/7 for months. However one hdd bay (middle one) has stopped working within 4 month of buy!!! I've tried different disk new/old big and small, SATA doesn't seem to detect.(already worn out) Checked connections in PC which is fine. I haven't overused or changing drives 10 times per day or so, I haven't even used all HDD-bays at all time. Have changed disk max 50 times over a period of 4 month... In order of product it's written "return window closed 16 Sep. 2016" (a month after purchase) Product must have longer warranty than a month! Haven't contacted seller yet will follow up.

used in a dell t320 for several months now, easy extra 3 slots in place of the empty 5.25" bays

Some other reviews mentioned this doesn't fit into 2 5.25" drive bays which has not been my experience, this fit exactly in 2 bays with no issues. It can be a bit awkward to get the drives in and if you have little space behind the bays it might be a problem. The fan is a bit loud and the control switch to control it's speed (simple toggle, no granular speed control) is on the back of the unit instead of the front where depending on your case it might not be easily reachable. It doesn't have any way to connect to a motherboard or external control unit separately or automatically. I'm not sure about the qality of the electronics, that will take some time.