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Thread: SATA 'Power Strip'?

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    SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Has anyone seen a single strip of sata power connectors on a cable? I have a Lian Li full tower server, and I really struggle for space at the back where the cables connect to the sata drives. If I was able to connect the power to all 7 in one continuous line without extra cable in between, it would make things considerably easier.

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    Senior Member Pob255's Avatar
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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Never seen one for sale, but I have seen the made, fairly easy to do.

    Use a load of these http://www.kustompcs.co.uk/acatalog/info_1950.html (also get the caps for them, http://www.kustompcs.co.uk/acatalog/info_8762.html http://www.kustompcs.co.uk/acatalog/info_8763.html )
    It's very to fit those to an existing sata power cable on a psu, if your psu already uses these types even better.
    You just align it with the correct wires in correct slots & correct distance apart from the next connector, then push the wires in with a small flat bladed screwdriver then snap the cap on the back.

    (I cut these connectors off when changing dead psu's at work, as you can carefully remove the wires and reuse them )

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Maplin do 4-in-1 cables

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Hi Pob, thanks for the reply. I actually did look at those Kusom PC ones... I'm quite scared about them to be honest because if I make a dogs breakfast of it and put 12V into a drive rather than 5V the magic smoke will get out. My PSU is a Corsair so the wires are all black.

    Gagaga - I've found it on Maplin's site and it's EXACTLY what I was looking for - with the obvious problem being it's 4 and not 7.

    But together I think that might be a solution. I'm much happier applying auxilliary plugs to coloured wires as I can check, double check, triple check and finally test one by one on an old 120GB Hitachi Deathstar drive before use. The drives I use in the array are WD RE3 1TB and are £100 a pop last time I checked.

    Next step is to find out from Maplin how long it is... and the distance from the first plug to the last plug. Either that or just order one and work it out from there.

    Additionally I notice that it only has 4 wires on it, which is fine by me, if it works it works, and I know SATA drives have no special power requirements over PATA which used standard 4 pin Molex.

    So I could take a big length of Molex wire and just fire the plugs onto that.

    In any case, I'm much further forward thanks to both of your replies. Thanks very much indeed!

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    re the Maplin cables ... iirc, they are about 30 cm long in total, arranged as 2 strands with 2 plugs on each. The distance between the 2 on each is just right to plug between the 1st and 3rd drive in a Lian-li case with the 2nd cable doing the 2nd and 4th. Guessing adding extra plugs lower down the cable will give you 3/4 drives on each.

    Re 4 number of cables ... molex is 4 sata is 7 I think - the extra cables are used for 3.3v (1.8" laptop drives etc) and possibly other voltages not available on Molex.

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Sata is 5 cable, the 5th being 3.3v (used by low powered 2.5" hard drives)

    those clip on sata connectors are very easy to use, the only way you might damage your psu is by ether trying to stick too many onto one cable (although you'd have to be putting quite a few drives on and you could have the same issue with molex adaptors if you tried to put too many onto one cable.)
    In theory (not 100% on the maths, because length of wire is also a factor, as is quality of the installation) but 18 gauge wire (used on half decent psu's should be able to take up to 40amps at 12v over about 3 feet.
    getting the wires in the wrong order would be bad for anything pluged into the sata connector, just make a note of the correct sequence and double check before pushing the wires in.

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Ah, Gagaga with you explaining it was 2 tails from the one molex lead I now understand how they make these. Sadly it's not what I had hoped. It means my idea of a long strip of them is out, and things are becoming more complicated.

    And Pob, I'm not too worried about damaging the PSU. I'm well aware that the wires they supply are just fine. I'm worried that the £800 of drives I'd be connecting with the cable would die instantly if I got the wire the wrong way around. Hard drive logic is on 5V and if I accidentally feed it 12V it goes quick. My worry with the PSU I have just now is that all the wires are black, so it's far easier to make a mistake.

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Graeme at Kustom has kindly confirmed that they'll be getting the strip of 4 back in stock in a few weeks, so I'll add a few in line SATA power connectors to that and it should do the job nicely.

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    Does he need a reason? Funkstar's Avatar
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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    Kustom PCs have really great customer support. Any time I've contacted them with queries or stock requests they have got back to me really quickly, they are polite and friendly too.

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    I've spoken to Graeme a few times over the past 7 or 8 years and he's always polite and helpful.

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    As a random question (sorry to tack it onto this) there's obviously no minimum distance between each connector on the cable? I.e if I had 6 drives in the slot in bays of say a fractal case I could make a cable with a connector every 5/6cm without it causing an issue? It's just dumb power so i'd assume not but....

    About to order a 5 drive raid 5 and cabling is one of the things i'm fretting about slightly. Being able to build a cable that matches the setup perfectly would be a HUGE plus. Have plenty of adapter cables etc to steal the clips from.

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    Re: SATA 'Power Strip'?

    There shouldn't be any issues with the space between connectors.

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