Question about hard drives in SFF PCs

I have been looking into buying a SFF PC setup to use as a music server, but I a question about hard drives.

With some of the Shuttle motherboards, there are options for SATA Raid options and indeed IDE. In other words there options for using multiple hard drives.

What's the point of all this if you only have space, in many cases, for just one 3.5" drive.

Example, with the Shuttle ST61G4, you only have space for one 3.5" bay. You can't use the 5.23" bay as you need it for an optical drive.

Or is there a way of using a caddy of external drives connected to the motherboard?

Apologies in advance if I'm asking daft questions.

Thanks

Quite a lot of the shuttles actually have enough space for two drives, though in some you need to remove the supplied card reader or do some modding to fit a second drive. Newer boxes, such as the SB81P have specifically been designed with space for three drives.

The chipsets have support for the features, so I guess its easy for shuttle to implement them in case some people want use them, even if the majority will not.

Scott

Edit: Just thought I'd add, the ST61G4 is an example that has two 3.5 bays, but the card reader electronics block the second. Remove these and you are free to use the second bay. Unfortunately, it leaves the open slots on the front. Also, had the SB81P number wrong, so many damn models to remember...

Im running 2 drives in mine, 120 and a 160 - have to sacrifice a floppy drive but who uses them any more ?

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Originally Posted by Surgeon

Im running 2 drives in mine, 120 and a 160 - have to sacrifice a floppy drive but who uses them any more ?

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Ditto, got 2 drives in my SN41G2. Aint used the floppy drive in years!

Hi Atomic,

Can I check when you installed the second hard drive did you place them both on the IDE 1 connector? With the one at the end as master? Assuming then you just had your optical drive on IDE 2?

Cheers
ren

there is space for 2 hdds in the machine along with a optical device.

ide 1 is a short cable for one device only

while ide 2 is a longer cable for 2 devices.

Err.... what's a floppy drive?

Well a floppy drive is the thing most people need when they use SATA, to install the drivers before they can install windows.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by renhoek

Can I check when you installed the second hard drive did you place them both on the IDE 1 connector? With the one at the end as master? Assuming then you just had your optical drive on IDE 2?

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Yep IDE1. Dunno which is master tho, both on CS.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Flibb

Well a floppy drive is the thing most people need when they use SATA, to install the drivers before they can install windows.

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Yup but you can just plug it in and leave it to one side, it dont have to be screwed into the case...

I have mine in a draw and just plug it in when needed (only network ghosting nowdays)

I've got a (an?)SB51G with optical drive in the 5.25 slot, combined floppy/cardreader in the top 3.5 slot and HDD in the bottom 3.5 slot. I'm wanting to put another HDD underneath this (only place it looks like it'll fit.) Has anyone done this? if so, any advice on how, or better still, pics?

For what it's worth, the drive works fine, configured as a slave on the same cable as the optical drive - I'd just like to be able to put the cover back on!

Have a look at the Soltek range, I have the 3801a and is fitted with 2 optical drives and 2 sata drives, tv card, and a Nvidia FX5700le vid card.

Might be just what you are looking for :)

I have two Samsung 120 GB SATA drives, no floppy. You should know you do not have to use RAID with SATA, fact is you'll likely get better performance overall without it, unless you want backup, then you are still better with an external drive and a good optical writer. For the hassle involved, I don't think its worth it. i guess I could slip the IDE cables out of the case to some external drives, either powered off the rig or separately.