Sharing failure is equally important as sharing success. I'm new to your channel and I like the way you explain everything. I'm a big fan of Supermicro. I have the one with 36x 3.5" drives on front and 12x 3.5" in the back.
In all fairness, 4 columns of 3.5 drives is a rather industry standard width. Anything else can be narrower but this setup seems to be the max width possible in a standard rack.
I've done this on all of my servers in my rack on my channel as well, however I'm blown away that there isn't a standard server size? All my 4U servers are all the same width
Interesting, just watched the video you showed them on. Only thing I can think of is Supermicro is either 1) using up extra space with the caddies or 2) purposely trying to get us to use their expensive rails lol
yeah, you got a really old Supermicro chassis with the old style rails (that's not even rev-A, it's pre-rev A). those are really hard to find, although I saw some over a year ago for $50 or so, but other than that, they are either really expensive or impossible to find.
Well that explains why I couldn't find rails for it. It had to be around 2012/2013 when I purchased it used. I remember it coming with a super old motherboard that used the long PCIX 64bit slots for the disk controllers 😂
I have 3 of them that need rails, so it's a difference of over $120 using the generic rails. Having gone through this experience, I wouldn't do it again though! Best bet I thinks is to stalk ebay for the right deal.
Yeah I bought a set of the newer Supermicro RevB rails and riveted the inner rail in place the same as I did here wiith the iStar rail. It worked perfectly and is racked up now.
@@HomeSysAdmin awesome to hear. I bought an old shelled out 836 and have been getting it filled in. I ordered the rev b rails before even noticing they made old wide ones. I’ll give it a shot and see if I can make it work. Thanks for giving me some hope
@@HomeSysAdmin did you end up mounting them at the same height as shown in the video? Or what ended up working? Haven’t started yet but couldn’t quite decide where it needed to be.
Just saying that you can do a DYI to widen it. Get some 1/8” by 1/2” stock and with a little measuring / bending / drilling to make an off set. Then next time buying the correct one. But don’t let the bad fit go just modify it. Thanks again for your work and moving the two podcasts apart.
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APC Rack Rails... ebay.us/Qen5FH
Supermicro CSE-836... ebay.us/KvQKZY
Cheap Drives... shop.digitalspaceport.com/
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Great video. Never would have thought to measure the width of the chassis! Figured they conformed to some standard as well. Good to know.
Great help. Bought the wrong rails too but your video stopped me from fighting to fit the chassis into the rack. Thanks.
Yeah. not a fail. You learned an important lesson. Measure twice. Cut once. Keep after it. Thanks for sharing
GREAT VIDEO, LOVE THAT YOU SHOW EVEN FAILURES!!!!
Sharing failure is equally important as sharing success. I'm new to your channel and I like the way you explain everything. I'm a big fan of Supermicro. I have the one with 36x 3.5" drives on front and 12x 3.5" in the back.
Excellent video. Thank you.
Great resource!! I have the opposite issue. The width of case and rail is too wide compared to rack. So I just ordered iStarUSA rail.
In all fairness, 4 columns of 3.5 drives is a rather industry standard width. Anything else can be narrower but this setup seems to be the max width possible in a standard rack.
Yeah you're right. I didn't think on it enough before jumping to purchase the rails kit.
I've done this on all of my servers in my rack on my channel as well, however I'm blown away that there isn't a standard server size? All my 4U servers are all the same width
Interesting, just watched the video you showed them on. Only thing I can think of is Supermicro is either 1) using up extra space with the caddies or 2) purposely trying to get us to use their expensive rails lol
yeah, you got a really old Supermicro chassis with the old style rails (that's not even rev-A, it's pre-rev A). those are really hard to find, although I saw some over a year ago for $50 or so, but other than that, they are either really expensive or impossible to find.
Well that explains why I couldn't find rails for it. It had to be around 2012/2013 when I purchased it used. I remember it coming with a super old motherboard that used the long PCIX 64bit slots for the disk controllers 😂
I modified it to use RevB rails after this video and it's been working fantastic in the rack since.
@@HomeSysAdmin care to share a video of how you made the rev b’s work? This is what I need to do on one of my servers.
Is it really worth the effort and time? Sometimes you get the matching supermicro rails for around 80-90$ on ebay... and they just fit.
I have 3 of them that need rails, so it's a difference of over $120 using the generic rails. Having gone through this experience, I wouldn't do it again though! Best bet I thinks is to stalk ebay for the right deal.
Did you ever come up with a solution? I find myself in a similar issue with an old chassis and can’t locate any rails
Yeah I bought a set of the newer Supermicro RevB rails and riveted the inner rail in place the same as I did here wiith the iStar rail. It worked perfectly and is racked up now.
@@HomeSysAdmin awesome to hear. I bought an old shelled out 836 and have been getting it filled in. I ordered the rev b rails before even noticing they made old wide ones. I’ll give it a shot and see if I can make it work. Thanks for giving me some hope
@@HomeSysAdmin did you end up mounting them at the same height as shown in the video? Or what ended up working? Haven’t started yet but couldn’t quite decide where it needed to be.
👍
Today I learnt that chassis do not conform to size standards..
Yeah that was news to me too... ha
Just saying that you can do a DYI to widen it. Get some 1/8” by 1/2” stock and with a little measuring / bending / drilling to make an off set. Then next time buying the correct one. But don’t let the bad fit go just modify it. Thanks again for your work and moving the two podcasts apart.