Choosing a Rosewill case...

[tomahawkeer]

I am in the process of trying to decide between 2 Rosewill cases, to re-build my first attempt at a freenas box. Originally I had purchased a ....not good.... case, however, I have decided to get a better case to house my storage. I am trying to decide between these 2 Rosewill cases

Rosewill RSV-L4312 - 4U Rackmount Server Case or Chassis, 12 x SATA / SAS Hot-swap Drives, 5 x Cooling Fans Included - Newegg.com

Buy Rosewill RSV-L4312 - 4U Rackmount Server Case or Chassis, 12 x SATA / SAS Hot-swap Drives, 5 x Cooling Fans Included with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

Rosewill RSV-L4500 Black Metal/ Steel, Server Chassis - Newegg.com

Buy Rosewill RSV-L4500 - Server Case or Chassis, 4U Rackmount - 15 x Internal Bays, 8 x Cooling Fans Included with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

Does anybody have any experience with either in particular for air flow considerations?

Looking for feedback. I really like the idea of being able to swap out the drives easily with the 12 bay case (hotswap), vs the 15 bay.

 

[Jessep]

Not a lot of information available about them.

I would be concerned about the backplane mostly. No info on Newegg or Rosewell sites about what it is or even what connectors are required. Not a good sign in my opinion.

I'd check the used market.

 

[Cyknight]

Fans are all 4pin molex passthrough in the ones I've seen. Not a terrible case at all.
Don't know about their hotswap bays though, the internal ones are 'ok' - I use 5 of the loose bays in a custom rackmount myself and they're not bad for my purpose, but I wouldn't call them anything special.

Unless you really need hotswap, I would take newegg up on a $100 for that 4500 in a hardbeat.

 

[Astraea]

From what I have been able to research, as I too am looking at Rosewill for my FreeNAS build the hot-swap bays require 2 Molex power cables for each set of 4 drives and 4 SATA cables for each set of 4 drives. so on the model, you have specified you would need 6 Molex and 12 SATA cables to be able to use all 12 bays. Though do note that they have a newer version of the 12 bay case which is an RSV-L4412 which is the one I am looking at for my FreeNAS box, I am hoping to get 4 of those cases to build in to replace my current white box setup from QNAP.

 

[mhweb]

@Astraea the RSV-L4412 is newer, but why does it come with USB 2.0, and the RSV-L4312 comes with USB 3.0 in the front panel? What are the biggest differences between the RSV-L4412 and the RSV-L4312?

 

[Astraea]

It appears that the differences include USB2 or USB3, differing support for E-ATX and also the mounting rails could be different heights on the cases. I am hoping I and get my hands on one of each before ordering as I am wanting to use this case for more than one machine I am planning to build.

For me, USB2 or USB3 is no big deal but having support for as many motherboard sizes and also being able to fit in a rack with other equipment is very important.

 

[mhweb]

I originally wanted the RSV-L4412 too, I was just looking at the L4312 because is currently on sale for $130, and that's the only reason why I'm considering, but you're right about the motherboard compatibility. I'm not getting a rack any time soon, so that's not an issue.

Thanks,

 

[Astraea]

I will probably go for 4412 as it has better motherboard compatibility and with the rails mounting in the middle and having full control over where equipment goes I should be ok there too. Plus the 4312 is not listed on their site so getting more later could be a problem.

MY goal is to have 4 of these cases for FreeNAS servers and 5 for Proxmox Servers as right now I am running 3 QNAP devices and 4 old enterprise servers (Dell 2950 G3 and 3 HP DL380 G5)

 

[mhweb]

I'm trying to build to my first FreeNAS box that's why the doubts.

Do you know if the 4412 has a SAS2 backplane? I read in Reddit that the 4312 has it and it won't be an issue with the 3.3v if I use shocked drives.
Also, although the 4412 is a better model, do you know which one came out first? I'm reading 2014 for 4412 and 2019 for the 4312.

Thanks,

 

[Astraea]

I believe that neither of them has a backplane perse they have individual SATA connectors for each drive. I personally don't use shucked drives from other storage devices so I don't have to worry about pins. As for which one is first and which is not I am not too sure I would get the one with USB3 is the newer one but to remove E-ATX support doesn't make sense in a case this large.

 

[tomahawkeer]

I didn't research the differences, other than seeing the huge price difference between them. (4412 vs 4312).

I did, however, decided to go ahead and order the 4500. I would have loved to have had the hot swap capabilities of the 4312, but there is a lot more reviews on the 4500 and with the fiasco I went through with the el cheapo case I originally bought, I figured I would try to get something with better reviews.. Plus the fact that its made to hold 3 more drives than the 4312, AND has 8 fans for good air flow. It's something I should be able to build and grow with.

 

[Velcade]

For 49.99 you can't beat it. Let us know how the build process is for the case.

 

[tomahawkeer]

Yeah I kind of got screwed there. I ordered it on Black Friday for $94, when it was on sale. It shipped, and now, its on sale for $49.99. Should have waited a couple of days. Black Friday / cyber monday are 2 sales days that Newegg wont honor the price matching stuff. Guess I could buy another one for $49.99 and send back the one I bought for $94, but then I have no idea how much restocking etc is going to be, plus possibly pay extra for shipping :-\

 

[mhweb]

Do you guys know if buying the 4500, then you can buy the hot swappable cages and it'll fit and work with this case?

 

[Velcade]

Do you guys know if buying the 4500, then you can buy the hot swappable cages and it'll fit and work with this case?

Yes you can remove the fans and add hot swap cages. They're the same price as the chassis. :) https://www.newegg.com/rosewill-rsv-sata-cage-34-hard-disk-drive-cage/p/N82E16816132037

 

[mhweb]

Sweet, I think I'm going to get this deal.
Thanks,

 

[tomahawkeer]

You may want to look at that again. Those cages are to be put into 5.25" bays, 3 of them to be exact. I don't have experience with the case or cages yet, but you may want to verify that first.

 

[mhweb]

@Velcade Thanks, I got the deal, and no only the price, but the fact that many people are complaining about problems with cages causing drives to not work made me make decision to get this model.

 

[tomahawkeer]

@Velcade Thanks, I got the deal, and no only the price, but the fact that many people are complaining about problems with cages causing drives to not work made me make decision to get this model.

I had seen some of those issues as well. I had considering buying 1 those cages into the crap case that I originally bought, but saw all the issues with people saying they didn't work, or they fried their drives, so I stayed away.

 

[Velcade]

You may want to look at that again. Those cages are to be put into 5.25" bays, 3 of them to be exact. I don't have experience with the case or cages yet, but you may want to verify that first.

They fit. The chassis is no different than the 12 hot swap version. The 4500 version you just need to supply the drive cages.