

[Ask HN]: Cheap Bulk Storage - Part 2 - jason_slack

There was a HN thread a few days ago on Cheap Bulk Storage: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2503552<p>BackBlaze Pods are interesting. Here is an updated link where Harvard recently built one of these: http://cleanenergy.harvard.edu/index.php?ira=Jabba&#38;tipoContenido=sidebar&#38;sidebar=science<p>The total cost was: $6,377.00 for then entire POD, 90TB.<p>Someone recommended a Super Micro Chasis: http://www.provantage.com/supermicro-cse-417e16-r1400ub~7SUP92AE.htm<p>The cost on the Super Micro chasis is $2100.00<p>Factoring in all the parts required for the BackBlaze POD (excluding drives, ram, mobo, etc) isn't the SuperMicro a good solid start for the price? 72 bays instead of 45 too.<p>Doesn't buying the SuperMicro eliminate a lot of work and parts needed for the BackBlaze style POD?<p>Can anyone help me analyze which way builds the best system, cost is a factor. I am starting an NPO for information archival.
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gvb
Note that the SuperMicro chassis uses 2.5" Serial Attached SCSI (SAS)[1]
drives. The BackBlaze is using 3.5" SATA drives. Those are in a totally
different classes. SAS drives are "enterprise" drives: faster and presumably
more reliable that SATA, but lower density and higher priced.

2.5" SAS drives appear to top out at ~600GB and at a premium[2]. The 3.5" SATA
drives used by BackBlaze are 1.5TB (probably more by now) and less expensive.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_attached_SCSI>

[2]
[http://www.google.com/search?q=2.5+sas+hard+drive&hl=en&...](http://www.google.com/search?q=2.5+sas+hard+drive&hl=en&client=ubuntu&hs=oS6&channel=fs&prmd=ivns&source=univ&tbm=shop&tbo=u&sa=X&ei=CaLATfTuLcHYgQeeyKDMBQ&ved=0CFsQrQQ&biw=1156&bih=538)

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jason_slack
Yikes, I definitely want to go SATA route. Thanks for pointing that out.

