That's 25 146G 2.5" 10k SAS drives, or 3.6TB raw. The thing is somewhat an oversized holder for the drives too, with one layer up front going back maybe 6" and then just power, fans, and interface behind for another foot or so. The drives only list 5W on 5V and 3.6W on 12V, so it's pretty reasonable on power too.
Unless you need the performance (or size), I'd say go with the 400GB 3.5" SATA-II drive for less than a quarter of the cost ( less than 10% cost/GB). The number and type of drives are for performance, not for raw cost per size.
When I actually buy one I'm sure it'll be the 400GB, as that is a good price. But I figured if you just had one lying around...
C'mon, go 750 GB (or the 1TB;s that are supposed to drop by years end). Nothing like 6TB in one full size PC case ;)
If you're trying to jam in a given amount of space, and don't care about performance, those are definitely great. A few weeks ago when I looked, 400GB for $95 was definitely the sweet spot on the curve though.
Actually, how about 112 drives per shelf? I think a shelf is like 3u.
Their "hook" is that they only spin 1/4 of the drives at a time. Cuts down on heat and power. Kinda cool stuff.
Given they have 8 plus a central ~2 shelf tall unit, and a rack being 42U, they're probably 4U. Plus 48" deep - they definitely need their own rack. I'm guessing with the density the quarter-spinup is partially so the drives don't overheat, not just so the unit doesn't put out as much. That looks like maybe a data-archival type solution as opposed to active use? I think SATABeast is probably one of the highest storage-space-dense systems with decent performance. Their spin-at-partial-speed for power and heat savings but near-instant recovery is cool too.
Yeah, this is definitely an archival situation. I think they have a burst mode where they can spin them all but I can't think that'd be sustainable given, as you stated, drive heat and what not. The shelves are wicked heavy and you *have* to have a sturdy four post rack for those.
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Any extra of those HD's lying around? I could use an extra 146GB.