Question 1

How hot does it get inside this Syba 4 bay enclosure?  For those of you with all drive bays loaded, have you had any heat problems or failed drives?  I know some drives get hotter than others....  Thanks!

Accepted Answer

While the drives are close together in the enclosure, I have not had any issues with heat on this device. It has an exhaust fan as well as switches to turn individual drives on and off, so if heat is a concern you can turn off unused drives. Additionally, the fan speed has three settings. You can leave it on high 24/7 if needed.

If heat is still a concern, I recommend you use this device as a quick way to access data on storage drives, especially since it is USB 3.0 and not SATA III. This is how I use the device. I leave it turned off when not accessing data in order to preserve hard drive life and the life of the device.

You will have slightly faster access with a SATA III drive installed internally than a USB 3.0 drive attached externally. While you will probably use an internal SATA III drive more intensely, you will probably have better cooling solutions inside a PC case as well, so those will balance each other out.

To conclude, I would use this device as a quick way to access storage drives. I would reserve drives you are going to use consistently (and thus that will generate a lot of heat) for inside the PC case. That said, heat should still not be a concern as long as the exhaust fan is used on the highest setting and the drives are in good working order.

Question 2

It says "no AC adapter required, direct DC power connection to the unit".  What does that even mean?  How is the unit powered?

Accepted Answer

The unit has a built in PSU, akin to what you'd find in a desktop computer. So there's only a standard computer power cord from the outlet to the back of the unit. I think they meant that there's no external power brick because it's built into the unit's chassis.

Question 3

It says limited to 8TB/drives. Is this just what was tested, or will it not access (or fail with) drives over 8TB due to an electronics hardware limitation in the box?

Accepted Answer

I don't know of any limitation on the actual drive size. Maybe something on the O/S side that is used to access drives in this bay.  From what I can tell this bay is just a power supply in one cabinet big enough to support 4 3.5" drives ... so the capacity shouldn't matter. When you put 4 drives in what you see is 4 drive letters on a windows O/S not one big drive that has a capacity equal to the sum of all four. Not sure this helps but these are my thoughts on the matter. The vendor is real good about actually answering the phone and giving solid tech support by my own personal experience.

Question 4

How noisy is the fan in your Syba 4 bay drive enclosure?  What speed do you have it on?  Is it very noisy on medium or high?

Accepted Answer

I originally had mine set to medium and barely noticed any sound .. I recently put it onto high and didn't notice a difference at all in sound

Question 5

Is it a soft power button or a toggle?  That is, will this unit turn back on after a power failure without intervention?

Accepted Answer

Note also that it also shuts down cleanly. For example, I leverage UPS backup power. If I loose power, my workstation shuts down when the UPS has fifteen minutes left. When the computer finished shutdown, this unit also turns itself off. It kicks back on when the workstation restarts itself after power is restored.

Question 6

Can it be setup to use software RAID using a LINUX OS?

Accepted Answer

Absolutely! I've been using it with software RAID on Linux for several years now. Each individual disk appears separately to the OS.

Question 7

Can you  use a 2.5 to 3.5 adapter with this?

Accepted Answer

So far as i can tell it should work with an adapter. The 3 1/2 seems to fit in just like any other drive case so depending on the adapter it should work fine. The tech folks at the organization are quite helpful, and readily available.

Question 8

it says "No A/C Adapter Required. Direct DC Power Connection to the Unit" so where does it gt its power from?

Accepted Answer

The DC power converter is in INTERNAL. It plugs straight into an electrical outlet.

Question 9

What are the dimensions?

Accepted Answer

Product Dimensions10.25"L x 5.25"W x 8"H

Question 10

Will this unit support 4 Seagate Barracuda 4 TB Hard drives? for some reason they won't read in my other external docking bay. or do you need some sort of adapter  to use Seagate  Barracuda 4 TB  Hard drives?

Accepted Answer

If the drives are SATA, they should work as I'm using various drives in mine. What exact drives are you using? Are your drives SAS, which look like SATA, and are usually used in servers?

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