[Official] U-NAS 8-bay Mini-ITX NAS (OTiS - 8th/9th gen Intel)

Question about the DAS build route -

Is there a reason to go for the HP SAS expander instead of an 8e LSI card in the host and a sff-8088 to sff-8087 passthrough on the U-nas case to the backplane? The passthrough just seems much simpler.

The cost mainly, the price of one of those dual port 8087-8088 adapters plus two cables is a bit more than the HP card and a single cable.

Okay, can confirm the backplane in my U-NAS NSC-800 is molex powered, but the drives still do not power up without tape over that 3.3v pin. Weird. Just did a test, removing the tape from a drive - it doesn’t power up. Never put much thought into it myself, as taping the pin is a very easy process, considering you can just tape over the last three pins, so don’t need to be very careful.

My build as posted above, with

  • 6x 14TB WD white label WD140EDFZ drives
  • 2x 10TB WD white label WD100EZAZ drives
  • 1x WD 120GB Sata M.2 SSD in a USB enclosure (Using one of these cables to keep the drive hidden inside.)

I measured power usage through my Cyberpower UPS - Spikes at 165VA on boot, and idles at 60VA. Power facter of 0.9 so I believe that’s a 148.5w spike and a 54w idle based on this calculator.

Here’s some photos - excuse the mess inside, tidied up a little, but gave up making it look too nice, when the case would rarely be opened :sweat_smile:

Any more pics of the BLU-NAS?

What did the seller have to say?

I can take more tomorrow when the lighting is better, but here’s the one so far:

I sent a message yesterday asking for an exchange or refund, but I haven’t heard anything back yet. The listing says they don’t accept returns, but further down it says they do have a 14-day DOA warranty. However, the buyer is responsible for shipping so if I do get a refund, I’ll still be out $40-$50 (assuming they don’t refund the shipping charges). I could try to bend it back into place with some tools, but I’ll see if I hear back from them first.

I just purchased the U-NAS 800 chassis. I was looking to utilize the SSD bays but noticed the 9207-8i has back-facing mounts that seem to somewhat obstruct the 2.5" SSD mounting points especially with the thick cables.

Is it okay to purchase any of the below (I believe they are all SAS2008 aka PCI-e 2.0) to get vertical / side-mounted SAS ports to route the cables like below picture? How should I pick out which one of the below?

The cables at the end of the card will not interfere with the 2.5" drive.

Here are the recommended LSI SAS HBAs…

Mine just arrived - got the black one, although after seeing it in person, I’d consider the cover more gunmetal than just plain black. It’s clearly much lighter than the front and coated steel parts of the chassis.

image

Sadly, won’t get to build in it until the new year; moving in a couple weeks!

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Hmm, I got a blue one as well :face_with_raised_eyebrow:. No damage thankfully.


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I also received the blue version. Did you check the inside of your NAS box? The outside of my case looked okay, but the inside had rust on all of the rails and standoffs. I’ve asked for a refund. With the amount of water/condensation necessary to rust the frame and standoffs, I could never trust the backplanes or power supply in this case. I was so excited to work inside of this case :frowning_face:

yeah wow that is bad

Oh, wow! A lot of my parts haven’t arrived yet so I was just letting it chill. But after seeing those images I busted that thing open. Thankfully I see no signs of rust. Sorry man, that’s bad!

I’m glad to hear that yours is in good shape! I hope that this is just a one-off issue. I’ve never seen equipment get this rusted before. It’s like it was stored in a shipping container, exposed to salt water, for a very long time. Even the terminals in the PSU cabling show signs of corrosion.

Black here!

Even a little bit of moisture can do a lot of damage, given enough time…

Definitely ask for a refund… I bet it still works fine though!

You are certainly correct. Moisture can be surprisingly damaging over time.

I haven’t received a response from the seller yet. I’m certain this wasn’t intentional. I couldn’t even see anything out of the ordinary until I opened the case up. It probably would work, but I’d hate to risk 8 hard drives with a PSU or backplanes that may have electrical issues.

BTW, Thank you for this awesome guide!

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I know you’re not me, but if you were…

I’d make sure it were completely dry, inside and out - and I’d test it. Then I’d use it, and I’d probably forget that it was rusted. And I’d spend my refund on something else :wink:

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Haha! I might just do that :grinning:

I can report that I received two blue chassis. No rust present inside. They were shipped in the form made cardboard boxes with carrying handles. The bottom of one of my boxes did have water stains, the cardboard was compressed from being wet then dried.

Thank you @JDM_WAAAT for doing the build doc and tracking this chassis.

I have two mini ITX boards I was hoping to use but the bottoms of the boards have an m.2 sata connector and so aren’t shallow enough to work in the chassis. Now to find a suitable modern I3 capable board with either lsi 3008 or 10Gbe SFP+ onboard.

Just popped my black one open, and confirm no rust inside. Was packaged exactly like JDM’s and showed no signs of moisture.

Seems like maybe the rusty one was a one-off issue? Or at least fairly isolated?

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