cross-posted from: https://discuss.tchncs.de/post/66988984

What I have

I have an old Acer Aspire A515-51G and I also have a desire to have a home server. In combination this creates a need for the laptop to carry more HDDs than it can from factory. Usually it can take one M.2 SSD and one 2.5" SATA drive.

What I want

I want to make the laptop able to run at least 4 HDDs in RAID 5 for storage and have one SSD as boot drive.

What I did

The buying phase

  • 4 HDDs
  • M.2 to SATA adapter
  • 12V/5V SATA power converter
  • 12V 10A power supply

The designing phase

I needed space to hold the HDDs, so I designed a 3D printed a cage to attach to the bottom of my laptop. Two 80mm fans can be attach to it. You can see it on printables. Also I remixed a tray (here is the original) so the HDDs can slide in and out of the cage.

.

The assembly phase

A cutout at the bottom of the laptop was needed to give access to the SATA ports of the adapter.

I put a 2.5" SSD into the already present place for it in the laptop.

Then the cage was attached to the laptop, the HDDs were put in their trays, the trays inside the cage and the cables attached to the adapter and HDDs.

      • user_user@lemmy.zipEnglish
        16·
        2 days ago

        yeah and 3d printer and money for parts and time, but not old pc for nas, sure. Wonderful story

        • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          1·
          24 hours ago

          maybe a friend has the 3d printer? also, reduce, reuse, recycle. and finally, it likely consumes less power.

    • horus_son_of_isis@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      2 days ago

      bro doesn’t get it. A substantial subset of selfhosting is using old tired stuff to make new sweet stuff. The only new parts on my machines are nvme ssds for the OSes and plugs and wire adapters. Everything else is yanked from an ancient unit or bought from ebay for pennies on the dollar of new. My services are free and my machines were close.