I’m just curious to get other people’s thoughts on this since 45Drives just recently released their 15-bay rackmount case that’s supposed to be aimed toward the homelab community.
Some of the items being sold in the e-store don’t make sense to purchase, specifically the LSI 9600-16i HBA and the x540 10Gbe NIC.
Why would the top of the line LSI 9600-16i be offered (for $1.1k)? Wouldn’t the more reasonably priced 9400 series card make more sense? I guess this would be if you’re running NVME drives (which the 9400 can also do)? It just seems strange to offer the top of the line and not anything else. Especially when the HL15 is aimed at the homelab community.
Also, the intel x540 network adapter. We go from the most recent, top of the line LSI 9600-16i HBA to a network adapter that was released in 2012 (for which they’re still asking $400 for). Wouldn’t it make more sense to offer the x550, or better yet, the x710-T2L?
I also understand that companies need to make money but the profit margin on these add-ons and accessories seems extreme. For example, the Intel XL710-QDA2 40 gig NIC is being sold for $818 while at FS.com it’s being sold for $520. That’s a 57% markup for an already marked-up item.
Is the HL15 and accessories really geared toward homelabbers?
Man, I saw 800 for the case and thought it was not bad, honestly, with the backplane. This is not from China. It’s from Canada and made in country. I’m not sure what people here expected. 400 dollars? 200 dollars? 800 for the Case, and the backplane is reasonable due to where it has been manufactured. Sure, you can get another case for 200 or 300 dollars or DIY your own, then do that. China is cheap. If I hadn’t built another NAS already for a truenas server, I would pull the trigger on this.
Downvote away.
Completely agree. I’m not sure why people expected the price to be competitive with retired enterprise gear from eBay. It’s a premium product, made by a small company in Canada, for an extremely niche audience.
Personally, while I haven’t ordered one myself, I’m glad there are more options available that aren’t made out of riveted sheet metal and flimsy plastic.
To be fair , they design and manufacture the case in canada … so it makes sense that it’ll be a little more expensive than when you get the labor done in china
And yeah when you compare it to synology , i guess you still get more bang for the buck … but YMMV
It’s not cheap to operate a business in Canada
Is there an easy way to buy the 45 bay chassis bare? i dont want to use the daughter boards, i really just want a case that can hold more than 28 drives. honestly i just want the metal chassis and front/back panels, but im sure they would charge $$$.
I’m assuming it’s because they are in Canada, and prices tend to be higher there.
They need to find a US warehouse to ship to US customers.
I always buy used NICs and HBAs off eBay, way cheaper even if I had to replace it on my dime.
45 drives is in Canada? Interesting. I did not know that.
Somehow, I just don’t think the product or the accessories they are selling, are truly aimed at the homelab community. I think they are aimed at the tech bro crowd who want to go and sip overpriced drinks While telling their buddies that they have a new homelab even though they haven’t figured out how to turn it on yet
Don’t worry, they have a lot of shelves too.
Why on earth are sas cables 30$? What’s so expensive about sas cable when sata cables are like 2$
sounds like they’re probably selling off leftover inventory from customer builds.
these parts wouldn’t make great sense for a 15-bay, but for a 45-bay probably right at home.
I bought the full build, no sales tax/ shipping, just a 61.77 international fee. :). Definitely would not buy anything on the estore though because can just google and get it cheaper :).
Seriously, they call it a homelab store and are easily charging 40% more than just going to other resellers. Like $90 for a Supermicro AOC-SLG3-2M2. You can buy them on Amazon for $55 all day long. It’s a dumb card, you have to enable bifurcation on the slot you install it in.
I certainly didn’t build myself a homelab to pay double for everything.
Sorry Marcus, I don’t feel that overburdened by money.
Wouldnt it be possible to take base spec and source cheaper addon parts?
I am not sure some stamped tin and a few circuit boards are worth $1000.
IMHO this is just a $150 Rosewill RSV-R4200U with backplanes, so maybe $300 max.
I would MAYBE think about this if it came fully function certified system for $1000 that I could just drop drives into, but even then that is out of the typical homelab price point and entering the SHO market.
I have 3 or 4 chenbro/rosewill whatever Chinese server cases. I also have a 45drives q30. I’m never getting another rosewill/chenbro.
Laughably high price on the chasis and backplane. More expensive than a Norco 24 bay with less features. They didn’t seem to have read what people wanted in their thread.
They read the ones that agreed with what they already wanted to make
I think they are aiming for “cool stuff, easy mode” for those that want to pay for it.
That’s great and all, but if you’re creative there’s cheaper things you can do. Which to me that’s more fun anyways.
I’m glad it’s not just me that thinks their prices are insane (and not in a good way). At first I thought maybe they were showing Canadian prices so I added something to my cart and checked. Nope. USD.
I recently bought a metric crapton of Seagate Exos 20TBs and it looks like they’re overpricing that drive by about $130.
I think it was during the self hosted podcast last episode or the one before, they had 45 drives on. They basically said the drives that you can buy from their store will be marked up and they completely expect you to buy them elsewhere.
~$150-170 (depending on sale) over the newegg price for the drive new