- cross-posted to:
- selfhosting@slrpnk.net
- cross-posted to:
- selfhosting@slrpnk.net
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.
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This is some proper cyberpunk. Great job.
I like it. The OCD in me is screaming why you didn’t use a dremel tool to cut the slot for the USB ports instead of using a rusty, dull, steak knife from the junk drawer, but that’s just me. LOL
So I actually have a setup similar to this, but with a mini pc (m.2 to 6x sata adapter, each one connected to a 4tb ssd - well eventually, only 2 are populated currently) and I did use a dremmel to cut through the metal top of the case and it was still a horrible sharp mess, even after I tried sanding it down. I ended up 3d printing a custom i/o shield to stop my cables (or fingers) getting sliced on it and that actually works really well!
Edit: I dropped some pics of my setup in the comments on the original thread!
But it doesn’t bother you those are SATA ports?
I would love to watch a short documentary following you trying to take this on a plane
waves hard drives with loose cables around
It’s just a hard drive! What’s the problem?!
gets shot
This post is cursed.
Not because of the insane jank, of course. That’s on brand for self host and I love it.
It is cursed because it has awakened something in me, and I can feel every old laptop in my vicinity trembling in fear.
I can feel every old laptop in my vicinity trembling in fear.
Don’t deny them that last chance to live a life of purpose.
That’s janky as hell, I love it.
❌ Fat Client
✅ Fattest Client
ClientServer
Next step is to free the acer from it’s physical bonds and screw the motherboard to the 3D printed stand.
It’s handy having the service screen though.
One could frame it and put it on the wall
if you wire up some blinky LEDs to the power supply, then yes. I NEEDS THEM BLINKYS
This has awakened sonething in me
this is cursed and i love it
This is the type of stuff I love to see the most when it comes to PCs. This to me is far more impressive then someone with a standard case, with standard RGB fans, standard AIO RGB cooler…
This reminds me of stuff I did in college.
Lol, cause who wants to use a single USB to interface with the laptop? That’s crazy.
The fact that there exists an m.2 x6 port SATA adapter is the wildest part to me.
There is an adapter for everthing
There’s a NINE PORT ONE! That’s bonkers!
I was also very happy to find out they exist, otherwise this whole thing would’ve been a no-starter.
I used one for my server. I’m quite happy with it
Excellent hack.
In case you’re a masochist like me and want a lot more work on your hands, then you could remove the whole laptop mobo and make its own case and make it more compact in the process.
I’ve done this recently to make a standalone machine out of a busted laptop. This can give you a single, more compact unit with all the parts inside. You can improve the cooling and noise too (by using desktop fans). You’ll maintain your laptop resale value too by not destroying the case and being able to put the mobo back in place in the future. Infact, with today’s ram prices, the reason I went down this route is because you can get broken laptops with soldered in DDR5 ram.
This can give you a single, more compact unit with all the parts inside.
what if i want a multiplex, larger unit with several parts outside? can this help me accomplish that too?
Since this is DIY, you can fuck it up as badly as you want. The possibilities are endless!
@cRazi_man @selfhosted My kind of retirement project. The only problem is that time is not endless and they won’t tell me the deadline.
I’ve been pondering doing this to a broken iMac I’ve got.
It got donated to me by someone who needed to thin out his studio a bit, so it didn’t cost me a penny. But I took the screen off to give it a clean out and repaste, apparently didn’t tape it in place securely enough as a temporary measure, so the screen fell off. And smashed.
I did some swearing.
However, it’s still a surprisingly handy spec. 3.5ghz i5, 24gb RAM and a Radeon GPU. So I’ve been wondering about pulling the guts and turning it into a desktop, then making it my home server to replace the 2014 Mac mini I currently use.
ponderings intensify
I still have my black Core 2 duo Black Macbook, it’s cut to a 4th of its size, a magnet is stuck near the lid sensor and it outputs video from the port on the side.
I mean it used to output, I haven’t tried turning it on in like a decade
Watch this guy’s video. He DIY restores a smashed iMac screen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FStfdGjAwc
I’ve gone this route! Anything with a busted screen is fair game to me, though I haven’t picked up any recently, mostly just tiny/mini/micros (and heavy on the lenovo tiny).
But a custom hacked up laptop can be a great option especially with tight space to work with
Edit: I’m surprised I missed your original post! I did the same, though what I reused was first a lenovo tiny, more recently updated with a digital signage player I picked up that I swapped parts out on - way more fun than a standard console imo!
I thought about replacing the entire bottom part of the laptop, but then I looked at the screw layout and thought this is way too much effort for not much benefit. I am not lacking in rack space so I am okay with it being bulky.
I’ve literally been considering exactly this for a media center. I already have a server built put of an old tower, but it’s got limited specs and I don’t want to bog down the other stuff running a gui and all that.
That’s scary looking but also really awesome.
so what kind of looks did you get when you booted that up in the public library? how long before either (a) the cool librarian asked you how you did it or (b) the jerk librarian asked you not to burn down the library
I’m more irritated than I’d like to admit by the fact that there is no 12V to 6x SATA power converter going with that M.2 to 6x SATA adapter.
Well, I just used a similar adapter in my tower to get more sata ports. M.2 is not just for laptops. Even my ancient mobo had a slot.
Also slightly bugging me, but I didn’t find 6x SATA power. And my plan always was to use 4 drives.
