A JBOD enclosure is a device that is attached to a computer that provides additional storage. If you neeed a few extra terabytes, (and who doesn’t?) you can easily expand your storage capacity by using JBOD enclosures. JBOD actually stands for “Just a Bunch Of Disks (or Drives)”, and it means the drives themselves, without necessarily being in a RAID configuration.
To show off some of what you can do, and to give you some easy ways to spend your storage budget:
Here are 5 awesome JBOD enclosures:
JBOD Enclosures #1 – 4 bays; 12TB total capacity
Mediasonic ProBox 4 Bay Hard Drive Enclosure with USB 3
This JBOD enclosure from Mediasonic has room for up to four (4) drives. The drives need to be 3.5″ SATA I / II / III. The drives can be from different brands and capacity up to 3TB per drive.
Note: Motherboard’s SATA port MUST support Port Multiplier in order for your computer to recognize multiple hard drive if the unit is connected via eSATA. (Most modern systems do, but you can check with your computer manufacturer’s documentation or your system BIOS to be sure.)
Fill it up with 4 Hitachi 3TB Hard Drives.
JBOD Enclosures #2 – 8 bays; 24TB total capacity
Sans Digital TowerRAID 8 Bay JBOD Performance Tower
If you need more space, you need more drives. And with 8 drive bays you definitely get more space.You do need two eSata ports for running 8 drives – so it comes bundled with a controller card for providing those ports. The controller also provides the RAID functionality – which is a big plus if you want to take advantage of a RAID 0/1/10/5 configuration. Like the Mediasonic, this accepts drives up to 3TB. Plug in up to 8 HDDsand max out with 24 TB of JBOD storage.
JBOD Enclosures #3 – 12 bay rackmount – 36 TB total capacity
Sans Digital AccuSTOR AS216X6 12-Bay Rackmount JBOD
Sans Digital 12 Bay JBOD Enclosure
This AccuSTOR rack-mountable 2U 12 bay storage enclosure. It supports SAS 6G, and accepts either 6G SAS or 6G SATA drives. Using a 6G RAID controller, this storage unit gives more than 1GB/s of data transfer (depending on RAID format). The AccuSTOR AS212X6 includes a user selectable switch that allows monitoring via the RAID controllers, so that you can get detailed information on individual drives through SCSI Enclosure Services (SES).Use a compatible RAID cards like the LSI MegaRAID controller and can use very fast SAS drives.
JBOD Enclosures #4 – 24 bay Hot-Swap with 72TB total capacity
Norco DS-24ER External 4U 24 Bay Hot-Swap SAS/SATA Rackmount JBOD Enclosure
Norco 24 Bay External JBOD EnclosureA 4U rackmount design with 24 hot-swappable SATA II, SATA III or SAS 6G drive bays. It has a built-in 6Gb/s SAS Expander for single SFF-8088 cable connectivity.
It provides system status notification through LED for link status and activity, an LCD, and an alarm.
It also includes a full range redundant power supply.
The data comes in through a single SFF-8088 and there are two more SFF-8088 outbound connectors to expand with additional JBOD enclosures if you need to.
JBOD Enclosures #5 – 42-bay 126TB rackmount that’s expandable to 252TB!
Sans Digital AccuSTOR 4U 42 Bay Rackmount 6G SAS/SATA to 6G SAS JBOD with SAS Expander
With a high performance RAID controller card, the AS442X6 is capable of delivering over 1700MB/s in read and 1500MB/s write performance, doubling the existing 3G SAS expander bandwidth.
System status information is provided by the LED, including hard drives, power supply and cooling fan status. All necessary hardware comes standard including mini-SAS cable and hard drives tray modules.
Now you know what to get your favorite geek.
When you need to expand, it’s not hard for your eyes to be bigger than your stomach, digitally speaking at least. If you haven’t yet considered adding some storage to your home server or workstation, you might now think that it’s an easy thing to do. It is very easy, and can be done very affordably.
Of course, when you need more capacity for enterprise systems, it’s also just as easy to use the same concepts to add a lot of storage capacity through JBOD enclosures.
Now you have an idea of what is available when you want to get your favorite geek soem JBOD enclosures for Christmas, or their birthday, or just because you love them.
