A JBOD enclosure is a device that is attached to a computer that provides additional storage.  If you need 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

Buy MediaSonic ProBox 4 Bay JBOD at Amazon.com
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 – 5 bay Tower Storage from Sans Digital


Buy Sans Digital 5-Bay Hardware RAID5 Tower Storage Enclosure with 6G PCIe 2.0 from Amazon.com

The Sans Digital 5-bay JBOD Enclosure uses SATA 150 or 300 drives to supply a variety of RAID options for your storage: RAID 0, 1, 10, 3, 5, Clone with Hot-Spare or JBOD. The drives have rails and are hot-swappable to help with easy replacements in case of a drive failure.

JBOD Enclosures #4 – CineRAID Home from TekRam

Buy TekRam CineRAID 4 BAY JBOD Enclosure from Amazon.com

The TekRam CineRAID Home has a storage capacity of up to 12TB once it’s populated with drives. It’s compatible with Linux, Mac and Windows and includes a feature to automatically rebuild a RAID 5 if you’re running it in that RAID mode. In addition to RAID 5, you can also use a RAID 0,1,10, or 3.
It also includes some configuration software to help you get it set up in on a Windows computer. If you need storage but you’re not exactly comfortable working with Drive Manager on your PC, this might be a great choice for your JBOD enclosure.

JBOD Enclosures #5 – Simple and inexpensive 2 Bay JBOD enclosure

Buy Rosewill Aluminum DUAL-BAY External JBOD Enclosure from Amazon.com

If you really only need JBOD, and nothing else – AND you are looking for an inexpensive solution to hook up a couple of drives, then this 2 bay option from Rosewill should be just what you’re looking for.

Nothing fancy on this model, but it can usually be found for under $50 and if you’ve already got the drives then you are good to go!

Now you know what to get your favorite geek (or yourself)

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.