A friend gifted me a Dell R730 server, with the 8 2.5inch bay chassis. I’m trying to figure out what would be the best drives to put in it.

My current esx host (which I’m replacing) is a MUCH older dell with 8 3.5 inch bays in it. Those bays are filled with 8tb WD reds, but I am only using about 10tb of that array.

I plan on having the new drives in a RAID array (50, 60, maybe just 6, idk yet)

I am trying to figure out what the best path forward will be for new 2.5 inch drives. This is what I’ve come up with so far

  • Seagate ST5000LM000, 5tb (slow, best price per tb, reliability / how easy would it be to find replacement drives down the road?)
  • Crucial MX500 series
  • Samsung EVO series
  • M.2 to SATA adapter like this (I have no clue if something like this would even work, but it’s an interesting thought…)

TIA for any thoughts / suggestions you can provide :)

Snarfy

ETA details

  • SnarfsmojoOPBEnglish
    1·
    11 months ago

    I ended up buying a used R730 LFF chassis for just $200 on ebay. this was hands down the most fiscally reasonable approach, as I can re-use my 8tb 3.5 inch drives. :)