ARK IPC-3U380D Black 3U Rackmount Server Case 3 External 5.25" Drive Bays

Pros: Simple, and built like a tank.

Cons: None

Other Thoughts: Less is more.

Pros: Decent design. Somewhat sturdy.

Cons: One of the 40mm fans was in pieces. Kind of frustrating and would have liked it to be turn key.

The case is NOT 14.96 inches, it's 15.75.

I don't trash many products, but this is annoying.

Other Thoughts: N/A

Pros: Fairly sturdy construction, a reasonable size, and plenty of HDD space. The fan are nice and quiet, and with the open construction, airflow is easily managed.

Cons: Not terribly well-designed.

Other Thoughts: The placement for the HDD and 5.25" drive holders isn't terribly well planned out. If you have a full-size ATX board, something is going to get blocked off, even if it's just the bottom-most space in the three 5.25" bays. To even reach the screws to remove the drive supports requires a driver with a 6" shaft, and it's definitely advisable to save the drive placement for absolute last.

Once everything was wrangled together, though, it was a breeze. Fans are quiet, and there's enough room to manage cable runs however you prefer. Another warning; the power LED is BRIGHT. I mean retinal damage bright. A bit of duct tape over it and it was *still* shining through.

A reasonable case overall, but could definitely benefit from being maybe an inch longer and somewhat sturdier HDD supports.

Pros: - Case is great for the size. I got it to fit in a tripp lite wall mounted rack. It is only a max of 16 inch's deep.
- Stock fans move a ton of air, plus a air filter.
- Well built. The complete system can be picked up by one of the handles ~30Lbs.
- 3 5 1/4 bays in 3U
- Loads of internal storage.

Cons: - There was not a ton of info of what fits with what. Like you can't use 1 of the 3.5" bays with a matx/atx board.
- Top panel screws are on the sides.
- No rails.

Other Thoughts: If you are going to use an ATX board, you lose 2 3.5" drive bays, and the bottom 5.25" bay is rather short.
Also with a regular PSU you could have trouble getting to headers on the board.

I put a mATX board, a 5 in 3 hotswap bay, a raid card, and a sfx psu. Everything fits as is, but no way you could do the 5 in 3 bay with a regular psu or a regular atx board. The 5.25" bays are really short, and the hotswap bay would hit the mobo, or psu.

I would highly recommend the silverstone 450W SFX PSU. It is a small form factor PSU, but it comes with an ATX bracket. It is really short, and tiny. Gives clearance for ATX boards, and long 5.25 bays.

Also the AMS 5 in 3 hotswap bay is great. 5 hotswap hard drives, for cheap. You have to use an ITX or mATX board to fit it though.

My build:
- EVGA z68 mirco ATX
- i5-2500
- 2x4GB Samsung ddr3
- HighPoint RocketRAID 2720SGL
- AMS 5in3 Backplane
- 5 Samsung 1TB
- 60GB Mushkin SSD
- Silverstone 450W SFX PSU

Pros: - sturdy
- all hardware included
- clean look
- lots of fans

Cons: - fans are LOUD!
- need a LONG magnetic screwdriver to remove optical drive holder and HDD holders. not at all easy to install either.
- no cable management

Other Thoughts: A really good case for the price. Very roomy inside for all you need to build a server. Once power supply is in and all 4 fans connected the case looks a little sloppy. But over all this is certainly worth the price you pay for it. Got mine to make a home server and it is exactly what I needed. 1 egg for the difficult drive install and loud fans

Pros: Solid case, built strong, simple. Included fans could power a jet engine (and are almost as loud).

Cons: Be careful with full ATX size boards, they dont fit as well as they should be able to.. Power supply (Thermaltake TR2 W0379RU 500W ATX 12V v2.2) overlaps the end of my motherboard (GIGABYTE GA-970A-UD3 AM3+) covering almost all my front panel options.

Other Thoughts: probably should be considered primarily for micro ATX.

Pros: - Very sturdy construction.
- All mounting hardware for Motherboard (at least mine) included.
- Standoffs hold board high enough to route ATX Power (barely), CPU Power, Internal USB and Front Panel connectors.
- Fits very well in 3RU, no need to wiggle equipment above or below.
- Very easily migrated from an Antec 300 to this case since it contains lots of drive bays, and allows standard ATX PS.

Cons: I would like to have had another 3-4 inches of depth which would allow:

- 8 internal 3.5" drives to be used in the included mounting solution.
- Larger air gap between my 3x5.25 to 4x3.5 chassis and PS, and maybe include the possibility of flush mounting it.

Additionally:

- Fans mounting behind the front filter, but accessible from the front of the case. As it stands, you must remove all of the 3.5 inch drives to replace fans.
- Slightly shorter Front panel & Front USB cables
- Less ungodly bright Front panel LEDs

None of these are really show stoppers for me, just little nit-picks

Other Thoughts: I have what I'd consider to be an average sized ATX PS and a Silverstone CFP51-B bay adapter. With the power supply mounted, mounting the bay adapter causes some little issues. From previous reviews, I knew this was likely to happen, but thought I'd share my experience.

- Must yank out one of the standoffs, which is welded to the case. It's easy to get out, but you end up with a new hole under the case.
- In order to fit with my PS, the bay adapter must be mounted at the forward most position allowed by the internal brackets, which leaves about 1" sticking out of the front of the case. It sticks out no further than the front handles, so not a big deal to me.
- As mounted, I have about 1" of space from the adapter to the PS, which limits air flow.

Overall I like this case, but again, I would like to see it a few inches deeper.

Pros: Good air flow and if you are planing on putting your drives internal there is good space for that.

Cons: If you get a power supply of any quality, it may be too deep to place a 5x3 Hot swap drive Bay in. Or even a full size CD ROM in the external bays.

Other Thoughts: Keep in mind that if you have a wide main board, it could end up directly under the power supply. This case has the power supply at the left side which might it hard to fit your board under it.

Pros: - Good value for the price.
- Build quality is better than that of an average desktop case. All components are steel. There is no plastic whatsoever.
- 3x5 inch bays allow for a 5-in-3 HDD bay.
- Includes easily removable fan filter.
- Allows for desktop PSU which are usually quieter than a 2U/3U.

Cons: - No cable management hand holding. Up to the user to plan and figure out. The motherboard standoffs are tall enough to route a 4 pin CPU power cable under the board.
- Cooling seems insufficient for too many high power components if you want to keep the machine quiet.

Other Thoughts: High quality Delta fans included but they are loud as expected. They can be made quiet running at 5V.