Question 1

Could a 2.5"-3.5" drive adapter be placed inside the 3.5" toolless drive cages?

Accepted Answer

The tool less drive cages use plastic sleds, these sleds wrap around the drive and have metal and plastic pins that fit into the front most and rear most of the three screw holes on each side of a standard 3.5" drive. Google the drive tray part number "MCP-220-73101-0B" for pictures. Assuming the 2.5" to 3.5" adaptor uses these holes and is the same dimensions it should work, although I've seen plenty of adaptors with the screw holes not precisely placed or which only use the middle and rear screw holes on the sides of the drives.

Question 2

Can you mount non SuperMicro micro ATX boards in this chassis?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Micro ATX is a standard. Any board that conforms to that standard should mount.

Question 3

Is HDD cooling sufficient in this case? It's actually my biggest concern about it, since it seems that it has only one fan and there's no option to add additional one which will blow on HDDs.

Accepted Answer

That's going to depend on the number of drives and their types.  I have installed three Enterprise class SATA 7200rpm drives without any issues of overheating using the stock fan that's included.  I suppose if your drives are 10,000 rpm and they are normally warm to the touch you may want to add more cooling.  The case supports a second fan that installs below the hard drive cage, so yes you can have more cooling, but no, it doesn't blow directly on the drives.  Not withstanding, this is an excellent server case.  I have installed over 50 of these without any issues, and have been happy with the quality.  The power supply is top notch as well - I have yet to have a single one fail, so thank you Super Micro for making a quality case and power supply.

Question 4

Why the Super micro X7DCA-L MicroATX Motherboard does not fit within the Super micro CSE-731i-300B Black MicroATX case Pedestal Server?

Accepted Answer

The case was built with different mother board specifications in mind. The mount spots are not the same and they also have different mount points thus the screws that hold everything together don't quite work together properly. It all comes down to the size of the motherboard vs the space needed in the case. It was the manufacturers choice sadly on this one.

Question 5

What are the maximum dimensions for the optional front fan?  I purchased an 80mm fan, but it does not fit.

Accepted Answer

We ended up buying some very deep fans and we just removed the fan tray mounting hardware and mounted them directly onto the metal bar.  There are screw holes for 80mm fans, you dont have to use their little purple things.

Question 6

Hi,

How many SATA power connections did the provided PSU in this case have? Since there are 4 internal and 2 external bays, I would imagine that the psu had 6 SATA power connections.

Accepted Answer

There are 2 harnesses. One harness has 2 SATA and one Old Style power. The other harness has 2 SATA 1 Old Style and 1 Floppy. So there are only 4 SATA connections total. I like this case. I've never had more than 2 HDDs and 1 CD-ROM but if you were to fill up everything you will probably want to upgrade the supply.

Brand	SUPERMICRO
Model	CSE-731i-300B

Chassis Type	Mini-Tower
Color	Black
Motherboard Compatibility	9.6" x 9.6" micro-ATX
Power Supply	300W Bronze Level Certified High-Efficiency Power Supply

External 5.25" Drive Bays	2
Internal 3.5" Drive Bays	4
Expansion Slots	4 x full-height & full-length expansion slots

Dimensions	14.25" x 7.25" x 16.75"
Weight	16.00 lbs.

SUPERMICRO CSE-731i-300B Black Mini-Tower Server Case

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Item#: N82E16811152123