Lets try and cram 6x SSDs and a 10Gbit PCIe card in a SC505-203B...

[Quartermaster]

I have the wonderful problem of some A2SDi-4C-HLN4F boards without 10Gbit networking in SC505-203B chassis, spare Intel X520-DA2 cards, and spare 2TB SSDs.

In my mind there's potential for a nice, low power Proxmox host or general purpose low power workhorse for point in time projects.

The SC505-203B can fit a HHHL PCIe card with the both spaces for Supermicro 2x 2.5" drive cages in use, but it would be fun to be able to cram 6x SSDs in for 10TB of raidz1.

Silverstone make a drive cage for 3.5" slots that can house 3x 2.5" SSDs (SilverStone SDP08-E INTRODUCTION) but it has some flanges that make it take up the full dimensions of a 3.5" drive, which won't allow use of a HHHL PCIe card.

Apart from buying a 3D printer, designing, and printing a solution, or selling all the hardware to buy something with 10GbE onboard, has anyone else got some ideas on how this could all fit together in a non-rubberband+superglue form?

 

[Zedicus]

just from the pictures i am seeing, it looks like you could take a dremel to the silverstone ssd brackets and make everything fit. it looks like there is maybe only a half inch of overlap and you could cut that and more off the brackets and still be fine.

 

[nerdalertdk]

Here is what I did in my hpe dl20

https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/lff-bays-on-hp-dl20-gen10.24361/post-232251

 

[UhClem]

First the "Analog" ... Is this a show-stopper? (from your linked page)

Remark :​

* Installing three 7mm 2.5" hard drives may require staggered placement where the middle drive is oriented to have its connector facing the opposite direction from the other two drives.​

A possibly less-restrictive option:
ICY DOCK Tool-Less Triple 2.5 to 3.5 HDD Drive Bay SSD Mounting Bracket Kit Adapter - EZ-FIT Trio MB610SP

And, the "Digital" ... If you use all 8 SATA connections (0:3 & 4:7), you have NO PCIe lanes for your (open-ended?) x4[*] slot. [See SM notes re:Flexible I/O]

But a workaround would be to configure for 4 lanes and only 4 (on-board) SATAs, but use your M.2 slot with one of these:
M.2 to NGFF 5 Ports SATA3.0 Adapter Card JMB585 M.2 Key M [**]

[*] Your Intel card is x8 so you need open-ended, and it is Gen2 so you need (all) x4 lanes to get full 10GbE throughput.
[**] Your M.2 slot is x2 Gen3, as is this card. That will get you 1700-1800 MB/s -- ~450 each for 4 connections.