US $192 ($190 BO) Great deal on a Quanta D51B-2U 2u Chassis

[SPCRich]

I'm hesitant to post this as I feel this is a rare opportunity, but I figured I'd be nice and help others out since everyone contributes great deals here.

I just snagged a Quanta D51B-2U chassis off ebay:

QuantaGrid Server D51B-2U SFF Barebone System NO CPU RAM HDD CHEAPER THAN R720 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for QuantaGrid Server D51B-2U SFF Barebone System NO CPU RAM HDD CHEAPER THAN R720 at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

Listing says $192, I OBO'd it for $190....yeah i know, $2 is $2.

I was worried a little at first because the listing says "no rails", and I reached out to the seller to see if they had rails, they said no. The only ones I could find on ebay were from Germany for 100$ + 70$ shipping...almost as much as the chassis.

Well, It arrived today, and as soon as I opened the box, I was surprised not once, not twice, not thrice, but FOUR times...It contained:

1.) Set of rails
2.) FULL set of drive trays (not shown in the photo, at $5-10$ each on ebay, thats ~$120 - $200 alone
3.) 12Gbps SAS controller (listing says only SATA on board) with BBU
4.) The best part.... IT WAS IN MINT... I mean MINT condition. plastic still on top, immaculate inside, no dirt/scratches anywhere. This thing looks like it just came off the assembly line.

It contained both CPU heatsinks as well.

for $190$, this thing is a steal. I can't comment on if they all come like this, but considering I have the worst luck usually, it's safe to say the probably all do.

Sorry for the long post. Hopefully this helps someone else out! I purchased it because the 2x 1U's I'm using for Plex + K8s are just too loud/power hungry, consolidating them into a larger 2U with more airflow. Although I don't have a use for a second, I might just get one for a backup / second K8s node later. @ $190, its hard to say no.

 

[Xoid]

Thanks for this, it's very tempting. I haven't seen anything that cheap with two 2011-v3 sockets. I noticed the listing you linked for the SFF chassis says that rails are included, but for the LFF model it says they aren't. I think either way it's a gamble on whether the rails and sleds are included or not, but for $190 you're right, hard to pass up. Gonna have to sleep on this one...

 

[SPCRich]

Thanks for this, it's very tempting. I haven't seen anything that cheap with two 2011-v3 sockets. I noticed the listing you linked for the SFF chassis says that rails are included, but for the LFF model it says they aren't. I think either way it's a gamble on whether the rails and sleds are included or not, but for $190 you're right, hard to pass up. Gonna have to sleep on this one...

They must have updated the listing. When I ordered it Friday, it had no mention of rails, so i messaged them and they replied back "we don't have them, sorry". Maybe they went and checked?

Also i was able to knock off $2, but I bet you could probably knock off 5 or more for a better deal. Also, if you're into reselling, I bet you could flip the trays + SAS controller for more than 190 alone

 

[Fritz]

Buy some ear muffs. This thing is loud.

 

[Thomas H]

Buy some ear muffs. This thing is loud.

That kills it for me. Any recommendations for quieter ones?

 

[PGlover]

Will a E5-2600v2 CPU work in this unit?

 

[PGlover]

Buy some ear muffs. This thing is loud.

How does the sound compare to Dell Poweredge servers (R620, R630, R720)?

 

[Fritz]

That kills it for me. Who makes quieter ones?

It goes wah wah wah wah........ I ordered a set of fans for it and it made no difference. Plugging in only one PSU made no difference. If it was a steady noise I could grin and bear it but as is, no.

 

[EasyRhino]

Will a E5-2600v2 CPU work in this unit?

If it's version for v3, then nope

 

[Fritz]

Will a E5-2600v2 CPU work in this unit?

Don't think so.

 

[Markess]

Buy some ear muffs. This thing is loud.

Thanks to @Fritz, I'm saved from yet another mistake. 2011-3 for that price is great. But, all my gear is in the home office with me, and if @Fritz couldn't quiet it down, I doubt I could either.

A word on the seller: I buy from them rather frequently and have never been dissatisfied with anything. Based on my experience and posts on the internet, they seem to list condition & included parts/accessories on the "lowest end" of the lot when theres a large quantity available. I bought a different system from them recently with "no cpu, heatsink, or RAM" and got all three. I got an E3-1230 &16gb of RAM, while others seem to have gotten 1270s, 1240s, or none as the listing said they would. If nothing else, its a fun, if pricey, lottery experience But, If they said no rails or had pictures with no drive sleds, I bet its inevitable that someone won't get them.

 

[SPCRich]

If it's version for v3, then nope

only v3/v4

 

[SPCRich]

Buy some ear muffs. This thing is loud.

I think loud is subjective, It's of course not as quiet as a WC'd desktop, or a 4u SMC with -SQ power supplies, but it HAS to be quieter than the 1U D51B-1U's that I have, those things with their tiny 60mm or whatever fans sound like banshees.

Also, FWIW, you can spin down the fans using IPMItool. I wrote a script that drops them down to 30-50%, which makes the sound managable. I haven't hooked this thing up yet, but considering it has larger fans than the 1U's, it has to be quieter. These sit in my garage so sound isn't as much a concern to me, but I think replacing the 2 1u's with this (which can move air better at lower speeds) will still be quieter than what I have now.

Thoughts?

 

[semidetached]

I think loud is subjective, It's of course not as quiet as a WC'd desktop, or a 4u SMC with -SQ power supplies, but it HAS to be quieter than the 1U D51B-1U's that I have, those things with their tiny 60mm or whatever fans sound like banshees.

The pitch of the fans in this unit is better than the 1U, but since the 2U has larger counter-rotating pairs of fans they end up producing a very noticeable and annoying beat frequency. The 1U is more like white noise where the 2U is "WAH WAH WAH WAH" and it slowly drives you insane.

 

[SPCRich]

The pitch of the fans in this unit is better than the 1U, but since the 2U has larger counter-rotating pairs of fans they end up producing a very noticeable and annoying beat frequency. The 1U is more like white noise where the 2U is "WAH WAH WAH WAH" and it slowly drives you insane.

Thanks for the info. I have the 2 1u's sitting on top of each other in my rack, one running about 30-40% fan speed, the other running 50% (the 30-40% is lower load, just running plex). It kinda makes a wha-wha sound now since they're out of sync, I'll fire this up once I can get some spare ram sticks to throw in it. If it's REALLY bad, I'll try slowing down the fans to see if that helps too. I really wish SMC -SQ PSUs fit in here, I find power supplies sometimes are the loudest part of these things. I've got a 4u and the 21u's plus a Palo Alto networks PA-3020 in the rack and with everything shut up (glass front door) I can't really hear it in my living room, so as long as the cumulative sound level stays around there, it's a win for me.

I'll follow up in a few days once some more ram arrives and I can start populating this thing. At the very least, if it ends up being a screaming banshee and I can't find quieter fans, I can recycle it, I'm not out tons of money

Thanks for the info @Fritz and @semidetached

 

[gb00s]

I have the 2 1u's sitting on top of each other in my rack, one running about 30-40% fan speed, the other running 50% (the 30-40% is lower load, just running plex) ....

Do you cool passive only? Are you not able to use 1U active coolers, like an HCIPC P301-1 HCFB1 (Square 80x80) if this is for 2011-3? I'm sure there are Narrow-Pattern version out there for 2011-3 if Square-Pattern is available. Made a huge difference in noise.

 

[SPCRich]

Do you cool passive only? Are you not able to use 1U active coolers, like an HCIPC P301-1 HCFB1 (Square 80x80) if this is for 2011-3? I'm sure there are Narrow-Pattern version out there for 2011-3 if Square-Pattern is available. Made a huge difference in noise.

I have a 1u cooler with fan in my 4u Supermicro storage box, that helped quite a bit with the noise in that (able to run the chassis fans around 50% or less there as well and still have temps in the high 30-low 40 C range, plus i have the -SQ model PSU's that are virtually silent. Since this case has more room inside, going with an active cooler is a possibility, as long as the fan doesn't interfere with the shroud. I should know in a day or two how this works out, but I'm not too concerned at the moment. I've spent a lot of time in datacenters, My "annoying" level is Arista switches at the moment, anything quieter is fine by me.

 

[SPCRich]

Just fired it up with 2 E5-2630L V3's and a single stick each of 4GB RAM (all i had on hand. It screamed about the ram (my guess is it doesn't like just one stick, according to the ipmi log). but It fired up. The initial blow-out was about as loud as my 4u's blowout, but after that it quieted way down. Subjectively I'd say it was at least as loud as one of my 1u's with the fans around 40-50%, but there is, as mentioned, a slight "WUB WUB WUB WUB" sound from the fans. It's less noisy for sure then 2 1U's though. This was just sitting in the bios, obviously no OS yet or fan tuning, but I think it'll be manageable.

 

[PGlover]

Just fired it up with 2 E5-2630L V3's and a single stick each of 4GB RAM (all i had on hand. It screamed about the ram (my guess is it doesn't like just one stick, according to the ipmi log). but It fired up. The initial blow-out was about as loud as my 4u's blowout, but after that it quieted way down. Subjectively I'd say it was at least as loud as one of my 1u's with the fans around 40-50%, but there is, as mentioned, a slight "WUB WUB WUB WUB" sound from the fans. It's less noisy for sure then 2 1U's though. This was just sitting in the bios, obviously no OS yet or fan tuning, but I think it'll be manageable.

Would you purchase another?

I have a 3U and 4U SuperMicro currently. Thinking about replacing those with 2 of the Quanta D51B-2U. Good or bad move?

 

[vintagehardware]

There are several disadvantages compared with SM I can think of: one is that with the air shroud you can not use full length pcie cards, the other is the caddies are less durable, the springs tend to fall off.
also Bios is less tunable. You can not set pcie bifurcation for example. At least I could not find it.
And it does not consume less power than a more equiped SM 3U.