A Decent, Low-Cost 2U Server Chassis For $69

[phoronix Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close phoronix]

Phoronix: A Decent, Low-Cost 2U Server Chassis For $69

For those in need of a 2U server chassis to handle micro-ATX/mini-ITX motherboards, the Rosewill RSV-Z2600 rackmount server chassis is the best deal I've found thus far and am happy with them after purchasing several for use in the new server farm.

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=21537

[markus_b Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close markus_b]

Power-Supply air path covered

From the pictures I looks to me like the case has a major flaw:

The air supply for the big fan of the power supply is going through the top cover. This is fine, if you leave a 1U space between the individual servers, but this is not the case. You stack them directly one on top of the other. So the air supply of the lower chassis gets obstructed by the upper chassis.

These chassis are not designed to be stacked directly !

[TeoLinuX Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close TeoLinuX]

From the pictures I looks to me like the case has a major flaw:

The air supply for the big fan of the power supply is going through the top cover. This is fine, if you leave a 1U space between the individual servers, but this is not the case. You stack them directly one on top of the other. So the air supply of the lower chassis gets obstructed by the upper chassis.

These chassis are not designed to be stacked directly !

Exactly my thoughts

[Michael Phoronix Find all posts View Profile Close Michael]

From the pictures I looks to me like the case has a major flaw:

The air supply for the big fan of the power supply is going through the top cover. This is fine, if you leave a 1U space between the individual servers, but this is not the case. You stack them directly one on top of the other. So the air supply of the lower chassis gets obstructed by the upper chassis.

These chassis are not designed to be stacked directly !

Yes was an initial concern of mine too, though as mentioned in article though, the performance so far hasn't yielded any thermal related issues.

[markus_b Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close markus_b]

Yes was an initial concern of mine too, though as mentioned in article though, the performance so far hasn't yielded any thermal related issues.

I suspect you did not have a lot of load yet. With modern motherboards, CPUs etc. you will end up between 100 and 200W, the power supply, hopefully will be 80% efficient, and dissipate below 40W. That amount of power can be dissipated by the stray air pushed by the blocked ventilator.

The main problem is that the off the shelf components (power supplies, motherboards) are designed for standard cases. This is the heritage of Intel's ATX design. For example the big fan of the power supply is supposed to be close to the CPU on a motherboard, so that the air moved by the power supply fan cools the CPU too. A 2U rack-mount case is too low to allow for correct positioning of the power supply.

Also, all proper rack-mount equipment is designed to draw cool air from the front and push it out at the back or side. This requires specially designed cases, power supplies and often motherboards. Unfortunately no standard has evolved yet, so there are not low-cost components and every server manufacturer creates it own designs.

[schmidtbag Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close schmidtbag]

If these chassis are mounted above everything else then these power supplies are fine. But yeah, I'd look into getting PSUs with a fan on back of rather than the bottom. In some situations, I'd be a little worried about proper CPU cooling too.

Those chassis do seem a bit cramped, but luckily for Michael, he doesn't really need to use up much more space than is available to him.

[Kushan Phoronix Member Find all posts View Profile Close Kushan]

I agree the air circulation looks bad. I don't think the PSU is as big of a problem as the CPU fan, though. The PSU at least has a vent, but I can't see anything equivalent for the CPU.

I wonder if it would be worth switching one of the front fans to be an output rather than 3 inputs. 3 inputs into a closed space with almost no exhaust seems like a bad idea, at least having one output would be a start.

[Michael Phoronix Find all posts View Profile Close Michael]

So far there's no issues except with potentially one system (but I think that's a motherboard issue). And with these systems running the same workloads in the same pattern daily in a temperature-controlled environment, things should be panning out fine.

[DeepDayze Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close DeepDayze]

I agree the air circulation looks bad. I don't think the PSU is as big of a problem as the CPU fan, though. The PSU at least has a vent, but I can't see anything equivalent for the CPU.

I wonder if it would be worth switching one of the front fans to be an output rather than 3 inputs. 3 inputs into a closed space with almost no exhaust seems like a bad idea, at least having one output would be a start.

That would be my idea too. At least it is possible to mitigate the cooling issue using that little hardware hack of reversing one of the fans. Maybe the middle of the 3 fans in the back could be flipped over.

@Michael could you try that?

[Michael Phoronix Find all posts View Profile Close Michael]

That would be my idea too. At least it is possible to mitigate the cooling issue using that little hardware hack of reversing one of the fans. Maybe the middle of the 3 fans in the back could be flipped over.

@Michael could you try that?

If I run into any issues, would look into something like that, but with things panning out so far, no reason to unbolt them :P