Forum Discussion

Aspirant

Dec 22, 2017

Solved

Does the RN214 come with trays to support mounting large drives?

I am trying to decide between the RN214 and RN424 and plan to use larger capacity drives. Probably 6TB or 10TB. I understand these newer, larger drives have different mount points. Can someone confir...

Hard Disk

Streak2
Dec 23, 2017
Here are photos of one of the drives in my RN214. It's 2TB Toshiba dt01aca200

Also, see here for drive compatability

https://kb.netgear.com/20641/ReadyNAS-Hard-Disk-Compatibility-List

BJB

Aspirant

Dec 23, 2017

Thanks for the pix. I read that some of the newer drives mount from the bottom or something.
Looks like there are the mounting holes for those.
BJB

StephenB

Guru - Experienced User

Dec 23, 2017

BJB wrote:
Thanks for the pix.

I posted a side-by-side of the old/new trays about a year ago - you can see it here: https://community.netgear.com/t5/Idea-Exchange-for-ReadyNAS/Update-Disk-Trays-to-handle-newer-disks/idc-p/1168642/highlight/true#M697

The photos above suggest the new RN214s are in fact shipping with the new trays. Though you might still get the old trays, depending on the age of the inventory.

BJB wrote:
I read that some of the newer drives mount from the bottom or something.

"or something".... Overall, the issue is that the center mounts on the drives (both side and bottom) limit the interior space for the disk platters. So manufacturers specified "alternative mounting" some years ago, so to eliminate this constraint.

If your drives have the center side hole, then you can use the normal tool-less mounting. My 6 TB and 8 TB WDC Red drives do have the center side hole. So do Streak2's Toshiba disks. But the larger Ironwolf do not (and I suspect some WDC drives also will not).

If the disk doesn't have the center side holes, you remove the plastic inserts in the tray, and use the screws that are shipped with the units to mount the drives to the bottom of the tray. There are instructions in the hardware manuals on how to do this (the inserts also need to be removed if you are using 2.5" SSDs).

If you look at the side-by-side photos I posted, you'll see that Netgear added a couple more mounting holes in the bottom of the new trays. That's because many drives have also dropped the center mounting holes on the bottom of the disk also. You can still attach these disks to the old trays, but only with two screws. The newer trays should let you mount any drive with 4 screws.

BJB
Aspirant
Dec 23, 2017
StephenB,
That makes it crystal clear.
Thanks!
BJB
- Streak2
  Master
  Dec 23, 2017
  Just as an FYI. My drives arrived already mounted but not using any screws. They're held in place by the center plastic locating knob you can see in my second picture above. So unless you really want to screw them into the tray the screw hole location shouldn't really matter.
  - StephenB
    Guru - Experienced User
    Dec 23, 2017
    Streak2 wrote:
    Just as an FYI. My drives arrived already mounted but not using any screws. They're held in place by the center plastic locating knob you can see in my second picture above. So unless you really want to screw them into the tray the screw hole location shouldn't really matter.
    
    Streak2 - Your drives are small.
    
    This matters because many large drives like the seagate shown below don't have the center side mount point. So the plastic insert you are talking about needs to be removed.
    
    And if you look at the bottom of that drive, you'll see it has no center mount point there either:
    
    With the original tray, the only place where the tray holes lines up with the drive mount point is the pair of holes furthest away from the SATA connector. That's probably ok, but it does suggest that there will be more vibration at that connector.
    
    With the new tray, both pairs of mount points on the bottom of the drive can be secured with the screws.