Silverstone Technology FS305-12G Three 5.25" to Five 3.5" hot-swap SATA/SAS Hard Drive cage, up to 12Gbit/s Transfer Rate with All Aluminum Construction, SST-FS305-12G

I recently picked up the SilverStone FS305-12G to add some extra drives to my system, and I'm really happy with it. This thing is built like a tank! Swapping drives is super easy with the hot-swap bays, which is awesome. I was worried about compatibility with my SAS drives, but it works perfectly. The built-in fan does a good job keeping things cool, and it's way quieter than I expected. I actually bought a Noctua fan to replace it, but honestly, I don't think I'll bother. It even comes with a key to lock the drives, which is a nice touch, and the little LED lights let you know what's going on. If you need more space for hard drives, definitely check this out. It's been great so far!

This probably should get somewhere between 4 and 5 stars, but 5 stars is for perfection. It's close but not quite there. My main issue with it is the latch mechanism which works well but I don't like how the strike plate is plastic. The latch is metal, but the stationary part that the latch hooks into is plastic. It's probably ok but I pull the release as I close the door because I'm picky and don't know if it'll wear the strike plate. If this is the only real complaint I can come up with, that should tell you the product is pretty good. There's a blue power LED, and each drive slot has its own LED that is blue when drive is present and a red LED that shines through the same little window for drive activity, making it turn purple when there's activity. And a fan hi/lo speed control which is awesome. I replaced resistors on the PCB to drastically lower the blinding LEDs and make the fan speed even lower, something that isn't easy to do unless you're good with SMD soldering. Interestingly the fan is a 3 wire but I don't believe the 3rd wire (tach) is used for anything. It doesn't complain when the fan is disconnected. Overall I love it.

Very impressived with the build quality, when adding/removing drives it’s tight & smooth, no wiggle Nothing! I debated this purchase for a while, should have bought a longtime ago. The tray less feature will save alot of time when doing backups. This price is a little too high in my opinion but it’s definitely well made so up to you.

I installed this in the top 5.25" bays of a Dell T330 tower server chassis, and it was a perfect fit. It looks great and blends in well with the case. I was pleasantly surprised by how quiet the fan is—especially important since this Dell server is already fairly quiet. Installation was extremely easy, and I absolutely love the trayless, screwless hard drive bays. It doesn’t get much more convenient than that. While I do think it’s a bit overpriced, the build quality and overall aesthetics are hard to beat. Overall, I’m very pleased with it—my only real complaint is the price.

Fits well in an Antec brand case. I updated the firmware in the controller card. It was working fine before the upgrade, however. I am utilizing all of the bays, and I have not had a single glitch.

The cage seems well constructed and the technical functionality has been superb. However, I did have to replace the fan on the unit after less than 2 weeks use. The fan started making clicking sounds. As I didn't want to be without a cage, I replaced the fan with an extra fan I had. Standard power connectors, sizing, and mounting made this easy, but I knocked one star off due to the fan failure.

My Windows Server box, serves a few roles, including hosting a NAS for my home - and combined with Windows Storage Spaces it gives me beautiful flexibility to hot-swap and upgrade/replace drives easily. No downtime and smooth upgrades that take minutes instead of an hour or so. It's quiet, connects very easily (taking up 4 SATA headers), and is made of a black anodized aluminum enclosure. The drives disconnect when you pop the doors open and reconnect when you latch them. If it were cheaper, I would've also bought this for my backup server. I went with the plastic tray one on that one, and while it also performs flawlessly, it's definitely not as nice to work with.

Purchased two of these to use in a build. They were easy to install. I did have an issue when I used the bottom holes for mounting as they stuck up inside the cage. I had use the screws provided for my case, versus the ones that came with the drive, so that could've been the issue. Instead I just mounted on the top. I really like how you just pop the drives in with no cages required for them. They look nice and are solid.

I was slightly sceptical at first as this was a drop shipper but item came in pristine condition, factory, sealed, works really well with no issues. It looks beautiful in my case.