5.25 drive bays. Why do modern cases have so many?

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Tutelary

I'm a nice banned boy.
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4 on most cases seems excessive. Most people will have 1 dvdr, 2 max. Is there any reason beyond "its whats always been there"?
 
There are people that have 4+ CD/DVD writers to write multiple disks at a time. Also there are fan controllers and LCD displays, the list goes on.
 
Can you fit a hard disk into a 5.25 drive bay? Yes
Can you fit a DVD Burner into a 3.5 drive bay? No

I agree with the OP though, there should be more cases offered with fewer 5.25 bays in exchange for more 3.5 bays.
 
they're not just used for optical drives. one of the main reasons i can think of are hot swappable hard drives. it's tedious to reach into the case and unscrew a hard drive, when you can just turn a key and unplug one and swap another in its place. i know a computer teacher who keeps the internet, photoshop programs and computer diagnostic tools on seperate hard drives, so no more than one can ever be corrupted at any one time.

also you can use those slots for things like fan and light controllers and temperature meters and such. it's always better to have the bigger drive bays available for other applications rather than the smaller bays just far hard drives.

now, why some computers still have two floppy drive bays IS beyond me :)
 
Tutelary said:
4 on most cases seems excessive. Most people will have 1 dvdr, 2 max. Is there any reason beyond "its whats always been there"?
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I need to have ATLEAST 4 5.25 bays in my case since I use 4 bays. 2 DVD drives, X-Fi, and a card reader/usb&card reader/fanbus controller panel.
 
i also agree with OP.. i want a nice selection of cases that only have one 5.25" bay and can hold a matx or atx mobo that would still be sff type..
 
As others have said you have a lot of other things that can go in the 5.25 inch bays. In my case I had dual optical drives(one failed and I never replaced it) and a fan controller. That was 3 spots. Removable hard drive setups are nice too since sata can be hot swapable. Hell remember the old huge at server cases most of the people on these forms had back in the day? They had like 10 plus 5.25 bays in them.
 
i'd rather i have more 5.25" bays than i need and just not use them, than if i had too few and needed them for more optical drives or fan controllers. if there werent as many as 4 bays, what would you use the extra space for?
 
I'm using all 4 of my 5 1/4" Bays in my Antec P180.

dcp00222qm4.jpg
 
While I agree with the fact that some people use the extra bays for things like fan controllers, hot swapable hard drives, etc, these tend to be enthusiast oriented products and I would think the enthusiast market is in reality very small. Is the enthusiast market really dictating that much of case design? (If so, can we get rid of those cases with the ugly ass 'robot faces'?) ;)

I dont understand the media reader comments however. All the flash readers I've seen fit in a 3.5
 
Tutelary said:
While I agree with the fact that some people use the extra bays for things like fan controllers, hot swapable hard drives, etc, these tend to be enthusiast oriented products and I would think the enthusiast market is in reality very small. Is the enthusiast market really dictating that much of case design? (If so, can we get rid of those cases with the ugly ass 'robot faces'?) ;)

I dont understand the media reader comments however. All the flash readers I've seen fit in a 3.5
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Read: My case :mad:

Robot faces are nifty!

But yea, lol. I like having extra 5.25 slots as I used to have a HDD mounted in a slot cuz I broke the 3.5 for it ><
 
yep fan controllers, water cooling, ect
now adays you need alteast 4 for most setups.
 
In my case I have 4 bays but I will probably need more. I've currently got a DVD burner and a CD burner. (I keep the CD-RW drive so I don't wear out the DVD one since I primarily burn more CDs than DVDs)

It's nice to have more than one drive in the event you get a game installed that requires more than 2 disks. You can just kick over to disk 2 or 3 without having to change over.

Down the road I plan on getting an X-fi with the front bay, and possibly a multi-card reader so no matter what digital camera I get down the road I'll always have a way to access the cards without having to rely on the USB cable. That's four bays right there.
 
SamuraiInBlack said:
and possibly a multi-card reader so no matter what digital camera I get down the road I'll always have a way to access the cards without having to rely on the USB cable. That's four bays right there.
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Card readers are 3.5 inch though. Even if you need a floppy you can get a combo that does both.
 
Tutelary said:
While I agree with the fact that some people use the extra bays for things like fan controllers, hot swapable hard drives, etc, these tend to be enthusiast oriented products and I would think the enthusiast market is in reality very small. Is the enthusiast market really dictating that much of case design? (If so, can we get rid of those cases with the ugly ass 'robot faces'?) ;)

I dont understand the media reader comments however. All the flash readers I've seen fit in a 3.5
Click to expand...

It is the enthusiasts that are driving the aftermarket case scene - they're the ones that are building their own PCs. Yes, there are a lot of PCs being built in the lower end cases by companies for onselling, however the majority of mid and high end cases are being bought by private individuals.

Take a look in the gallery postings, they're predominantly the more expensive cases. Now go and look in half a dozen computer shops. You will see those cases, but they're all being sold empty. A large proportion of those cases in the gallery have at least two 5.25" devices, and a lot of them have more things hidden in the back, like the rad posted earlier in this thread. There are also plenty of 5.25" card readers, though most have other things integrated as well.
 
Legion© said:
It is the enthusiasts that are driving the aftermarket case scene - they're the ones that are building their own PCs. Yes, there are a lot of PCs being built in the lower end cases by companies for onselling, however the majority of mid and high end cases are being bought by private individuals.

Take a look in the gallery postings, they're predominantly the more expensive cases. Now go and look in half a dozen computer shops. You will see those cases, but they're all being sold empty. A large proportion of those cases in the gallery have at least two 5.25" devices, and a lot of them have more things hidden in the back, like the rad posted earlier in this thread. There are also plenty of 5.25" card readers, though most have other things integrated as well.
Click to expand...

I'm just saying it doesnt explain all the plain beige office cases with 4 5.25s
 
Everfalling said:
i know a computer teacher who keeps the internet, photoshop programs and computer diagnostic tools on seperate hard drives, so no more than one can ever be corrupted at any one time.
Click to expand...

he keeps the whole internet on a seperate hard drive how big is that hdd
:p :cool:
 
Tutelary said:
I'm just saying it doesnt explain all the plain beige office cases with 4 5.25s
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Probably just hold-overs from the days when 5.25" floppies, CD Roms, zip/jaz disk readers(or other 3.5" external media that didn't fit since you had two 3.5" floppies, or one floppy and one tape drive), WORM drives, and spares for future harddrive expansion (either 5.25" HDs like the Quantum BigFoot or 3.5" HDs after the one or two internal 3.5" bays were filled up) were still around/wanted.
 
using all mine in my v1000..

1) VFD readout
2) DVD+RW
3) Water temp LCD
4&5) Reservoir and flow meter
 
Tutelary said:
4 on most cases seems excessive. Most people will have 1 dvdr, 2 max. Is there any reason beyond "its whats always been there"?
Click to expand...


Let's see, you have ATX Full Towers (7+ 5.25 bays.....although I think above 9 bays and we start calling it a super tower):



ATX Mid Towers (4 to 6 x 5.25 bays)





ATX Mini Towers (2 to 3 x 5.25 bays)





microATX Micro Towers (only microATX FF as far as I know. 1 to 2 x 5.25 bays)




Just pick a mini tower if you want a mini tower, instead of a full tower and then complain about too many bays lol.

I have 6x5.25 bays and 1x7" bay on mine (7" bay is getting a flip out TV :) ) And with water cooling, 2 drives and x-fi, and the tv, all my bays are going to be used. If it had one more bay, I woulda used it up too lol
 
these days there's just so many goodies that fit in those bays, gotta love lots. And cant argue with all that up front space.
 
as far as office PC's with that many bays, think about backups, you know travans, tapes, dvd-ram, etc.
 
I use three 5.25". An NEC CD-RW Drive @ top, NEC DVD-RW Drive below that. Bottom bay is my reservoir, which is going to be removed in favor for a t-line. I'll put a fan controller in that soon too. I use one floppy sized for a card reader too.
 
Everfalling said:
now, why some computers still have two floppy drive bays IS beyond me :)
Click to expand...

I guess that's why Lian Li only had 5.25" bays with 3.5" converters.

Things that go in floppy drive bays:
1. Floppy Drive... w00t.
2. Fan controller
3. Thermometer
4. Zip Drive... who uses these?
5. Multi Card Reader

Anything else?
 
I used all of my 5.25" bays. Those 2 grills on top are for my Raptor hard drives, I have 2 fans on top in back of the case that pull air over the drives and exhaust the warm air from the top of the case.

 
Using all of mine in the mid tower atx case pictured above, centurion 5. 1 fan controller, 1 120mm fan, 1 dvdrw drive means all my slots are taken. I had to give up a drive I occasionally use to put the fan in so I wish I had one more slot.

More slots I say.
 
i've got a friggin 3.5" (maybe?) slot, and it's full! And that's all I've got! :eek:
Granted, i've used mostly laptops, but I've never seen the need for more than one. OTOH, my next build will be in a stacker, so go figure :D
 
I'm using all 5 in the front of my small tower (small being the height of an ATX board with the PSU mounted in front of the board);
2x hard drive racks/coolers
2x optical drives
1x graphics card LCD display

I would have a floppy drive in the single 3.5" slot, but I can't route the floppy cable behind the PSU...
 
I have a P180, and have a single external 5 1/4" bay used, and two of the HD slots. I'll most likely use this case for a household server once I move, so I can make my HTPC quieter by removing most of the HDs from it. Honestly I'll most likely get some kind of multi-drive holder for my other 3 - 5 1/4" bays so I can have 11-12 HDs in this case.

I gotta finish my electrical apprenticeship first so I can afford it though. ;)
 
I have a tape drive, litescribe drive, bluray drive, fan controller, and an x-fi controller. The tape drive and fan controller both take two bays.

That is SEVEN bays filled (I still have two open though :D ). Now I just need to find a decent 7" LCD or something to fill those poor, empty bays.
 
I have been upset about this to but it all is because of the ATX standard which makes a case really tall. So if it is very tall there is lots of space in the front.

In the future ATX will probably go away and be replaced by notebooks (20 years from now). At least here in Europe notebooks sell more than desktops already.
 
Not all card readers are 3-1/2" - there are plenty that are 5-1/4". The Soyo BayOne(s) come to mind.

I'm using 3 of 4 5-1/4" bays:
CoolDrive6/WD2500KS
Maxtor 200GB on 5-1/4" adapter
DVDRW
empty.

The Maxtor will be in another CoolDrive6 as soon as it gets here. I wanted my HDDs out of the way of any cool incoming air for icing temps. They are inline with my dual-fan PSU now, so their heat is quickly removed from the system.

I was using the 4th bay for my slot-load DVDRom, but figured I could get by with just the DVDRW. The last bay could still end up being a BD/HDDVD drive, or another CD6/HDD, or even a card reader - though I would prefer to eventually get a 3-1/2" FDD+card reader combo.

-bZj
 
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