Hi everyone, I have a Zimaboard to which I have connected the “PCIe to 5 Port SATA” card to expand the storage and add 4-5 3.5" HDDs. My question is: once I connect them to the card via SATA, how do I power them externally? Thanks
And standard psu should work but you may need to short the PSUs sense connection (pin 14 - green wire and ground -multiple black from memory) to make it turn on.
A PC PSU would be pretty inefficient so look at a Pico PCB type set up be remember some drives can pull up to 2A each so you need to be thinking of a PSU that can handle that load. That peak load will only be a short or momentary load but you still need to consider that it’s possible.
Thanks for the reply. I had considered the PSU solution but I don’t like the idea of short-circuiting the pins.
For the Pico PCB solution, is there anything ready-made or do I have to create the connections?
Thank you!!!
You can but pre-made switches such as this…
However multi drive PSUs are generally not cheap. You may be better buying a used multi bay NAS and Frankenstein-ing it like this one.
Neither are mine or recommendations just examples…