3 in-stock listings tracked · prices updated
The cheapest NetApp DS4246 we track right now is $2860.00, already populated with drives. It is a 24-bay 3.5" SAS disk shelf - a box of drive slots and a backplane with no CPU of its own, presenting drives to a host over SAS. Every listing we hold for this model already includes its drives, so the price you see is the working unit.
Every row below carries its own source and provenance tier. VENDOR FACT means NetApp's own documentation states it, with the document linked; SELLER CLAIM means the figure comes from the listing text rather than a vendor document we could confirm; a blank row says plainly that neither sourced it - never a guess dressed as a specification.
| Field | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Bays | 24VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243 and DS4246 Disk Shelf Overview (part# 210-04675+E0, © 2013 NetApp) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
| Drive form factor | 3.5"VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243 and DS4246 Disk Shelf Overview (part# 210-04675+E0, © 2013 NetApp) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
| Rack units | 4VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243 and DS4246 Disk Shelf Overview (part# 210-04675+E0, © 2013 NetApp) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
| SAS generation | SAS - NetApp's own cabling guide does not state a generation (Gb/s) figure for this shelf's SAS interface. | |
| External connector | NetApp's own SAS and ACP Cabling Guide does not use SFF Committee connector names (SFF-8088/8470/8644) anywhere for this shelf family. It documents "SAS copper cables" for short runs and "SAS optical" cables for longer runs - optical cables specified as QSFP-to-QSFP (up to 50m) or MPO-to-QSFP breaking out to SC/LC/MTRJ at a patch panel. Match the physical port shown in the cabling guide's own diagrams rather than assuming a generic external-SAS standard applies.VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243, DS2246, DS4486 and DS4246 SAS and ACP Cabling Guide (part# 215-05500_J0, June 2020) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
| I/O modules | IOM6. NetApp's overview document states IOM6 appears on the DS4246's I/O modules (DS4243, the same shelf body, ships IOM3 instead) and that "mixing IOM3 and IOM6 in the same disk shelf is not supported."VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243, DS2246, DS4486 and DS4246 Installation and Service Guide (part# 215-06427_F0, June 2020) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
| Daisy-chain limit | NetApp's cabling guide documents multi-shelf stacks (diagrams show stacks of three, and configurations citing up to eight stacks total across a system) but does not state a maximum number of shelves per stack or per SAS port in what rendered - it defers that number to the NetApp Hardware Universe, which requires an authenticated NetApp account and could not be reached.VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243, DS2246, DS4486 and DS4246 SAS and ACP Cabling Guide (part# 215-05500_J0, June 2020) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
| Sector format / firmware | not documented | |
| Power (watts) | not documented | |
| Acoustic (dB) | not documented | |
| Drive tray part number | Not documented for DS4246/DS4243 drive carriers. NetApp's installation guide gives rack-mounting rail-kit part numbers for the DS4486 (a different shelf) but for DS4243/DS2246/DS4246 says only to use "the two-post telco tray kit or four-post rail kit that came with your disk shelf," without a part number, and never gives a per-drive carrier part number for any of the four shelves it covers.VENDOR FACT | NetApp DS4243, DS2246, DS4486 and DS4246 Installation and Service Guide (part# 215-06427_F0, June 2020) - accessed 2026-09-12 |
A disk shelf has no USB port and no network interface - it connects to a host over SAS, through a host bus adapter with an external port. An internal-only HBA (the kind that ships in most used servers) has nothing to plug this into. See our HBA pages for cards with external ports and IT mode for why you want the card presenting raw disks rather than a RAID volume. The cable itself depends on the connector generation on both ends - the SAS cable guide covers every external SAS connector family in use and which HBA ports match which shelf ports.
This shelf takes 3.5" SAS drives natively. We do not assert SATA compatibility or an interposer requirement without a vendor statement - see the FAQ below for exactly what we could and could not confirm on that point for this model. Recording technology is verified per drive the same way it is everywhere else on this site: unknown recording tech is excluded from anything we call CMR-safe, and shingled (SMR) drives are never recommended for an array that rebuilds.
This class of hardware reaches the used market because a business retired the servers that were plugged into it, not because the shelf itself failed - the compute moved on, the drives were often pulled and sold separately, and the enclosure is the part nobody wants to keep in a rack that no longer needs the bays. That is also the practical case for buying one: adding a 24-bay shelf to a server or workstation you already own is usually cheaper than buying a bigger chassis outright, because the host keeps doing the compute and networking work it already does and the shelf only adds slots and a backplane behind an HBA. Run the two paths - a bigger single box versus this host plus a DS4246 - through the build calculator before committing to either.
24 bays maps cleanly onto a RAIDZ2 or RAID 6-style array with room left for a hot spare, which is why shelves in this class show up regularly in the TrueNAS and Proxmox builds covered in our build guides - losing two drives to parity leaves 22 bays of usable capacity rather than 24, the same RAID-overhead arithmetic the fill calculator runs for a bare NAS chassis. A shelf bought already populated is exactly the kind of secondary-market hardware worth checking the moment it arrives rather than after it is racked and loaded - our verify-on-arrival checklist, written for used servers, applies the same way to a shelf: confirm the bay count, the I/O module version stamped on the module itself against what the listing claimed, and that every drive the seller says is included actually spins up and reports its full capacity before you consider the purchase settled.
Every listing we track for this model already bundles drives, so there is no bare-shelf-plus-drives arithmetic to compute - the live listings table above is the basket. Ranked by total price, the cheapest complete, working DS4246 we track right now is $2860.00. That price already includes whatever drives the seller fitted, at whatever capacity and condition they state - check the listing text itself for exact per-drive capacity rather than assuming every row in the table below holds identical drives, because a populated shelf's total price moves with both the drive count and the drive capacity a seller chose to include, not with the shelf alone.
3 in-stock listings · refreshed every few hours
| Listing | Condition | State | Price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
NetApp DS4246 X477A-R6 96TB Expansion Shelf with 24x 4TB Drives ($2,860) | Used | 24x 4TB HDD | $2860.00 | Buy Now |
NetApp DS4246, X316A-R6 144TB Expansion Shelf ($4,470) with 24 x 6TB Drives | Used | 24x 6TB HDD | $4470.00 | Buy Now |
DS4246 X380A 240TB NetApp ($5,840) Expansion Shelf with 24x 10TB Disks | Used | 24x 10TB HDD | $5840.00 | Buy Now |
IOM6. NetApp's overview document states IOM6 appears on the DS4246's I/O modules (DS4243, the same shelf body, ships IOM3 instead) and that "mixing IOM3 and IOM6 in the same disk shelf is not supported."
Every in-stock DS4246 listing we track right now ships already populated with drives, which means trays are already fitted - you are buying a complete, working unit rather than an empty shelf. If you later find a bare DS4246, the same caution applies as any other shelf: confirm trays are included before you buy, because they are shelf-specific and not interchangeable with a different model's carriers.
NetApp's own SAS and ACP Cabling Guide does not use SFF Committee connector names (SFF-8088/8470/8644) anywhere for this shelf family. It documents "SAS copper cables" for short runs and "SAS optical" cables for longer runs - optical cables specified as QSFP-to-QSFP (up to 50m) or MPO-to-QSFP breaking out to SC/LC/MTRJ at a patch panel. Match the physical port shown in the cabling guide's own diagrams rather than assuming a generic external-SAS standard applies. See the SAS cabling guide for how to match this to your host bus adapter's port.
We found no NetApp documentation stating SATA support or an interposer requirement for this shelf, and are not going to guess. Listings for this model that bundle drives may include SATA units, which is evidence a seller has run SATA in one, but seller practice is not the same as a vendor compatibility statement. If SATA support matters to your build, confirm the sector-format and electrical compatibility of the exact drive against the exact shelf before buying, and treat SAS as the shelf's native, unambiguous option in the meantime.
24 bays, 3.5" drives.
The cheapest complete, already-populated DS4246 we track right now is 2860.00 dollars - see the live listings table above for every capacity and condition currently in stock.
We found no formal end-of-life notice for this model in what we could source. It is old enough that new-condition stock is essentially gone regardless of formal support status - budget for used/pulled units and verify on arrival like any other secondary-market enterprise drive.