I'm wondering if there are any backplanes cases/setups where where it's just the backplane and HDD's (and PSU, obviously), where an external cable connects to the backplane vs an external cable to a PCIe card to the backplane.
If that doesn't make sense, imagine a server back where the front part (backplane/HDD's) is a separate unit from the back part (mobo/etc). I have a nice server running already, but am curious about getting an HBA card with external connectors to run connect up more HDD's. Current case natively supports up to 12 HDD + 4 SSD, and with an adapter, 2x5¼ drives converted to 3x3½ bays, and another 4 SSD's in a 3rd 5¼ slot. So plenty of room there, but might need more. Don't want to go case shopping to only get maybe a couple of more HDDs to fit. Rather, be able to have a smaller case (smaller due to not needing a mobo so that space isn't included) that can hold only necessary boards to connect to a bunch of HDD's.
I hope that makes sense.
If such cases exist, what are they called or often referred to so that I can research them?