91–100 of 400 posts
Rack mount equioment is often more expensive. Also noisy. I have mostly consumer (non-rack) equipment in a small Ikea closet. Looks less nerdy, which also improves the WAF.
I can hear my racks but they're about as quiet as the furnace until I do a really big compile.
On reboot they go into full speed fan mode until the controller comes online, that sounds like a jet taking off.
I know it's becoming the new "I use arch btw" meme but if you go down this route I highly recommend using nix as the distro. Ideally you can just leave these systems running once they're working and using nix means all your system state is logged in git. No more "wait, how did I fix that thing 6mo ago?" or having to manually put the system back together after a Ubuntu dist upgrade explodes. Every change you've made,…
My home lab journey was:
manual installs -> Ansible -> Docker + Docker Compose -> Kubernetes (I told you I loved complicated things)
I kept everything source controlled. This repo documents my long journey: https://github.com/shepherdjerred/servers
Docker and Docker Compose are nearly perfect. Here's an example of what that looked like for me: https://github.com/shepherdjerred/servers/blob/839b683d5fee2...
I mostly moved to Kubernetes for the sake of learning. Kubernetes is very cool, but you have to put in a large amount of effort and learning before it becomes beneficial.
Ansible is nice, but I didn't feel like it met all of my needs. Getting everything to be idempotent was quite hard.
what would be the typical use of such a lab? Why are so many different components needed?
* Streaming media server with Plex
* Jenkins build server
* Game servers (Minecraft, Factorio, etc.)
* Photo syncing with Immich
* File syncing with Syncthing
* Alternative frontends for Reddit and YouTube with Teddit and Invidious
* Home automation with Home Assistant
I'm older than 30 so I just call this having a home network and more than one computer. Why do I have a home network? Like many here, I develop network applications. I'm not a network technician, but being able to truly understand how the various components of the internet work, like TCP/IP, DNS etc., is really useful and sets me apart from many developers. I also just like being in control and having the flexibility…
But unless you have a real rack it's gonna be a bit of a pain, because it WILL end up being stacked on other pieces of gear in a rackish tower that requires full dismantling to get to the piece you want to work on.
If you go off-lease rack equipment, go whole hog and get a rack and rails too. Rails can be a bit pricey, check the listings for those that include them - rails often work for much longer than the servers so the big companies that liquidate off-lease equipment don't include them; smaller sellers often do.
> Attic > Pros: Less noise, easier cable runs. > Cons: can get hot depending on where you live, roof leaks, humidity/condensation, and creepy at night. Where do attics not get hot? I live in northern climate, and ours regularly gets hotter than 140F during sunny summer days. And I say hotter, because the remote temp sensor I have up there maxes out at 140F. I wouldn't be surprised if it actually gets up to 150F or mo…
what would be the typical use of such a lab? Why are so many different components needed?
The responses are kinda a mixed bag here - there are two totally different use cases. If you want something for practical purposes, /r/selfhosted actually has you covered. It’s usually jellyfin for movies, etc. And you use a NAS or a PC, but the idea is normally that you setup something reliable and don’t lose your data, and it does not require too much tinkering. Maybe once in a while run some docker container to te…
I don't think the insult to a generalized group of people is necessary.
Some enthusiasts have overkill racks, 40Gbps fiber, enterprise-class switches and vlans, etc, etc ... because it's their enjoyable hobby. The over-the-top components and making it all work is all part of their fun.
It's not a hobby I'd personally pursue but I do understand why it can attract a passionate set of people.
how/where can a complete noob learn all these skills to set something like this at home?
The non-noobs also don't have all the skills. The main skill is being able to progress towards a goal even though you don't know how, by searching for others that have done similar things and adapting their instructions. Some starter goals: * Get a Raspberry Pi * Assemble the case for it, format the SD card, start the OS * Install PiHole & Tailscale * Setup Tailscale on your phone so that you can use PiHole on the go…
The article is good, but it is intimidating buy its size and scope. A homelab could be a single NUC on a desk. I have one with 64GB RAM and it could fit so so many things. NUCs are very efficient to run 24/7, but become noisy with sustained CPU load. For that one could grow the setup with OptiPlex or Precision Tower (can haz ECC) SFF from eBay. These Dell SFFs are very good, quite small yet proper desktops/servers wi…
I'm annoyed at the lack of ECC-capable sub-ITX NAS boards. I have a Helios4, but I've no idea what I'll migrate to when that dies.
I know it's becoming the new "I use arch btw" meme but if you go down this route I highly recommend using nix as the distro. Ideally you can just leave these systems running once they're working and using nix means all your system state is logged in git. No more "wait, how did I fix that thing 6mo ago?" or having to manually put the system back together after a Ubuntu dist upgrade explodes. Every change you've made,…
I use nix btw. I totally agree. It (nix and nixos) is/are such a pain so often. But, wow... when you get things to work it is glorious. Quickly and easily syncing system/user/application configurations across multiple devices is incredible. The declarative approach means that the often laborious effort it takes me to get things to work pays off when I finally figure it out and realize I never have to do that again -…
It's annoying enough that I won't use nix personally. I've used it at work so I'm quite knowledgeable with it.