Building out a home network and rackmount server

[Red Squirrel]

Those are nice cases. Expensive, but nice. I also prefer that over a prepackaged storage solution like a prebuilt SAN or NAS as it's not going to require proprietary drives and you can use whatever software backend you want. Basically it's something you have for as long as SATA stays a standard.

My only worry is the PSUs. I have not found any place to buy them on their own in case one fails. I need to look into that further as it would be good to have a spare on hand. Storage is the one place you want decent redundancy. I don't bother with redundant PSUs for my other machines. Though I probably should have for the VM server.

 

[rchunter]

My only worry is the PSUs. I have not found any place to buy them on their own in case one fails. I need to look into that further as it would be good to have a spare on hand.

You can just buy them straight from supermicro. They sell them.
https://store.supermicro.com/server-accessories/power-supplies.html

 

[Red Squirrel]

You can just buy them straight from supermicro. They sell them.
https://store.supermicro.com/server-accessories/power-supplies.html

They only seem to sell in the states unfortunately.

 

[repoman0]

They only seem to sell in the states unfortunately.

NCIX?

https://www.ncix.com/detail/supermicro-power-supply-pws-741p-1r-740w-74-100467.htm

Those are just two that I bought, they probably have others. eBay had tons of every model when I was looking too.

 

[sdifox]

NCIX?

https://www.ncix.com/detail/supermicro-power-supply-pws-741p-1r-740w-74-100467.htm

Those are just two that I bought, they probably have others. eBay had tons of every model when I was looking too.

Kaput.


https://www.anandtech.com/show/12115/ncix-files-for-bankruptcy-after-restructuring-attempts

 

[Red Squirrel]

Yeah I'm reluctant to order from there, I'm surprised the site is even still up. Too bad since they were decent.

We're running out of retailers to buy from here. :/ Just discovered a new one called Memory Express but everything I search for seems to be out of stock. There's Canada Computers but their site seems to be running off a single DS0 link.

I need to search some more I'm sure they're out there, just hard to find and never spent that much time looking. Come to think of it if I build a mining rig I should try to incorporate the same PSUs that my file server takes, wonder if you can buy just the backplane for those.

 

[XavierMace]

My only worry is the PSUs. I have not found any place to buy them on their own in case one fails. I need to look into that further as it would be good to have a spare on hand. Storage is the one place you want decent redundancy. I don't bother with redundant PSUs for my other machines. Though I probably should have for the VM server.

You must not have looked very hard....

https://www.ebay.ca/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_sacat=0&_nkw=supermicro+power+supply&rt=nc&LH_PrefLoc=1

Hell, I'll go one better.

https://www.ebay.ca/itm/FREE-SHIP-L...181905?hash=item1a3e3aaad1:g:a8UAAOSw8x1ZegSE

Buy those. Now.

They're one of the best power supplies in their line up. Quieter than most and 80+ Platinum.

 

[repoman0]

It showed up today .. the case is a beast And the whole system is very clean, professionally put together and built .. I'm guessing it was preconfigured by Supermicro or something. I already took out the RAID card to put on eBay and installed an IBM M1015 in its place. Fans are loud on startup but quiet right down and even full blast won't be a problem at all in the basement. Now to get off my ass and actually get the ethernet wiring done

 

[XavierMace]

Log into the IPMI and change the change profile to optimal.

 

[repoman0]

Log into the IPMI and change the change profile to optimal.

I finally started messing around with this thing last night now that ethernet cabling will be done tomorrow! (I ended up paying an electrician to wire four locations, eight total ports, plus a coax up to my second floor office and a 120V outlet where the equipment is going to go. I usually am comfortable doing things like this myself ... I am my own mechanic, etc. but somehow I don't feel like I have the skills to fish through 100 year old walls without totally screwing something up. I'm glad I hired this guy because he seems to have fished the second floor cabling to the office / computer room without damaging any walls or ceiling below it ... no idea how since I was not here).

Anyway I got IPMI working through my new tp-link switch and messed around with the web interface and virtual KVM. It's pretty slick. Is the profile you're talking about the fan profile? I didn't see anything else labeled optimal. It was the default anyway, and it's still plenty loud

For the rest of the hardware, I ended up with an eBay APC UPS .. SMT1500Rm2u I believe is the model. It arrived yesterday and I had no idea it would have almost as much lead acid battery capacity as a car battery, judging by the weight at least. I also grabbed the open air version of that Tripp Lite 12U rack for half the price because I was too cheap to buy the full cabinet ... that will be arriving this week.

Oh and I finally sold the RAID card that this server came with after about 40 days on ebay. I guess it shouldn't come as a surprise that there is not much of a market for this stuff

 

[XavierMace]

Yeah, sounds like you're in the right place. On my x9 systems, in the IPMI it's under Configuration > Fan Control and I've got it set to PUE(Power Utilization Effectiveness) Optimal Speed. It's never going to be "quiet", but optimal is far quieter than the other settings under light loads. I think I forgot to mention it before, but to update/flash the BIOS from the IPMI, you do need a license key. $25 from WiredZone: http://www.wiredzone.com/supermicro-software-management-sft-oob-lic-10024441

 

[repoman0]

Thanks -- should have flashed it before I moved the whole thing downstairs! Anyway everything is basically set up:

I still have my AC68U on the floor there as my router because I'm waiting for a Pro/1000 quad port NIC from eBay after accidentally buying a full height dual port one on [H], and a new bracket was almost as expensive (pretty sure the two ports on my board aren't enough? Seems like I need the two ports for router LAN/WAN, plus one to manage the VM host). Surprisingly my Wifi coverage is excellent throughout the whole house from down there, so no need to waste an ethernet port upstairs on the AP! I'll mount it to the side wall eventually.

I chose Proxmox as the base system and have it installed on the two rear SSDs in mirrored ZFS (one of the reasons I chose it is the mirrored install/datastore, along with the fact that it's Debian / FOSS). It's also nice that I can create my additional data storage pool directly from the base OS rather than inside a VM. I'll be setting up pfsense in a VM once my NIC gets here. I was going to use a Sophos product but again, open source/unrestricted wins me over. Then once that is working I'll back up all my data on my 4TB WD Reds and move them down there to be erased and set up in a ZFS pool.

This stuff definitely isn't trivial to figure out but it's fun to learn and mess around with.