Home Lab

For those who have their own home lab, what do you run in them?

I've just started piecing mine together and currently have ESXi 6.0U2 running Nagios, SQL host and Syslog with plans to add Grafana, FreePBX, mail server for sending out alerts, Windows VM for DNS/DHCP and generally a 'management' box.

I have a FreeNAS server (MicroServer) which is just acting as backup and an iSCSI repository for ISO's.

Ideally I want to get the above set up then start looking into security tools for work (kali/security onion/etc) but want to isolate the network a bit before then so hoping to pick up something like an ASA 5505/5510 soon.

Ideally my network would be split into LAN, WiFi, Demo/Security, and possibly some other networks for testing when I come to doing Cisco Certs (looking to get some Cisco certs and Security certs done in early 2017).

So what do you have in your network?

Run a couple of security products now and again, SIEM, IPS, but nothing setup and running permanently just some stuff I spin up when I want to play, sometimes related to work.

Keep meaning to look at getting it all running on something proper though, might get round to it next year!

I run pfense to provide VLAN isolation, you can install plugins-modules for all sorts of security tasks. A list which can be found here:
https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Features_List

Great free product, 10 out 10 from me

- Graphing (Grafana) for my Evohome central heating system. Graphs each room's temperature and set temperature.
- PBX (for VOIP calls -- I have a couple of VOIP Gigaset phones)
- A couple of AD domain controllers
- Unifi controller
- Remote VM I use as a general purpose machine to remote into from e.g. work, using Remote Desktop Gateway
- Plex server
- General purpose server (file, backups, downloads, etc)

Couple of Plex servers (one test) and a general purpose Linux server.

Other things get created and deleted as needed

Running a range of items such as ownCloud, Plex, Splunk, Opsview, etc across my two servers. Have a few items dockerised for the lulz such as Plex, but it really adds nothing.

ASE001 said:

I run pfense to provide VLAN isolation, you can install plugins-modules for all sorts of security tasks. A list which can be found here:
https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Features_List

Great free product, 10 out 10 from me

Click to expand...

What do you run it on?

I'm considering this rather than something like a 5505, not sure what to run it on though as I wouldn't really want it ran on an old re-purposed PC as it'll be power hungry.

Just have an Owncloud box and domain controller running on mine. There's nothing else I really need at home.

Got a couple of HP N40L microservers both with quad port intel NIC.

One has 16gb and running ESXI from USB for labs, the other has 8gb and runs W2008r2 for file/print, dns, dhcp, hyper-v etc.

Planning to migrate the W2008 box to a W2012r2 VM on the ESXI box and then run something like freeNAS on it for my storage.

Ive got a esxi 6 host currently running unraid, Zoneminder and OpenDNs VMs.

Scotteh said:

What do you run it on?

I'm considering this rather than something like a 5505, not sure what to run it on though as I wouldn't really want it ran on an old re-purposed PC as it'll be power hungry.

Click to expand...

I run it as VM, but I know from other forums running it on an old laptop with USB ethernet adaptors is popular.

ASE001 said:

I run it as VM, but I know from other forums running it on an old laptop with USB ethernet adaptors is popular.

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VM works well.

I run pfs on what used to be an htpc... completely fanless i3-4xxx build.

Fans annoy me and I like having the router next to the modem (router) to minimise lag as much as possible... even if it's only 1-2ms.



As for my home lab... I'm just about to upgrade it to either 2x 8 or 2x 10 core xeons & 128gb ram. I run a domain controller, exchange server, files, plex, various linux distribution and I'm about to have a play with penetration testing and other things, hence wanting the extra cpu grunt and ram.

You can pick up second hand dual 6/8/10 core xeons and 64-128gb ram on a motherboard for £300-400 now.

I like VMWare, but I prefer running Hyper-V at home due to the ease of licensing other 2012R2 machines as I was able to get 2012R2 Datacentre edition very cheap.

Keep being tempted to pickup a Skull Canyon NUC to what a load of ram in and use for running some lab stuff with the benefit of portability.

Couple of my colleagues have done this and it seemed to work really well for getting some of our lab environments running.

Not the cheapest way of doing it by far but could be handy

Don't see much benefit in that - if you want the portability a reasonable quad core laptop is a similar price.

If you'll hardly/never use the portability - then you can get a much more powerful system for half the price.

crinkleshoes said:

Fans annoy me and I like having the router next to the modem (router) to minimise lag as much as possible... even if it's only 1-2ms.

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100kms of network = 0.67ms in lag. Having it next to the router is not going to a jot of difference. =)

Ev0 said:

Keep being tempted to pickup a Skull Canyon NUC to what a load of ram in and use for running some lab stuff with the benefit of portability.

Couple of my colleagues have done this and it seemed to work really well for getting some of our lab environments running.

Not the cheapest way of doing it by far but could be handy

Click to expand...

Yeah, I don't know if the Skull Canyon NUC is the best value for money for a home lab.

crinkleshoes said:

Don't see much benefit in that - if you want the portability a reasonable quad core laptop is a similar price.

If you'll hardly/never use the portability - then you can get a much more powerful system for half the price.

Click to expand...

Portability would be one of the reasons for doing it, already have a workstation laptop that is a day to day work machine but would be nice to offload the lab environment onto something else.

So rather than having to carry two laptops be nice to maybe have one lightweight laptop and the NUC instead.

Anyway I digress as this isn't exactly for a home lab