Hardware for Home Lab

Capt Doufos · 18 Dec 2013 at 10:54

What are you guys running for home test labs?

I want to look at various things I don't have admin access to at work (Exchange, SCCM, Higher Level AD stuff) as well as Vsphere, Hyper-V and newer versions of Windows Server and anything else I don't get hands on with.

I am thinking 2 physical servers with a separate storage solution, to be able to test out various VM scenarios and Vsphere features.

Therefore I think the options are something like 3 MicroServers, running 2 with a hypervisor and 1 as shared storage, FreeNas, ReadyNas or the Synology emulatory thing. However you can pick up 1U servers with 2 x Quad Low Power Xeon's and 8-16gb for about £120 shipped. So maybe 2 of those + a Microserver.

Will the Microservers cut the mustard do you think? I would guess they will have better resale value than Dell or HP 1U servers but the Xeons will be a lot faster.

What do you think?

Mr-White · 18 Dec 2013 at 12:57

The HP microservers can run 3-4 VMs per host if they're not too CPU intensive. I have 4 connected to a Dell 2950 running openfiler as iSCSI storage.

The other option is to buy a higher spec single host and nest the installation as VMware now has vmtools for nested VMs.

MW

R121 · 21 Dec 2013 at 22:32

Capt D

I planning on doing the same thing. I was gonna also try and use FreeNAS to start off with.

Frozennova · 21 Dec 2013 at 23:08

If you plan on running FreeNAS virtualized it will have to be ESXi and Hyper-V doesn't support BSD as a guest. I'd also avoid never mentioning that you are visualising it if you go anywhere near the FreeNAS forums as they will be less than helpful.

I can however say that it does run and work exactly as intended under ESXi as mine has been running for 9 months now without a hitch.

Throrik · 22 Dec 2013 at 01:20

Frozennova said:
If you plan on running FreeNAS virtualized it will have to be ESXi and Hyper-V doesn't support BSD as a guest.

Not sure about FreeNAS but BSD is supported on Hyper-V.

Frozennova · 22 Dec 2013 at 17:59

Throrik said:
Not sure about FreeNAS but BSD is supported on Hyper-V.

Does it?

Last time I looked into running FreeNAS inside Hyper-V it didn't support guest additions, and as FreeNAS is BSD based they should use the same setup

Throrik · 22 Dec 2013 at 20:37

Frozennova said:
Does it?

Last time I looked into running FreeNAS inside Hyper-V it didn't support guest additions, and as FreeNAS is BSD based they should use the same setup

https://blogs.technet.com/b/opennes...r-windows-server-hyper-v.aspx?Redirected=true

Deleted member 138126 · 23 Dec 2013 at 18:21

Proliant ML110 G7.

jameshurrell · 23 Dec 2013 at 21:01

rotor said:
Proliant ML110 G7.

Same here. Brilliant bit of kit for ESXi.

Capt Doufos · 24 Dec 2013 at 09:54

I have found something I didn't know existed, it's helpful for the Microsoft stuff, not so helpful with anything else. MS have virtual labs you can fire up for 2hrs certainly useful for something that is free http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/virtuallabs/bb467605.aspx

gavind · 5 Jan 2014 at 18:14

I'll be trying out the combination of vSphere and vmWARE. Let's just see how this goes.

Hardware for Home Lab

Deleted member 138126

Deleted member 138126