Small home data center

[martynbez]

Going to be moving into a new place soon that happens to have a spare shed. I was thinking about converting (with some work) to a small data center. I'm going to be putting in a few servers in there for an ESX cluster and some storage for the host (most of the kit I have all ready).

Shed is less then 100m from the house so putting multi cores of ethernet cables in trunking down the garden is not an issue and power is all ready in place.

Now the question is doing this on a budget. Can't really afford aircon on all the time, security is an issue and keeping things as cheap as possible?

I'll be looking at doing a project log to go along with this but was wondering if has done anything similar?

 

[Steveocee]

I've literally just moved my little servery box spare PC into my brick built shed doing exactly the same thing. So far it's sitting next to my NAS drive (switch on end of ethernet)

 

[Yamahahahahaha]

Now the question is doing this on a budget. Can't really afford aircon on all the time, security is an issue and keeping things as cheap as possible?

Can't comment on security (depends on premises) but you don't need aircon. A good sized Ventaxia fan mounted above the level of the top device will be more than adequate.

 

[memyselfandi]

We used to do this at my parents old plave about 10 years ago. They had a garage with several other rooms behind which included a workshop we turned into a server room with multiple servers, a build area and various other bits a bobs.

Never had any real issues although we did find that rather than aircon we did need a dehumidifier in there.

 

[Deleted member 138126]

I'd worry about security, humidity, and snails! =D

 

[Caged]

Before you start on this work out whether it's something you actually need to do, how much it will cost you, and how that compares to hosting a vSphere instance on a cloud provider.

 

[martynbez]

They plan is to make it build an inner shell with the shed.

It's a way I can have more control over the setup and pull/add new hardware as and when I get it. It's not something I will keep powered on all the time but more something I can bring on-line for a few days.

 

[neil_g]

define shed. brick built structure or a common wooden garden shed?

if the latter id be very concerned about damp and security. also insects (source of warmth=home and spiders webs clog vents and fans nicely).

 

[martynbez]

I would say wooden shed but not a cheap one and not that old.

 

[JoeF1]

What will you be doing with it in the end?

 

[traveyb]

I think moisture might be the biggest issue, I know having tin is nice and all, but when I was doing my VCP I got away with running everything in VMware workstation on a laptop. Even got a vCloud environment up and running without too many performance issues.

 

[Deleted member 138126]

I would say wooden shed but not a cheap one and not that old.

Let me rephrase: I'd worry about security, humidity, snails, *and* insects!

 

[martynbez]

I think if I line out the inside well enough I can avoid some of those issues.

 

[traveyb]

Reminds me when an old CRT monitor blew up and I found loads of baby spiders in the back

 

[DIABLO]

I think with something like a common garden shed you're going to have trouble controlling the climate. Harrdrives don't like being too hot or too cold and there is the condensation issue.