What do you use your home server for?
- Thread starter nails666
- Start date
Have a HP M110 G7 with ESX 5.1 (usb) running headless
Have a number of VMs:
Win 2012 (AD)
2008 R2 RDS/File/Print/Torrent server
2008 R2 Exchange 2k10
W8 desktop
W7 desktop
Solaris 10 (Sun Ray Server / Secure Global Desktop server (SSL VPN)).
Also have a seperate pfsense box set up.
Mainly used for work dev - have several Sun Ray thin clients dotted around that connect to it in various ways.
Don't bother wth WHS - just go straight with ESXi. It's ridiculously easy to install & configure for home use.
Have a number of VMs:
Win 2012 (AD)
2008 R2 RDS/File/Print/Torrent server
2008 R2 Exchange 2k10
W8 desktop
W7 desktop
Solaris 10 (Sun Ray Server / Secure Global Desktop server (SSL VPN)).
Also have a seperate pfsense box set up.
Mainly used for work dev - have several Sun Ray thin clients dotted around that connect to it in various ways.
Don't bother wth WHS - just go straight with ESXi. It's ridiculously easy to install & configure for home use.
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Soldato
I have 3x HP N40L clustered together and connected to a Dell 2950 for iSCSI storage for my vmware lab. Not sure what i'll use it for afterwards, maybe just keep using it study purposes.
MW
MW
Associate
Custom build with Fedora 16 running KVM virtual machines -
Recently upgraded from AMD Athlon II X3 445 rig to SB i5-2300:
- Openfiler for NAS
- Endian for Firewall and Internet
- Windows XP VM for torrents and leeching
Recently upgraded from AMD Athlon II X3 445 rig to SB i5-2300:
- i5-2300
- Gigabyte Z68A-D3H-B3
- 8GB Patriot Viper "Black Mamba" DDR3 1600MHz (2 x 4GB)
- 4 x Samsung F4 2TB Ecogreen SATA HDDs in RAID 5
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Associate
the spec is in the sig, I use mine for labbing but I have:
2012 DC/File Server
2xExch 2013
2xSQL 2012
1xSCCM 2012
1xLinux for sab, sick, etc
I also have lots of VMs on my laptop too currently using my laptop as another entire domain and having a trust setup between my laptop's domain and my servers. Oh the fun
2012 DC/File Server
2xExch 2013
2xSQL 2012
1xSCCM 2012
1xLinux for sab, sick, etc
I also have lots of VMs on my laptop too currently using my laptop as another entire domain and having a trust setup between my laptop's domain and my servers. Oh the fun
Use my micro server with windows 7 installed to share out my media round the house to ipad, iphone, media machine etc. 7 seems to do the job fine with basic folder shares, streams well from remote locations as well when im out and about.
Was tempted by Server 2012 as I have a license but thought its overkill for what I really need
Was tempted by Server 2012 as I have a license but thought its overkill for what I really need
At current:
A6-5400K with Thermlaright Macho 120 CPU Cooler
Gigabyte F2A85XM-D3H
Crucial Ballistix Sport 8gb
Enermax 350W power supply
4x WD Red 1Tb in RAID 5
Lian-Li PC-A04B
Use it for file storage, torrenting, web dev, minecraft server every now & again.
Running Win7 Enterprise
A6-5400K with Thermlaright Macho 120 CPU Cooler
Gigabyte F2A85XM-D3H
Crucial Ballistix Sport 8gb
Enermax 350W power supply
4x WD Red 1Tb in RAID 5
Lian-Li PC-A04B
Use it for file storage, torrenting, web dev, minecraft server every now & again.
Running Win7 Enterprise
Associate
Currently have an N40L with 8GB RAM running NAS4Free with 6TB of storage (ZFS) and its just used as a file server and iTunes/DAAP server.
I will look to virtualise this soon under ESXi and run a few other VMs for learning really.
I will look to virtualise this soon under ESXi and run a few other VMs for learning really.
Run my N36L with Untangle/pfsense in Virtualbox under and win2008 with DvbViewer records off usb tuners 1 of which is HD. Awesome as a PVR. File Server and Backup. Had run esxi zen, but upgrading for that on another machine. Might turn HP into a San it has Adaptec 3405 in it.
HP M110 G7, 8gb RAM, 500gb RAID1 OS, 2tb RAID1 data.
Windows 2008R2
HyperV (Linux VMs)
BlueIris (CCTV)
Overlook Fingbox Sentinal (network monitoring)
Plex Server
Squeezebox server
SABnzbd/Sickbeard/CouchPotato (newsgroup automation)
get_iplayer (iplayer downloader/pvr)
APC Powerchute PE (UPS)
Windows 2008R2
HyperV (Linux VMs)
BlueIris (CCTV)
Overlook Fingbox Sentinal (network monitoring)
Plex Server
Squeezebox server
SABnzbd/Sickbeard/CouchPotato (newsgroup automation)
get_iplayer (iplayer downloader/pvr)
APC Powerchute PE (UPS)
Soldato
N40L just for media and a Plex server (12Tb)
Thanks for the replies everyone.
So it seems that running some form of virtualisation is a very common usage with a lot of people going for ESXi as the method.
Now my knowledge of VM stuff is extremely basic so I've got a few questions about it all before I decide how to setup my server.
For running VM's there seems to be 2 main approaches mentioned on here, using ESXi as the host and running all VM's from that or running an actual OS (eg some flavour of windows) as host and then running some VM package within that? What are the main advantages/disadvantages of these methods? I'm guessing the ESXi approach is 'cleaner' but what are the differences in performance, ease of use, device compatability, security, backups, portability, cost etc?
If you go the installed OS as host route would it possible in future to somehow convert your OS install into a VM to run within ESXi or indeed the other way around, take an ESXi VM and make that the installed OS without losing setup? I'm thinking here mainly about if I go one route and after a while want to change to the other how easy will that be without having to re-setup what I've done so far.
TIA,
Ross
So it seems that running some form of virtualisation is a very common usage with a lot of people going for ESXi as the method.
Now my knowledge of VM stuff is extremely basic so I've got a few questions about it all before I decide how to setup my server.
For running VM's there seems to be 2 main approaches mentioned on here, using ESXi as the host and running all VM's from that or running an actual OS (eg some flavour of windows) as host and then running some VM package within that? What are the main advantages/disadvantages of these methods? I'm guessing the ESXi approach is 'cleaner' but what are the differences in performance, ease of use, device compatability, security, backups, portability, cost etc?
If you go the installed OS as host route would it possible in future to somehow convert your OS install into a VM to run within ESXi or indeed the other way around, take an ESXi VM and make that the installed OS without losing setup? I'm thinking here mainly about if I go one route and after a while want to change to the other how easy will that be without having to re-setup what I've done so far.
TIA,
Ross
Man of Honour
Physical to VM is easy (if it's on seperate hardware, otherwise it's a bit harder).
VM to physical isn't so easy and isn't really a great way to go.
Unless you're running server core on the microsoft side then ESXi is a lighter weight hypervisor than Hyper-V is so performance will be fractionally better. ESXi is also free whereas you'll need a license for windows.
Personally, for this sort of thing I can't understand why you wouldn't use ESXi and VMs these days, performance isn't a concern if you're using a Microserver or similar to start with and VMs are so much more flexible. Making changes to config? Just snapshot your VM first and if it all goes wrong then just roll it back...for playing with stuff at home that's worth running VMs for alone.
VM to physical isn't so easy and isn't really a great way to go.
Unless you're running server core on the microsoft side then ESXi is a lighter weight hypervisor than Hyper-V is so performance will be fractionally better. ESXi is also free whereas you'll need a license for windows.
Personally, for this sort of thing I can't understand why you wouldn't use ESXi and VMs these days, performance isn't a concern if you're using a Microserver or similar to start with and VMs are so much more flexible. Making changes to config? Just snapshot your VM first and if it all goes wrong then just roll it back...for playing with stuff at home that's worth running VMs for alone.
Associate
Not true, you can download just Hyper-V for free, it'll only run Hyper-V and can't be modified to do much more, just like ESXi.
M$ have made big improvements of late in Hyper-V, unfortunately their Linux support (from what I've seen thus far is still lacking.)
I used to have a set of rackmounted servers at home.
One was running pfSense and used as my Router
One was running mythbuntu and used as my backend media server for MythTV
The rest were running FreeBSD, running a Web Server, Mail Sever, DNS Server and Samba/NIS/NFS server.
Also had one that was running IRCU, but i havn't used that one in years
But since moving to a new flat, i now have a VPS that i have moved all my servers too.
Just keeping the Router and myth server in my flat.
All the servers were built with Via EPIA's except the myth server, which is running my old Q6600, with 12TB HDD and 10 TV Tuners (5 duals)
One was running pfSense and used as my Router
One was running mythbuntu and used as my backend media server for MythTV
The rest were running FreeBSD, running a Web Server, Mail Sever, DNS Server and Samba/NIS/NFS server.
Also had one that was running IRCU, but i havn't used that one in years
But since moving to a new flat, i now have a VPS that i have moved all my servers too.
Just keeping the Router and myth server in my flat.
All the servers were built with Via EPIA's except the myth server, which is running my old Q6600, with 12TB HDD and 10 TV Tuners (5 duals)
I've got a Mini-ITX Server running WS2012 Essentials. It's the home media server and backs up my laptop and the home PC and then gets backed up itself to Azure Backup. It's also the DC for our company and hooked into Office365. It's also running a few VMs with VirtualBox.
Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2, Core 2 Duo E6400, 4GB DDR3
3x HDDs, currently 1x 1TB, 1x 1.5TB, 1x 2TB
Windows Home Server (v1) and the usual gubbins this entails:
Storage for music, videos, photos
Automated backup of all PCs in the house using the built in backup
Extras:
Sickbeard/CouchPotato/Headphones/sabnzbd - auto downloading of stuff
XBMC - the above notify this XBMC instance which is always running and keeps the database up to date
MySQL - for centralised XBMC database
OwnCloud - for synchronising stuff like photos/documents for parent's PCs (uses MySQL)
ArgusTV - record/playback LiveTV with a BlackGold BGT3620 FreeviewHD card, integrates with XBMC nicely (and uses MySQL)
Apache/PHP - for testing of website stuff
Thinking about moving to WHS 2011 or WSE 2012 as I want to swap to some higher capacity disks, but will miss the DriveExtender from WHSv1, I know there are 3rd party apps like DrivePool or DriveBender.
3x HDDs, currently 1x 1TB, 1x 1.5TB, 1x 2TB
Windows Home Server (v1) and the usual gubbins this entails:
Storage for music, videos, photos
Automated backup of all PCs in the house using the built in backup
Extras:
Sickbeard/CouchPotato/Headphones/sabnzbd - auto downloading of stuff
XBMC - the above notify this XBMC instance which is always running and keeps the database up to date
MySQL - for centralised XBMC database
OwnCloud - for synchronising stuff like photos/documents for parent's PCs (uses MySQL)
ArgusTV - record/playback LiveTV with a BlackGold BGT3620 FreeviewHD card, integrates with XBMC nicely (and uses MySQL)
Apache/PHP - for testing of website stuff
Thinking about moving to WHS 2011 or WSE 2012 as I want to swap to some higher capacity disks, but will miss the DriveExtender from WHSv1, I know there are 3rd party apps like DrivePool or DriveBender.