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Home Lab Setup Recommendations

M

mct

[H]ard|Gawd
2FA
Joined
Jul 14, 2004
Messages
1,246
So I have a new job where I will mainly be focusing on datacenter technologies. I will be installing Cisco Nexus and UCS in their various flavors as well as EMC products and VMware for my company's customers. I am wanting to setup a new home lab for VMware study and testing. I am looking at getting some Dell PowerEdge T110 II servers with Xeon E3 1230 v3 processors and maxing out the RAM with 32GB. I will throw some Intel NICs in there for more ports. I am also grabbing a Synology array, either a DS1513+ or DS1813+ haven't decided yet and will put some WD Se drives in that. I haven't decided on a switch for iSCSI traffic yet. What are you all using for your iSCSI switches these days?
 
If I were to purchase a switch today it would have to include at least 4 x 10Gb Uplinks. This would suit my needs perfect, however to each is own. If strictly going 1Gb and don't care about a 10Gb option, then I would go with a Cisco SG300-28. You didn't mention budget..i'm guessing for a Lab it's not that extravagant.

I use HP 1810-24g's..no problems so far and can be had on Ebay very reasonably.

Oh what i wouldn't do for a Nexus 5010 ....http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cisco-Nexus...88?pt=US_Network_Switches&hash=item2ecec7ab24
 
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WAF on the 5010 is lol though. I have a Powerconnect 8024F here at the office and it would be significantly less noisy from a 10GbE perspective although not as cool. I have two 3750G's in a stack which aren't too loud but I want real Layer 3. The HP and Cisco listed by Vader are good choices.
 
A Nexus 5010 would be awesome however I am not going to spend that much on one. I have a friend who might be able to get me a Catalyst 4948 very cheap. If he can't get me that then I will check out the SG-300 and the HP 1810 that were mentioned. Thanks for the help guys.
 
I forgot too mention for Layer 3 I use a Uniquiti Edgmax Lite
 
if i can borrow this thread instead of making a new one

im planing a small ESXi server, ultra low power , size and price to start working with virtualization a bit,
Will run a webserver (and everything that goes with it) on it and experiment with thin terminals later on (Horizon)

my plan was to get an Xeon 1230L, but due to low availability and high price i got a much cheaper i7-4765T ES;

choosing an ITX board gives me hard time tho
i know esxi is finicky with NIC, so can anyone recommend a non server grade board with esxi support out of the box and VT-d ?

prefer something cheap like Asrock:D
 
with itx you limit yourself

For a flexible ESXi solution, never miss
- a Xeon (allows ECC and pass-through)
- Intel nics (or you may need to buy one extra)
- enough PCI-e slots for expansion
- at least 32 GB RAM capability

- a second controller if you want to virtualize a storage VM with native performance and reliability.

There are quite perfect uATX solutions around like a http://www.supermicro.com.tw/products/motherboard/Xeon/C220/X10SL7-F.cfm
or similar without SAS controller if you not intend to virtualize storage.
 
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