In this series of posts, we’ll be working through building a routing lab-within-a-lab featuring VyOS. If you are unfamiliar with VyOS, you can read more about it here. Over the last few months, I’ve switched all the routing for my homelab to virtual VyOS instances. The main reason was to really get my hands dirty…
Building a ZFS on Linux Fileserver
After my recent migration back to ZFS on Linux, I decided to roll my own GUI for server reporting/management. Unfortunately, as referenced in the above linked post, I recently picked up some 10TB Seagate drives that refuse to be stable in any ZFS array, except on Linux. It’s worth mentioning that running them on Linux…
The ZFS walk-of-shame with Seagate and OmniOS CE.
This is a bit of a long one, so I’ll put this first. The TL;DR Opinion #1: OmniOS and Napp-IT are nice, but there’s a good chance it’s not worth the headache. There is absolutely little to zero support, and even with some Enterprise hardware that is potentially only 4 years old now, the driver…
RouterOS and Switching, finally managed
I think anybody that’s ever used a Mikrotik and RouterOS can probably agree. That tiny company from Latvia does things a bit… different. Since October of 2017, I’ve been fighting with RouterOS and switching. Well, not constantly, but it’s something that I keep finding reasons to try and hash out. A few days ago, thanks…
Building a Disk Tower, for all pain and no profit
In my lab, more than anything, quiet and power-sipping are the two factors that matter most to me. That means most of my servers are towers instead of rack-mount gear. So when a recent post on /r/datahoarder outlined shoving 15 drives into a DVD duplicator tower, I jumped all over the idea. One thing I…
Monitoring Home Power Consumption for less than $25
On almost a daily basis, I am bombarded with ads on Facebook for the Sense. This device allows you to monitor whole-home power consumption. I could probably find room for such a device in the budget, but I HATE electricity. Too many years of geeky endeavors have resulted in far too many shocks, and mains…
Fully embracing Docker
For years, I’ve used a variety of services on my home server. Much of it revolved around managing media. Only recently have I adopted Docker, and now I wonder why I have not done so earlier Services like Transmission and PlexPy have been staples on my home server for years. Since the beginning, they were…
Abusing the QNAP TS-831x with ZFS
Lately for my business, I’ve been recommending the QNAP TS-831x to clients. As I have a few of them sitting around my lab now, I decided to abuse them a little. In the world of SOHO NAS devices, most people would solidly recommend Synology. Arguably, the software is second to none, but then again so…
Migrating the lab BACK to ESXi after a Proxmox Experiment
A few months ago I migrated my home lab to Proxmox. After fighting with a few things, it’s time to move back to ESXi. It must have been about two months ago that I decided I wanted to move away from ESXi. My VMUG renewal is coming up, I wasn’t very happy with the bloated…
Proxmox and Ceph for the NucNucNuc
In the latest incarnation of the NucNucNuc, I get Proxmox and Ceph installed The idea of Ceph is very attractive. Distributed storage eliminates a huge concern of mine, which is being forced to replace a handful of very expensive Nimble storage units in the near future. The first step was to get Proxmox installed and…