Heya folks,
I am starting this thread to just have a general discussion and as a blueprint for anyone who wishes to setup their own homelab.
So, the journaling starts here (Obviously I will try my best to keep this post updated as I keep adding things, it might take up a few months I believe as there are quite a few things I want to setup).
(I have a few External Hard disks, about 5TB + 4TB + 2TB + 1TB + 500GB + 500GB) and about 3TB in laptops, which is almost full, the problem is that it is super difficult to organise and I cannot access them remotely. Plus there is another problem of Drive failure, because if any of these drives fail, my data is lost. So, I don't want that, obviously. I have been thinking about it for a few years now, but finally decided to dive into it and get it.
Specs:
- Synology DS923+
- AMD Ryzen R1600
- 4GB RAM (obviously I plan to upgrade this, it is upgradable to 32GB dual channel).
Additionally, I bought 2 Seagate Barracuda Compute 8TB @5400 rpm drives. Right now I have configured at SHR-1 (Which is basically RAID-1 when 2 drives, but as soon as I add another HDD, it will become RAID-3).
(RAID is a way to recover from lost drives, for now even though I have 2 8TB drives, I can loose 1 drive and still my data will not be lost).
Then this can add NVME M.2 for fast storage. So I bought a Western Digital Black 1TB 770 M.2 SSD. That is in RAID-0, which means, if gone, it's gone.
That's like my workspace storage, fast and quick, when I am working on a project, I use that, once done, I move to the HDD.
Right now, moving all the files. Considering I am going to office almost daily, I think this can take a week to complete. Let's see.
Also, I configured snapshot backups and recycle bin, so if I delete any file, I have 30 days to recover back from the recycle bin before it's deleted, even then I have daily snapshots for 6 months so I can recover post 30 days also.
Also setting up snapshots help because if I get attacked by an ransomware which encrypts all my files, I will have a way to rollback that to a working version which will keep me protected from Ransomware attacks as well. Ideally I need to follow 3-2-1 rule of backup, which will need me to have another storage medium. I will set that up in some time in the future.
Also,
My hardware started arriving. I got my first server, a second hand Dell Workstation PC with 8th gen i7, 16GB RAM and 512GB SSD.
Now I am moving to setup a way to manage the containers, I plan to use portainer for that. That's a very good way to manage docker containers, so that's going to be my orchestrator tool. I also ordered a VPN router and a managed switch.
The VPN router will offload the VPN Services from the NAS and switch I need because I will be adding more devices, I need that as a managed switch because I want to add VLANs to isolate different parts of my network.
I am starting this thread to just have a general discussion and as a blueprint for anyone who wishes to setup their own homelab.
What's a homelab?
Well, according to Gemini, it's a collection of computer hardware and software that allows you to learn about and experiment with information technology in a simulated environment. Homelabs can range from a single device to multiple rack-mounted devices.Why does it belong in TechnoFino?
TBH, I don't know, I don't personally like reddit and am more active here, so maybe just give it a try here. That's why it's under anything other than Finance part, 🙈.So, the journaling starts here (Obviously I will try my best to keep this post updated as I keep adding things, it might take up a few months I believe as there are quite a few things I want to setup).
Jun-12
I received my NAS. Moving all my files to that now.
(I have a few External Hard disks, about 5TB + 4TB + 2TB + 1TB + 500GB + 500GB) and about 3TB in laptops, which is almost full, the problem is that it is super difficult to organise and I cannot access them remotely. Plus there is another problem of Drive failure, because if any of these drives fail, my data is lost. So, I don't want that, obviously. I have been thinking about it for a few years now, but finally decided to dive into it and get it.
Specs:
- Synology DS923+
- AMD Ryzen R1600
- 4GB RAM (obviously I plan to upgrade this, it is upgradable to 32GB dual channel).
Additionally, I bought 2 Seagate Barracuda Compute 8TB @5400 rpm drives. Right now I have configured at SHR-1 (Which is basically RAID-1 when 2 drives, but as soon as I add another HDD, it will become RAID-3).
(RAID is a way to recover from lost drives, for now even though I have 2 8TB drives, I can loose 1 drive and still my data will not be lost).
Then this can add NVME M.2 for fast storage. So I bought a Western Digital Black 1TB 770 M.2 SSD. That is in RAID-0, which means, if gone, it's gone.
That's like my workspace storage, fast and quick, when I am working on a project, I use that, once done, I move to the HDD.
Right now, moving all the files. Considering I am going to office almost daily, I think this can take a week to complete. Let's see.
Jun-18
The sync was completed, also I found that Synology has a feature for setting up DNS serves, so just to try, I setup that and obtained SSL certificate from LetsEncrypt so I can access on a subdomain of my website. (Orcourse it's local so nobody from the internet can access that, I need to figure out a way to have VPN access). Even though Synology themselves have VPN Server as an additional software, I don't want to put all these things on the NAS itself as it will make it slow and maybe vulnerable. My storage is already getting filled. I need to soon get more storage. I will clear the Working area drive (M.2) and move data to HDD.Also, I configured snapshot backups and recycle bin, so if I delete any file, I have 30 days to recover back from the recycle bin before it's deleted, even then I have daily snapshots for 6 months so I can recover post 30 days also.
Also setting up snapshots help because if I get attacked by an ransomware which encrypts all my files, I will have a way to rollback that to a working version which will keep me protected from Ransomware attacks as well. Ideally I need to follow 3-2-1 rule of backup, which will need me to have another storage medium. I will set that up in some time in the future.
Also,
My hardware started arriving. I got my first server, a second hand Dell Workstation PC with 8th gen i7, 16GB RAM and 512GB SSD.
Now I am moving to setup a way to manage the containers, I plan to use portainer for that. That's a very good way to manage docker containers, so that's going to be my orchestrator tool. I also ordered a VPN router and a managed switch.
The VPN router will offload the VPN Services from the NAS and switch I need because I will be adding more devices, I need that as a managed switch because I want to add VLANs to isolate different parts of my network.
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