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serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
1 edit | Home Network "Node 0" Refurb, Network Cabinet and Fibre!
Hello All
A few weeks ago, I came across this thread on here whilst trying to find some inspiration for tidying up the network "Node 0" in my house.
Having looked at what a tidy setup that poster now had in his home, I was jealous and decided I had to have the same 
A bit of history first. The house was completely gutted a few years ago and refurbished, and in doing so, I pulled Cat5 cables to many rooms in the house where I thought there might one day be a need for them. I also pulled 2 coaxial cables to most rooms for TV purposes.
However, I never got around to finishing the central cupboard where all the wires terminated in one of our roof bedrooms. In the need to get internet to some rooms, I shoved some plugs on the cat5 and shoved them into a switch, and my servers (Smoothwall Express, Windows Home Server) were placed in the same little cupboard along with the UPS. The Coax cables were terminated tidily by the company who did much of the AV install in the house.
However, I decided that I had had enough of the mess in Node 0 and I was going to fix it. Properly  It also coincided with installing a fiber optic links to my grandparents house across the farmyard.
First of all the plan:
This shows my rough sketches deciding what I wanted the cupboard to look like. I knew I wanted a 19" cabinet to put some patch panels in, a rack mounted switch and my various other routers and modems and fiber media converter.
I planned to also patch the telephone sockets in the rack, as I may convert to using VOIP in the near future.
Along the floor, I wanted a series of sockets that I could plug my server into, the Smoothwall Router and a IP Camera server that will be installed shortly as well.
I already had an APC UPS so I decided to install this in the cupboard as well, with a series of tails hanging out of the wall which were patched into sockets behind the servers, to give a very clean look. I am going to purchase a brush plate to allow the tails with IEC connectors on them to exit the wall neatly.
I also decided to install a dedicated Fusebox, a) because it would give a central place to disconnect everything and b) because I wanted to and everything else is over the top anyway. I am also going to purchase one of those big red turnswitch Isolators before the fuse box.
Finally, I had a wireless access point that I wanted to mount neatly in the cupboard next to the one I am using.
In order to fit everything in, I realised I needed a bigger cupboard So I went in to the bathroom next door where right next to the current network cupboard, I found a much bigger cupboard where most of the network drops were still long enough to reach (as they had never been trimmed).
It is very easy to work in the area where the cupboard is as it is all dry lined and there is plenty of space behind the wall to fish the cables through. Also, in the old cupboard there was no plaster on the walls, so I could remove the dry lining and access the wall easily behind the cupboard to pass cables through.
Once I figured out what I wanted to do, I sent off two very large orders, one to the company I buy all my network hardware from and another to a general electrical wholesaler.
Then this evening I started work
This was part of the order from the electrical supplier. Lots of sockets, fused switches, dry lining boxes and electrical tape
Very important cable ties.
One of the two 24 port patch panels I ordered.
This is the new cupboard I have turned into Network HQ (or in the process of conversion!) You can see the cabinet being tried for size, but it is now mounted at the other end of the cupboard.
Again another view whilst I was lining the cabinet up ready to mount it (it is very heavy!)
This is the end where the cabinet is now installed. Those two little doors allow me to access the space behind the rear of the cupboard (really to allow service access to a bathroom extractor fan which is always turned off).
Here you can see I have marked out the mounting points on the plaster, and then I had to go to the other side and install extra battens to support the weight of the cabinet.
Another view of the cabinet. I am quite pleased with the quality of it considering how little I paid for it.
The cabinets door. I decided to take it off as it will make it easier to work on until it is all finished.
And..... the cabinet is now mounted with not silly stool holding it up
Laying out where I wanted my sockets to go. This bit took ages to work out...
And some cables pulled into the cabinet. The cabinet only had top or bottom access points, so rather than trying to drill a hole and the file it down in the back of the cabinet myself, I just made a whole in the wall beneath one of the bottom entry points. You cannot see where the cables come through unless you look really hard for it from underneath.
And this is the old cupboard. Please excuse the mess, I could not take the network offline when I was working on it this afternoon, so I had to work around this router. I had slid the servers out the way. Tomorrow I will be able to power the network down for the day hopefully.
You can see where I added the two extra joists to support the cabinet from the other side. You can also see how handy it is to be able to access this cavity wall from this side. I was able to cut a nice big notch out of the joist to pass the cables through. I had to drill holes on little joist at the end. I have separate holes for cat5 and fibre, and one for power for the rack at the bottom. The drain is from the sink in the bathroom where the new cupboard is.
A weapon for cutting through drywall like butter. I only paid the equivelant of 14 dollars for this jigsaw, I decided I could replace it every year for the next 5 years for the same price as a decent brand one, and I don't use them very often anyway.
And a tool for making holes to let the jigsaw get started.
And we have 5 gaping great holes  Some have the drywall lining boxes in for a dry fit.
I had to make up a big snake to get cat 5 from the 'server sockets' back to the rack. I decided it was easier to run it in one go rather than multiple pulls. I labelled them first each end 
And here we are, half an hour later, all pulled through.
And again by the looks of it.
Another view of the old cabinet, with the new cable snake now threaded through. On the wall of the cupboard behind the camera is the coax distribution network, I am not going to move this as it has already been done tidily. The panel lying down is the dry wall from the exposed wall, it had a phone connection in it that passed through it and I did not have the opportunity to remove this today. So I had to work around it. :s
Some cables were sadly not long enough to reach the new cabinet (5 of them). I find punching these connector blocks down very boring work (and I still have one to do tomorrow). And they are fiddly as I can never remember where the wires go without looking at the lids to see the chart.
And again.
Another three done and sealed up.
Finally the state I left things in tonight. I had started to run some power cables, and I have taken care to ensure that the power lines stay away from the data cables as far as possible.
You can also see the big blue socket on the right hand side, this is for the UPS. I have provisioned for two UPSs, so two of these sockets, but my order only came with one socket today, but there were two plugs. Strange.
The data and power cables are only temporarily taped together, the power runs along the ceiling and comes in the top of the boxes and the data comes in the bottom from the floor.
These final few pictures show the fiber optic line we are installing to my grandparents house across the yard. It is only a few hundred metres, but I didn't want to risk the lightening problems with a copper cable between the two. And wireless is just not fast enough or reliable enough for me.
I bought a roll of basically fibre patch cable with SC connectors on the ends very cheaply and have run it through a plastic pipe. I know it does not meet standards, but I figure it will be fine, and if it is not, well I will do it again with some proper underground rated cable
Burying the pipe around my grandparents house.
And the fibre cable going in to the house. I put some washers under the pipe so it is not trapped and can still move freely.
I have not finished terminating inside yet but I will get some photos of it when it is completed.
I hope you will enjoy looking through my project. It has become more of a personal project now then just a network, but I am enjoying doing it and learning in the process.
I will update this thread again tomorrow once I get more done. Today was just the first day.
Again I would like to say thank you to Beezler for giving me the inspiration to make a network closet to be proud of | |
asjamias
join:2003-11-20
Memphis, TN | where did you get the connector blocks? | |
Cjaiceman
Premium,MVM
join:2004-10-12
Parker, CO | reply to serverguy
It looks like this project is going very well, please keep us updated as I am interested how this will look when done.
--
Duct tape is like The Force – it has a light side and a dark side, and it binds the Universe together | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| reply to serverguy
asjamias, I am not sure which connectors you refer to but if you mean the ones that I used to extend the Cat5 cables that were too short, I just purchased them from my cabling retailer. Those were Cat6 ones, I ordered Cat5 but they obviously didn't have them so substituted them.
Today I got quite a lot more word done, yesterday I pulled the cables through and today I started terminating them.
I am not sure if I explained very well in my first post but the reason why I have the network points in this cupboard is so as I can put my Smoothwall Firewall (in essence a desktop computer with lots of ethernet sockets), my Windows Home Server, a UPS (network connected) and possibly a CCTV server in the future. I could have just run patch cables to each device but I decided dedicated sockets would look neater.
Originally I would have liked everything in a rack but buying new cases would have been quite expensive and I have no where to put a taller rack...
Anyway, on to today's progress.
This shows the second hole I knocked out in the cabinet, on the other side, to allow the two power lines to come in. One is direct mains power, from a fused switch on the control panel, and the other is for a supply that will be fed by the UPS, for devices that need battery backup.
This is where the wires come into the cabinet. I decided to do it this way a) because it was easier than cutting two holes in the rear of the cabinet and b) because it made cable routing inside the cabinet easier.
I really hate punching down cat5. You can see my Dymo Labeller in the photo as well. With paper labels it is perfect for the cables.
My method is as follows. Organise the cables into a logical order. Grab the next one. Consult a table to see what number the drop corresponds to. Write the label and set it printing. Strip and punch down the cable. Cable tie it if necessary. Stick label on it. Do next one.
Here you can see a closeup of the labels, as well as the patch panel. These were not the best patch panels I have ever used, but they were not expensive either. I tried to keep the wiring in nice and tight, but I had to work in a very small cupboard with very little spare cable, so it was a little frustrating at times :s
General shot of the cabinet and some wires punched down into one of two patch panels.
My trusty labelling machine. I really should get a better model but this one does the job fine (and I am improving at hunt and peck typing on the ABC keyboard )
Another shot of the patch panel. This one is for all the outlets in the cupboard, and at one end I looped the incoming phone lines into it to allow any network point to be patched for data or phone.
Here are the servers UPS power sockets installed. These sockets will terminate in IEC male plugs that will plug into the back of the UPS. I will use a brush panel to allow the IEC tails to neatly exit the wall.
You can also see where some plaster came away where the wall was already cracked slightly. Some filler and paint will soon cure this....
Close up of the socket and labelling. The 5 cat5 cables are for the network points for the Smoothwall Firewall. One for the incoming connection from the modem in the cabinet, then one for each of the orange, green and purple networks.
The other two server points. One is for my WHS and one is for a future CCTV server. I ran two cables so as there is one spare. And if I wanted to team the connections. Or if I wanted to use a KVM that sent everything over Cat5 (but these are very expensive).
More cables to be punched down. And thanks to the electrician, the cables were very poorly marked. And for the cables that were too short, I had to leave gaps until I could extend them. So I couldn't cable tie down as I went.
Two network drops, labelled, punched and marked. These things were cheap as chips, like less than a dollar each, and they feel pretty cheap but they work perfectly.
Server point 2. And a messy chip in the wall that needs fixing. The whole cupboard will be repainted once I have finished all the work.
Before I started to clean up.
You might spot the trusty old fashioned phone I used to test that I had wired in the phone sockets into the patch panel right!
A messy chip in the plaster :s
This is the opposite wall to where the cabinet is, and I have the mains electric supply switching. There is a fusebox to be mounted above and an isolator switch.
There are then four switched connections, shown in this pic, 2 for the 2 UPS (only one UPS will be used at first though), 1 for the non UPS rack supply and one for the Wireless Access Point located in another cupboard (more on this tomorrow maybe).
This is a socket I installed in the cupboard which is not switched or UPS'd. I thought I might need to plug in a laptop or screen temporarily one day. And more labelling goodness...
This photo shows the two UPS switches which are fed from the fusebox. The cables above will either go to the fusebox or the two other switches like the two for the UPSs.
All of the server points have now been terminated (bar the UPS one, I haven't quite decided how I will do this yet.
The mess inside the cabinet. Once I have finished punching down I will push all the uneven length cables back through the wall and make a nice snake to go up the side of the cabinet.
You can see the drop to a room that I found was too short (it was tight enough in their anyway, let alone being inside the cabinet to punch them down!)
And finally the power supply to the rack. This is not the permanent solution, there will be a rack mounted PDU to distribute the power and the mains socket is for the fan I will put on the top of the cabinet.
The box is not mounted either yet, just resting there as I don't know where is best to put it yet.
Thats about it for tonight.
Tomorrow I have to run some ethernet down to the office as it is currently wireless as the electrician forgot to install a network drop here :s duh it is the office after all!
We have also nearly finished running the fibre across now from the other building so that will be connected up soon.
Then it is just a matter of finishing everything else off.
Thanks for reading. | |
jeffmoss26
join:2002-07-22
Beachwood, OH | reply to serverguy
What is the big blue connector on the right of the wall?
the whole setup looks good! | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| said by jeffmoss26  :What is the big blue connector on the right of the wall? the whole setup looks good! The blue connector is a 16A Ceeform socket that I will use to plug the UPS in to. No reason for it other than I thought it would look cool and that is what they use in the datacentres I think.
Thanks. I got a lot further yesterday, but I haven't got around to posting the pictures yet. I will do a bit later today. Nearly finished with it now. | |
Rob
In Deo speramus, God Bless the USA
Premium
join:2001-08-25
Kendall, FL | reply to serverguy
Very nice!
I kept looking at the power outlets and thought that they were such odd looking, then I realized you're in the UK | |
JoeIac
Premium
join:2009-03-02
MA
clubs:
 ·Time Warner Cable
·Comcast
 ·Verizon FIOS
 ·Dreamhost
| said by Rob :Very nice! I kept looking at the power outlets and thought that they were such odd looking, then I realized you're in the UK Hahahahaha I did the same exact thing, then i noticed that their was a green / yellow striped wire going into one of the outlets, and that's when thought to check the location.
But... Awesome job So Far serverguy! I'm looking forward to seeing the final product!
Also, any info on what type of hardware / UPSes you're planning on using once everything is setup? | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| Yeah I should have said I was in the UK We get funny looking power sockets but at least we can get some proper voltage out of them (none of that piddly 110VAC over here ) We can get 6000 watts out of each of the double sockets technically.
Today I got it nearly finished, the cupboard is now in use and I moved the servers over. I have pictures of the move, it rather amused my mother how I moved them while keeping them plugged in! I didn't want to power them down unnecessarily.
I'll have the pictures up later. I am going to install the fuseboard later tonight.
The UPS is a APC SmartUPS 1000 and I have a network card coming for it. I would like to add another identical model though but this one keeps everything on for long enough.
Other hardware is quite basic at the moment (there is just a cheap wireless router in the cabinet as of now) but I am probably going to get a Dell Powerconnect 2716 or 2724? if they do such a model.
The servers are fairly generic desktops at the moment but I am going to upgrade these as well.
More to come later... | |
Beezler
Premium
join:2005-03-17
Allen, TX
| reply to serverguy
Serverguy,
First off, geart setup! Looking forward to seeing more pictures!
Second, thanks for the compliment.
When I saw your picutres of all the tools, cables, crimpers and power tools, I completely understood your project! My wife nearly killed me for the mess I caused in the closet. Sometimes she couldn't even walk into the room. You certainly have a nack for wiring (especially the high-voltage kind). I could have used you when I was trying to get power to my setup. I wouldn't have had the original issue with the electical wiring .
Quick question, I see the outlet for the two UPS on the right and I see the four outlets with the network drops and power drops. If the power to the servers is going to come solely from the UPS are you cabling an outlet drop to connect the UPS to the four power drops? I may be asking the obvious but I tired to look at the first picture of the network design but when I click on it I cannot see plan but get a login request for Photobucket. I would really like to see your plan.
I do like the thought of fibre cable to another residence from yours. I have a sister-in-law that lives in California and they have a house and shop on the property. They currently keep two separate service lines for the cable TV and internet so this might be a good match for them if it works. I'm anxious to see how you connect these and get the other house on the network so please post more of those, especially how you made those connections.
After seeing your install progress, the one thing that is very apparent is the level of planning you went through. Only a well planned and managed project moves that quickly. Great job!
b/t/w Dell does make a PowerConnect 2724 (it does have a fan so be aware that it's not entirely silent). | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| said by Beezler :Serverguy, First off, geart setup! Looking forward to seeing more pictures! Second, thanks for the compliment. When I saw your picutres of all the tools, cables, crimpers and power tools, I completely understood your project! My wife nearly killed me for the mess I caused in the closet. Sometimes she couldn't even walk into the room. You certainly have a nack for wiring (especially the high-voltage kind). I could have used you when I was trying to get power to my setup. I wouldn't have had the original issue with the electical wiring . Quick question, I see the outlet for the two UPS on the right and I see the four outlets with the network drops and power drops. If the power to the servers is going to come solely from the UPS are you cabling an outlet drop to connect the UPS to the four power drops? I may be asking the obvious but I tired to look at the first picture of the network design but when I click on it I cannot see plan but get a login request for Photobucket. I would really like to see your plan. I do like the thought of fibre cable to another residence from yours. I have a sister-in-law that lives in California and they have a house and shop on the property. They currently keep two separate service lines for the cable TV and internet so this might be a good match for them if it works. I'm anxious to see how you connect these and get the other house on the network so please post more of those, especially how you made those connections. After seeing your install progress, the one thing that is very apparent is the level of planning you went through. Only a well planned and managed project moves that quickly. Great job! b/t/w Dell does make a PowerConnect 2724 (it does have a fan so be aware that it's not entirely silent). Hello Beezler,
I was going to post photos last night as I have all but finished now, but I had to shut the home server down last night and when I tried to start it up I got a hal.dll error and it wouldn't boot, so that put me off doing anything else last night! I am going to fix it up now then I will post the rest of the pictures.
I will look into that photo later, and I have another of the actual wiring diagram, but simply, the three power outlets that are behind the computers, are wired individually back to an IEC connector that has a tail and hangs out of the wall. So basically those sockets are just IEC extensions. I'm going to get a brush plate to cover where the sockets all come out. I also did the same to the UPS socket in the rack.
The reason I wired them all individually was that I didn't know whether you could take the UPSs full output from just one IEC connector, so I didn't take and risks, and it will allow me to split the load to two UPSs later.
The fibre is all working now, I will have pictures of this later as well. It was kind of strange standing on the other side of the yard in my grandparents bathroom where the fibre is terminated in a cupboard with a laptop browsing facebook
Wireless just doesn't cut it here because we get too much interference from power lines that run across some of our land. And it is still not fast or reliable enough for what I want. | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| reply to serverguy
Hello again
Finally got around to posting. Since this could be a long post... I plan to split it into two parts. First off, I will go through the pictures up to the current state, then in a second part which may have to wait another day, I will explain why I did it like I did, what hardware I am going to be using, what future plans I have and what I may have done differently now looking back on it.
Anyway, the photos. I am afraid they are in a missmatch order, eventually I will go back through this thread when I do a proper writeup on this project and sort it out a little perhaps.
This is where the UPS gets it power from. I have run a line for a second blue 16A Ceeform with a switch up by the fuseboard so I can add a second UPS in the future and loadbalance between them.
This is a picture of the old cupboard. You can see where the two incoming BT lines terminate. I have taken lines from these sockets, and patched them into sockets 18 - 24 on the patch panel, so I can easily patch phones and DSL connections. I may try bonding two DSL lines in the future for better speeds so I have ran all the lines necessary.
A wider view of the old cupboard where I use to put everything. I was lucky to be able to remove the dry lining so I could get to the other cupboard and run the wires, it would have been a nightmare if not.
Now we jump to some semi-complete pictures. This is the rack, temporarily rigged up. Please excuse the cabling mess, I had to get internet back up! I will be buying more colour coded patch cables and labelling and cable managing. But I do not think it is necessary to have the rack absolutely perfect, because I am always changing stuff anyway and it just wastes time undoing zip ties etc.
This is the power control, on the opposite wall to the rack. The fusebox has one line for the UPSs and one for the rack supply. I may put another MCB in in the future but its not really necessary. The fused switches are for the two UPS supplies (only one is installed), the wireless access point which is not yet installed but will be on the wall of the cuboard on the other side of the room where it gets better signal and the last one controls the power to the un UPSed feed to the rack. (For fans etc, stuff that doesn't need UPS power).
This is a shot of the servers and UPS installed. Notice how there are not too many cable running between them. There is one USB cable from the server but this is because the ethernet card for the UPS hasn't come yet. The server on the left is currently a Smoothwall and on the right is a WHS. I am actually going to be getting a Alix 2D3 board with 3 ethernet ports on it and running embedded PFSense on it and this will go in the cabinet. The smoothwall will be retired. However, a new box will replace the smoothwall that will handle the MLPPP connection that will bond both DSL lines, this is why there are 4 ethernet runs to this server location. This will then feed the little PFSense box. The WHS will remain. The third server 'bay' will house a Virtual Machine server that will run the streaming software for the TVs, CCTV stuff, mail server and similar. I want the WHS to purely be a storage and backup device, as then it won't go wrong so often.
These are two of the connections that come from the unswitched sockets behind the server bays, and plug into the UPS. They are basically just extension leads. There is one for each single socket, 4 in total, 3 servers and one to the rack.
This shows how the tails from the UPS IEC connectors were attached to the cable that runs to each socket.
Same again.
Another view.
One of the server 'bays'. The ether is doubled, so in the future I could team connections or use one for a different purpose. It allows flexibility.
Another shot of the rack. I am almost wishing I had bought a bigger rack, but then the little doors would have been unable to open. I originally thought this would be a problem but on hindsight it wasn't. I might build a little box under the rack to take all the power supplies, this would save a lot of space. But there isn't really that much I want to put in the rack, so I think it will all work out OK.
Power command...
Overhead shot of everything, before it was finished.
Wiring ethernet sockets. Ughhh I was sick of this.
I had to run two new ethernet lines to my dads office. He had been on wireless up till now and it was too slow for viewing pictures streamed from the server. I had to go out of the house as we wanted to disturb the wall as little as possible. I hate trunking and I hate installing it and I hate bending cat5 cable like this but it had to be done. I couldn't drill through the window as there is a mechanism for the sash window in there that would chop the wires when the window closed.
Trunking installed.
Installing the socket. More punching down. Looks like I forgot a cable tie there.
Starting to return the bathroom to normal.
Oh yes, moving the servers. I did not want to power them down for the short journey to their new home. So I put them on some carpet with the UPS and dragged them.
Servers on the move
Shot of the old cupboard again. I have to wait on some more cat5 joiners before I can close this up again.
Where the servers have stood for the last few days before they were moved to the new cupboard.
Rack again. Notice the fibre media converter.
Again.
Prior to the servers arriving.
Nice label for the fibre line, in case anyone ever forgets where it leads
Rack, prior to poor cabling job. Notice fibre terminations.
Again.
Fibre cable rolled up. I could really do with a shorter patch cable. The orange cable going out the back goes to the other building, but it had the wrong connectors for the media converter so I had to do it like this...
Patch panels installed.
One patch panel wired up.
Tidying up the cable snake leading to the patch panel. I left enough spare in it to still be able to bring it out of the cabinet.
The media converter box. Notice the LINK light is on. That means it is working and receiving and sending from the unit at the other end. I will get pictures of that end later It is far simpler.
Same again.
Just after I had pulled the fibre cable into the crawlspace between the roof and the wall, and then into the old cupboard, before being threaded to the new cabinet.
That's all for now, please ask any questions.
I will make another post with what else needs doing, as well as my PFSense project.
Cheers | |
wirphotos
join:2002-07-22
Green Bay, WI | reply to serverguy
Could these photos get uploaded to this site? Photobucket is way to slow.
Awesome setup! | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| Yes I can do at some point, but I will be putting them on my own website at some point and that will be fast. Facebook was just quick for now as it was easy to generate the links for here.
I would upload them to this site now but the interface is awfully clunky...
Maybe open this page in Firefox and middle click on all the image to get them to load in separate tabs then come back 5 minutes later and view them
That's what I normally do. | |
jeffmoss26
join:2002-07-22
Beachwood, OH
1 edit | reply to serverguy
Looks nice! I like to see how things are done on the other side of the pond
Are the servers just plugged right into the router? | |
jbcg
join:2001-09-15
Milwaukee, WI
| reply to serverguy
Always fun to see another residential install. Really beautiful work on both the low and high voltage. Great to see a job with a serious cabinet and enough ports. So many homeowners think that six ports in a Leviton media center are enough because "I'll just connect everything wirelessly."
I'll be interested to see your patch cable work once you've got that installed and groomed.
Joey | |
DrModem
Premium
join:2006-10-19
USA | reply to serverguy
Very nice! | |
scrummie02
Bentley
Premium
join:2004-04-16
Arlington, VA | reply to serverguy
Nice but one question...heat..
That is very important, proper ventilation is a must. | |
Silentwolf
Vaprotan
Premium
join:2002-07-03
Kingsport, TN
clubs:
 ·Embarq
| reply to serverguy
Nice job. Have really enjoyed reading this thread thus far. I second scrummie02 about the heat issues. Maybe a nice AC vent blowing in and a return elsewhere.
Hope to see more. You've done some great, clean, organized work.
--
Brad ~ Blog | Vanadiel Ranch (FFXI) | |
serverguy
join:2009-10-27
United Kingd
| Just to quickly answer the heat question...
Thats one of the reasons why I didn't go with a rack. Because they get too hot without AC.
But, I have had servers in the cupboard next door for years, and they have never had a problem with getting too hot. With this bigger space, it should stay cooler.
Also, you'll notice that little crawl space through the tiny doors at the back. Well I have been leaving these open and there is always a cold breeze running down there, so at the moment it is really quite cold in the server cupboard. However, I plan to put two vent grills in these doors so then they can't be accidentally shut.
Theres no AC here :s. If in the summer it gets way to hot in there I'll just leave the main doors open and then it will be fine, but I don't think it will be a problem.
Also, I am going to put a case fan on top of the rack, as there are holes for one anyway, and it'll keep the temp down with the new router in there and proper switch.
For the other questions, yes the servers are plugged straight into this little router at the moment, it is just acting as a switch though. Soon, I will replace it with a managed switch and the servers are being replaced with proper HP Proliant servers, one for the WHS and another one that will run ESXi server (virtual machines).
Thanks for the compliments, I am quite pleased with how it has turned out. It allows a lot of flexibility.
I am ordering more stuff today | |
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