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Is an x99 board a good option for a first homelab setup?
  • Well I got no rack unfortunately so space is a concern. Plus my gf is very sound sensitive. I would Der be looking at the used. Market for everything but the board probably. Although there is a 720 with cpus and 64gb ecc for 120 at my local pawn shop. But they have "no idea where it came from" which makes me nervous.

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    Is an x99 board a good option for a first homelab setup?
  • Yeah maybe that's why they caught my attention. Money is certainly an object but I'm willing to piece it together slowly over time. Pretty much can only spend a few hundred bucks at a given moment before I need to wait for either a paycheck or a great deal, and really can't justify dropping thousands on a setup, but I also don't want to cheap out. I have plenty of storage (24tb in 4tb enterprise drives and then another 10 or so handful of other 1tb) but nothing else yet. I have a couple great deals on large eatx cases with tons of drive Bays. Thinking I might as well go big if I have the space (also it seems more cost effective to go with the lff boards). And yes I was at least initially thinking a dual cpu setup would be ideal, but seems there are a lot of mixed feelings about that so im less sure on that tbh. Looked at xeons mostly, but I do see/hear the epycs are great. I'll do some research on what's in my price range there today. Thanks for replying btw!

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    Is an x99 board a good option for a first homelab setup?
  • I'd like to be able to use it functionally off the bat to backup and serve files mostly, but want something that I can slowly scale up to educate myself on/experiment with a wide array of things down the line. I assume there's no all in one option, but I'd like to make sure I have options. I'd like headroom for a bunch of self hosted services, to experiment with different OS and software and ultimately to learn how to create some tools of my own to help either with work (IT management for a small org) or just to have fun and mess around with. And like I said deep learning is endlessly interesting to me, but I think that's pretty far down the like atm.

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  • OK lemme preface this by saying I've been researching my ass off, but there is a lot to take in here. One of my biggest struggles getting into this hobby so far is the gigantic range in pricing. Trying not to fall into the trap of either buying a $1K mobo or a $100 r720 and being like "OK, done, I'm a homelabber now". Ideally I want to build something and piece it together at a good price, but understand why and what Im buying as I do. Been looking at options from Asrock which while awesome are pretty fn pricey. What does keep coming up are a variety of x99 boards for dirt cheap. Some from random Chinese sellers, some not. Not looking to have me hand held here, I am fully willing to grind out my own research, but could definitely use an option on whether either of those options would be a waste lf my hard earned cash.

    As context, I want to run a Nas and plex off the bat, In addition to some.self hosting (vaultwarden, git, AD, etc.) Also coming into some cheap nvidia tesla p40s So ultimately deep learning is a big goal. That being said my main concern is having room to grow and learn and try new stuff withoutt being restricted by the hardware, and I'm a bit paralyzed by in indecision here.

    Anyways, like I said not looking to be spoonfed, just trying to wrap my head around what i should/can get started with (and what I have no fn clue about and need to read up on)

    Thanks evweeryone. .

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    Dell r640
  • What else are you running on the server? Most would suggest not running certain other things on your pfsense unit, and some don't even thing running it as a VM is a good idea. Seems to be a big debate though so it's not necessarily cut and dry, but if you run a bunch of VMs alongside it just make sure you know how to keep everything stratified and protected.

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  • Been messing with some virtualization recently (mostly plex, git and a couple smaller things like vaultwarden). Really enjoying it and want to upgrade from my current setup to something more capable. Dual socket mobos keep catching my eyes and there are lot of middle aged dual cpu sets in my area for cheap, but is it worth it? How much does a second cpu matter for vietualization vs ram, gpu etc.

    Also assuming I get this up and running what should I look into beyond what I've already listed?

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    Want a good amount of headroom for upgrades as I learn more and want to add VMs. Have a bitfenix prodigy itx case but doubt that's a good option. Willing to go up to eatx as long as it's not absolutely necessary to rack.

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    What is the point of vaultwarden? Is it safer or less safe than using the bitwarden app/website?
  • OK, thanks for the solid answer. I suppose the core of my question was that pretty much: is it just as secure AND a less likely target than bitwarden. That makes a lot of sense to me. I would probably still worry about the strength of the code , though. Do we know if/how it's been audited?

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  • Best way to configure a NAS for the safest, most reliable (as in will not become unusable, not necessarily worried about potential downtime) and least succesptible to ransom?

    12tb+ of data and hoping to use it to periodically backup the data of numerous machines.

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    What is the point of vaultwarden? Is it safer or less safe than using the bitwarden app/website?

    Not sure I understand why you'd want to self host a password manager. Bitwarden has never been breached AFAIK. How is it better or safer to keep if self hosted?

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