Home Server

it is every geek's dream to have all of their computers, and indeed every product they own networked together. Adama's aversion to networking aside, such a thing enables a central repository of information storage, and reduces duplication, while at the same time allowing for more access.

In our house, there is a central closet which used to house the gas fired heating unit before that was moved to the roof. Being centrally located, it is semi-ideal for the storage of a server and associated networking equipment. The only drawback is that it currently houses our water heater as well, and as you know, water and expensive electronic equipment generally do not mix well. Besides the once I mean. So we need to get that moved, or possibly replaced with a solar/instant heat unit.

In any case, the idea is to have a central server, a switch, router, wireless access point, and cable modem all in one place, with all wires running from that point to the various locations we would like to (so, all of them). Each room would have two or more RJ45 ports, and a cable port, so I will be spending lots of time under the house at some point. Wires would be Cat6, so that we could easily upgrade to gigabit Ethernet speeds.

The server would store all media, and would probably have its own backup hard drive to safeguard all "critical" files, such as pictures, documents etc. The current concept is that it will run off a purpose built Atom powered box, running Ubuntu Server (with a GUI), and around a terrabyte or two of drives in an array. Power usage when it is "sleeping" should be pretty small, so figuring out how to spin down the drives when not in use will be a major part of tuning the box for server use.

Future upgrades would be a dedicated firewall box, more switches for more devices, a PBX box for VOIP telephony, and a dedicated media server.

I have mostly been reading http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/ for information on this process, and anticipate most hardware coming either from my current stash of gear, or from http://www.newegg.com. Cost is anticipated to be around $500 for this first phase.

Timeline for the initial process is determined by when we can get the hot water heater issue resolved, with wiring taking an anticipated weekend, and setting up the server another weekend.

Anyone have any suggestions or tips for this process?