Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Colocation and Data Centers : Is server suitable for home usage?

[qllonceagain]

I am in need both a server and a desktop. I am not sure if I can just buy one computer and use it in both ways.

I wonder if those 1U, 2U, SCSI, or tower SCSI servers suitable for home use. Like running 2 copies of VMware in background and watching DVD in front.

My current machine running W2K. 1 VMware will take 150+ memory. Running two of them at the same time will make my computer unusable. Also, VMware gives more CPU powers to the one in front. So if I have 2 VMware running, only 1 is fast and the other is almost idle. I don't know if I use a Dual CPU + SCSI will help. I heard SCSI is very noisy and servers take more electricity, so they should not be used at home.

[Deepbluehosting]

You can build a tower server for home. There is no issue with your home power lines that will stop you from running the server.

[sshepherd]

Most rack and tower servers do have noisy power supplies and fans which isn't ideal for home for everybody. SCSI drives really aren't that noisy, at least not noisy enough to be heard over most power supplies or fans unless you're next to the case listening for it.

Power usage shouldn't be any worse than the larger power supplies in most PC's.

I've had a full rack in my house before, but set it up in a second room so it never really bothered me, besides I can't sleep without the hum of a computer or fan anyways.

If you intend to just use it for email/web browser/vmware/etc you'll be fine. About the only caveat is if you or someone else wants to use it for high end graphics or gaming, then you usually have a problem as most server motherboards or systems often don't have an AGP port to suport the newer video cards.

[gbjbaanb]

At my previous employer, we needed a set of 4 test machines, and we just happened to have an empty rack in the corner of the office, sort of sitting there looking like some unused furniture (this was an open plan, development office).

So, boss thinks.. "Hmm, I can rent 4 compaq mini-desktops for £50 a month, or I can rent 4 compaq racks of the same spec for £150 a month. I'll go with the racks".

Sometime later, the 2U servers arrive and are installed, and powered up... it took about 15 minutes for the number of complaints from everyone to reach the level where we *had* to power them down, they were like aircraft taking off in our quiet office.

The rack had to be relocated to the server room upstairs, where they found the aircon wasn't good enough and so had to be replaced.

And, to really rub it in, we bought 8 of the mini-desktop case PCs for use in the performance lab, and not only were they much cheaper but they stacked on top of each other very nicely, and were silent.

So. You can buy a server case if you want, but you might as well just get a £10 case for it instead (or get a nice Antec Sonata or BQE which is really silent). Incidentally, I'm sure there are options for VMWare so they do not run 'in the background', You also don't need to run 2 instances, but run your server in the VM session and use the host OS as your desktop (I do this). Obviously you will need lots of memory to support 2 VMs (as you're really running 2 OSes on the 1 OS, so you will need 2 OSes worth of memory to run them both effectively)

If you're running 1 user on this machine, then you don't need super-good components, commodity sata drives will be as good as scsi but a lot cheaper and easier to use.