After many years deliberating I decided to build a home server, based largely on HP Microserver’s cashback incentive.
Three main use cases at this point:
To act as a NAS, and hold all my files with some chunky storage;
To act as an ‘always-on’ gateway into my home network from the internet;
To act as an ‘always-on’ server from which I can run outward facing jobs like web scraping and website hosting, when the mood takes me.
Tools and Techniques
Plugging in hardware
Hacking away at Ubuntu Server
Bit of security thinking
After many years deliberating, I finally decided to build a home server, mostly incentivised by HP’s Microserver cashback deal, meaning I could get the main box a bit cheaper.
The server acts as a centralised file store, secure gateway to my network from the internet, and a platform to run some web facing tasks.
It’s built on:
HP Microserver Gen8
SanDisk Ultra Plus 128GB SSD HD for the OS
2 x Western Digital Red 2TB HD for Storage
I’m running Ubuntu Server 14.04 LTS for the most flexibility / hackability. Other notable points are:
Using Google Authenticator to provide 2 factor authentication for web facing SSH.
NFS for serving media to the network.
‘Lightweight’ gnome-core + VNC server installed for occasional GUI access to the box.
Rsync cron jobs for backup of important files.
In my blog post, I’ve outlined the steps I had to go through to get it set up!