So, this post has been a long time coming! A load of different things to talk about, so lets get started!
GodBox V3
So, for a long time, I have been thinking about GodBoxV3, the replacement to GodBoxV2. And when planning this, i had some ideas of what it should be:
- Minimum of 2×16 cores (double godboxv2)
- About the same RAM, if not more
- FAST STORAGE!
- Is able to run my twin 30" 4K monitors
- Would like 10Gb/s NICs
Well, It finally happened! I got the machine, built it and, well, its impressive! How did i do with specs? Well…
- 2X Intel Xeon Gold 6138 Processors (20 cores) cooled by 2 Noctua NH-U12 DX3647 coolers
- Supermicro X11DPH-T motherboard with 2x10Gb links onboard
- 128GB Crucial ECC DDR4 RAM (4 32GB Sticks)
- 2x 512GB Samsung 970 Pro NVMe drives
- 2x8TB HDDs for extra storage (shucked from 5 WD My Book 8TBs)
- NVidia GTX1060 graphics
- All in the very nice (and MASSIVE!) Cooler Master Cosmos II 25th Anniversary edition case.
All is good! Photos, more details and benchmarks coming soon… stay tuned!
Finally 10Gb/s Networking!
Since GodBoxV3 had a few 10Gb nics, i needed to upgrade the network to support it. I ended up with a Ubiquiti Networks EdgeSwitch-XG. 16 ports (12 SFP+ and 4 RJ45). The SubperMicro board has 2xRJ45 ports. Due to lack of RJ45 ports, GodBoxV3 is connected to 1, GodBoxV2 is getting a 10Gb card soon, which will be connected to 1 port, and a new Sun Microsystems server (details below) will be getting the last 2… Of the SFP+ ports, 2 are connected to the EdgeSwitch Lite, 2 to the Synology (it got a 10Gig NIC reciently too!) and 2 to the new NAS (again, more details below!)
Good bye Mikrotik, Hello EdgeRouter 4
Since i was going all Ubiquiti gear (Wifi is Unifi gear) i got rid of the old Microtik and replaced it with a Ubiquiti ER4. Happy days! Got some plans for this, more details coming soon…
Updates to BGP Stuff, including IPv6
I lost one VPS in London, but replaced it with a new one from HostUS. I still use Vultr, Packet and VServer.Site as providers too. I am also adding more and more IPv6 stuff too… There is a post on AS204994 explaining a lot of this.
New NAS and more storage!
New NAS got purchased: QNAP TS-932X. I have 5X8TB spinny disks (shucked from 5 WD My Book 8TBs) + 4 X 500GB WD Blue SSDs.
New Servers and cooling updates
Moved lots of stuff around the room… Servers run cooler, and less noisy! happy days! I also got my hands on a very nice looking Sun Server X3-2. Its a Dual Xeon E5 (currently got quad cores, going to upgrade it to 8 cores) and i think its got 16GB ram and 4x300GB SAS Disks. It also has 4X10Gb nics! ESXi will probably go on here!
VMWare in the house
Up till recently, I ran Hyper-V all round. Its still on GodBox V2 and V3 (v1 has a HDD issue, so its off…), but the main VM hosts (the C6100’s) are being migrated to VMWare ESXi… Why? Its a learning exercise… We see how it goes…
So, long update… Any questions, comments, etc… shout!
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This site is hosted on my own ASN on AS204994. More details about that over there. I also use Vultr for transit services and HostUs for LIR Services. Check them out. You can also check some of the gear I use on a daily basis over on kit.co/tiernano. Looking for a Backup Option? Check out Backblaze and get a month free.
