yesir. We use them in our Headend to monitor channels that are escalated for issues such as audio desync and Tiling and our Lineman don't see the issue field-side.
Current IT System Administrator, very clean, I always appreciate someone who takes time to mount a monitor to the rack, I had that same startech rack but a 25u flavor.
7:08 those product pictures are like that, because those rack-mounted monitors are mostly geared towards the live broadcasting space of sport events e.g. That's also why you see a Blackmagic rack-mount monitor there. This is also the reason why they're very expensive: they are probably color calibrated in such a way that they are suitable for live broadcasts.
just anwering that, also was broadcast engineer, not all racks are created for server, note those monitor`s description, broadcast sdi rack mount monitor
Video Engineer here. Can confirm this is exactly why those monitors show those pictures. These monitors are designed for broadcast television, not server rooms. However the price is mostly because they use the professional SDI signal standard as an input rather than something consumer like HDMI. And from the fact that they are built with a rugged metal chasis, not cheap plastic. The monitors shown are not color calibrated. Color calibrated broadcast television monitors are much much more expensive. $10k and up. For that reason we actually generally use very few color true monitors. Most monitors are just there to confirm what signal is going where, then you have one or two color critical monitors used for actual signal engineering.
One more thing. I love how IT people think that racks are only used by them. The 19" equipment rack was first standardized in 1922 by AT&T for relays. The idea of equipment racks dates all the way back to railways in the late 19th century. And us in the video production industry have been using equipment racks since well before the internet or IT even existed.
7:13 those monitors are for broadcast live events or tv stations, that's why the advertise them with live events because the "control master" needs to see many cameras. Those monitors are also rack mounted because the control tv room also have many racks, but I'm not sure that those racks has the same width of network racks, so they probably won't fit.
@@mirror71 I believe the 23" racks are for older telco gear. I worked in tv for 11 years and never saw a rack that wasn't 19". Biggest difference I saw between racks marketed to A/V pros and those marketed to IT is that the A/V ones always rails with tapped holes with #10/32 or #8/24 threads instead of square cutouts for cage nuts. But anyways, always 19".
@@eh5806 I'm probably out of date here. The last time I worked in that area was right as the switch from analog to digital was happening. At that time, we were primarily 19" but still had some 23" gear that was always a pain.
there are also event streamers that put racks in their road cases and simply open up a side of the case and just power it up and are ready to go quickly. There are so many uses.
I threw my 3D Printer in my Rack - hugely recommend. Some LED Strips when it's on and it turns into a center piece for it. I also have an open frame and instead of an actual monitor rack like you went with, I just use a simple Monitor arm that's off to the side clamped onto the shelving I used for the 3D Printer - allows me to reposition it when I'm working on something else on my workbench which is right next to it - very similar to your setup.
What I came up with in 2 years of using server rack at home: 1) UPS is not needed in my case. I lived in an old house with bad wiring, so I immediately attended to this issue and spent a lot on it. They are very expensive, and supplying only two GPU farms would cost more than the cost of the rack itself, and the batteries need to be changed every few years. As a result, I extended a separate power line from the electricity meter with it's own RCD and installed a voltage stabiliser + do checkpoints more often 2) extra shelves clogged with the wrong stuff 3) sitting at the rack is not very convenient, each time pushing-pulling out the periphery tires. If space permits, it is better to put a compact table nearby. It's not as aesthetically pleasing, but much more convenient. 4) It is better not to put a 3D printer on a server rack. Rack is not super solid, nor is the shelf, and the 3D printer can produce vibrations. The difference in print quality on the floor vs rack is small, but noticeable 5) ground the rack and cases, less dust will accumulate :)
Pretty sweet! I have a small data center in my lab (That support) eighteen servers and storage arrays for four enterprise (platforms) I am rebuilding my three racks (while recording the process...) from the ground up for a new layout... I like how you merge the tool cabinet as part of your back drop... Keep having fun and check out my stuff coming out soon... We need more guys like to help all the other out there... P.S. keep a eye on you cooling as you go...
dont worry about the wood, I've had a wood floor in my rack for over 2 years at this point, as I dont have rails for my server and I dont want the cables in the back to break if the back of the server falls in while pulling it out.
You could maybe put a shelf behind the monitor for more lose stuff or put the monitor on a arm, otherwise would be cool if you built your own 1u monitor mouse keyboard combo :P
The KVM cables are NOT normal VGA cables, they have extra data pins connected to the unit end that are then broken out at the server end on the USB cable. You put your universal rails in wrong, they mount from behind vertical rack rails.
expand your KVM with a PIKVM 3 - it would allow not only local to rack access but then network Access - i am doing this very soon for my tower rack just waiting for some mounts for the mac minis i have + a new storanator
Just wanted to throw in the football ad stuff you said was because those are usually used by broadcasters, especially at live events, in like tailor made vans or mobile studios.
I don't mind having towers at the bottom of the rack, in my experience this is quite common in home to small/medium business. Anyways this looks good and I'm jelly!
@@sentdex I gotcha. I realize you know what I mean though. Good that you are not obsesses with showing off your belongings and do it for your yourself.
I have a 1U KVM like the one you showed, but it was used and came with my rack. It's main problem is that it's so old that it's VGA and the older style PS2 keyboard/mouse connectors. Oh and the cables are about a billion feet long. I no longer use it because servers themselves all have IPMI or iDRAC interfaces that let you get virtual consoles.
What is the total power consumption of entire rack ? I put a sticker on each machine mentioning how much a current it sucks at idle. And an ammeter at the rack top displaying the current in amperes. I will know when a machine goes bad it starts sucking more power. Or at least I will know when there is action taking place :)
This is the best setup I've seen in a long time! What is the 'top-like' process monitoring utility you have running there at 9:14? I have not yet used that.
I have a KVM switch that I got used. It has the built-in monitor that flips up. Unfortunately, the power button for the monitor broke. I don't use it any more anyway since everything else in my rack has iDRAC or IPMI now. Which is good because the KVM switch is old enough that it has PS2 keyboard and mouse connectors.
Not sure what you've done since this video, but I just commented on P1 and mentioned some 30-35" deep shelves you can get on Ama but, after looking closer at what you did with the wood, you might want to just stick with the wood in the bottom. Maybe cut another narrow piece to use the full width and maybe some joining brackets or other hardware on the bottom, so it is one joined piece of wood and just paint it black. I say this because a full-depth self would have to start at 1U and you're getting a little extra space doing it the way you have here. And also, there were not many full-depth shelves available at decent prices, and a sturdy one would be expensive. So, I think the wood idea might be better than a shelf if you just refine it a bit.
Looks good man 👍 I’ve got a singular UPS battery in my rack: if you’re open to tinkering, you can run NUT (network ups tools) on a server (or raspberry pi), and even with a single battery it would last enough to safely save&shut down all your apps and servers, should anything happen
i guess the VGA and USB thing works like powerline, you have an analog signal between a frequency range and then you send digital signals on it using 2.4ghz or something similar and they never conflict.
In this case the monitor did have the VESA mount apparently only to be able to attach something like a mini PC or diskless client to the back of the monitor
These Amazon rack mounts work great. "Rackstuds P20 Rack Mount Solution Series II - No More Cage Nuts! The Easiest and Safest Server Rack Solution in 19" Racks with Square Punched Vertical Rails | 20-Pack, Purple, 3.2mm/0.126" Version"
Which monitor and vesa adapter are these? I swear, I need the exact same model, because that just looks so perfect and after seeing this, I don't want to have anything else. I didn't care that I need to take the monitor apar to get rid of the leg.
I would recommend not pushing the back of the rack against the wall, but push it against a wall... sideways. That way, when you pull it out, you can get to both the front and back. Or even get to both sides without pulling it out at all. I can tell you with my desktop on the desktop, I always put mine sideways with the motherboard side facing outwards, with the back of the PC to the left, and the front to the right. If you want it to still look impressive sideways, what I'd do is make a flat easily removable side panel for the full length of the case, and then emblazon your company or whatever logo on it 🙂 Your original fronts and backs become... left and right side... and there is no stigma to mounting stuff "in the back". Fill it all out. It's not like you are going to have rows and rows of these things... like an IBM datacenter.
I am in a space that I built for this purpose. Currently in the middle of a heat wave and things are more than comfy in here. Most of the heat-generating machines I already had anyway, I just changed how they're stored. I might have even net-reduced my power draw with all the monitors I've removed from the equation :D
Any time I see this server case the rosewell 12 bay hotswap I hurt a little. I have this case. Started to have issues with drives all in one bay. Started to Google the problem. Tons of people have the same issues. I moved to there non hotswap bays and issues have been resolved. Watch it carefully.
There’s a high chance you’ve mentioned it in one of the videos but I was wondering, how much did this all cost you? (including or excluding previously bought items, just a rough estimate) thanks!
I have a question I would like to buy a fully managed refurbished cisco switch 2960s 24 ports, but is it better than for example buying a tp link? what would the advantages be besides cli configuration?
Your build is very efficient. Why you don't sell your old PCs and buy new one for that system? I think it would be way cooler with multi CPU, multi GPU and multi OS.
I worry that the aquantia 10G NIC won't work with Truenas. Intel NICs are the best for compat with truenas/freebsd. Also, 12 discs in raidz3 outperform 4 discs in raidz1. Lastly, If one vdev in a pool fails, the entire pool fails.
My colegue was at client site in the server room and they had small monitor in the rack and Golf was playing on that so..someone may be watching fotball on that :)
Former Data Center Technician here: Rack design looks really amazing! Very well planned out for your use case!
'cept for that whole, laws-of-physics thing
Those rack monitors have football, etc. on them as they are meant for broadcast application.
yesir. We use them in our Headend to monitor channels that are escalated for issues such as audio desync and Tiling and our Lineman don't see the issue field-side.
Current IT System Administrator, very clean, I always appreciate someone who takes time to mount a monitor to the rack, I had that same startech rack but a 25u flavor.
The rack is really beautiful and clean.l love the Monitor mount solution.
7:08 those product pictures are like that, because those rack-mounted monitors are mostly geared towards the live broadcasting space of sport events e.g. That's also why you see a Blackmagic rack-mount monitor there. This is also the reason why they're very expensive: they are probably color calibrated in such a way that they are suitable for live broadcasts.
Beat me to in. I was a broadcast engineer before moving into rural paradise.
just anwering that, also was broadcast engineer, not all racks are created for server, note those monitor`s description, broadcast sdi rack mount monitor
Video Engineer here. Can confirm this is exactly why those monitors show those pictures. These monitors are designed for broadcast television, not server rooms.
However the price is mostly because they use the professional SDI signal standard as an input rather than something consumer like HDMI. And from the fact that they are built with a rugged metal chasis, not cheap plastic. The monitors shown are not color calibrated.
Color calibrated broadcast television monitors are much much more expensive. $10k and up. For that reason we actually generally use very few color true monitors. Most monitors are just there to confirm what signal is going where, then you have one or two color critical monitors used for actual signal engineering.
One more thing. I love how IT people think that racks are only used by them. The 19" equipment rack was first standardized in 1922 by AT&T for relays. The idea of equipment racks dates all the way back to railways in the late 19th century.
And us in the video production industry have been using equipment racks since well before the internet or IT even existed.
Thank you, just wanted to say that lol. Nice additions also Rob.
"Who's watching american football or nature documentaries *chuckles* on their server rack?"
-Sentdex, 2022, while gaming at his server rack
This is great, first time seeing one of these setup form scratch.
Really nice build!
These videos are amazing !!! It kinda gives me Lego vibe from seeing you create your rack ! So pleasant to watch.
Looks awesome man, very clean! inspiring to see what years of hard work and dedication has enabled you to build, well deserved!
I've always wanted a storage server. This gives me some motivation 👍🏻
OMG 😱, it's awesome Sentdex, so beautiful, I love it
Youre building my dream rack setup, stop it. Looks so good
wow I really enjoyed it. what a satisfying rack and servers 🤩🤩🤩
I like the ending visuals, great video as always!
Nice!
With the cost of energy lately though I have cut right back, grates on me spending so much.
7:13 those monitors are for broadcast live events or tv stations, that's why the advertise them with live events because the "control master" needs to see many cameras. Those monitors are also rack mounted because the control tv room also have many racks, but I'm not sure that those racks has the same width of network racks, so they probably won't fit.
They do fit....sometimes. While our server racks are almost always 19", the racks used in broadcast can be 19" and 23".
@@mirror71 I believe the 23" racks are for older telco gear. I worked in tv for 11 years and never saw a rack that wasn't 19". Biggest difference I saw between racks marketed to A/V pros and those marketed to IT is that the A/V ones always rails with tapped holes with #10/32 or #8/24 threads instead of square cutouts for cage nuts. But anyways, always 19".
@@eh5806 I'm probably out of date here. The last time I worked in that area was right as the switch from analog to digital was happening. At that time, we were primarily 19" but still had some 23" gear that was always a pain.
there are also event streamers that put racks in their road cases and simply open up a side of the case and just power it up and are ready to go quickly. There are so many uses.
I threw my 3D Printer in my Rack - hugely recommend. Some LED Strips when it's on and it turns into a center piece for it. I also have an open frame and instead of an actual monitor rack like you went with, I just use a simple Monitor arm that's off to the side clamped onto the shelving I used for the 3D Printer - allows me to reposition it when I'm working on something else on my workbench which is right next to it - very similar to your setup.
What I came up with in 2 years of using server rack at home:
1) UPS is not needed in my case. I lived in an old house with bad wiring, so I immediately attended to this issue and spent a lot on it. They are very expensive, and supplying only two GPU farms would cost more than the cost of the rack itself, and the batteries need to be changed every few years. As a result, I extended a separate power line from the electricity meter with it's own RCD and installed a voltage stabiliser + do checkpoints more often
2) extra shelves clogged with the wrong stuff
3) sitting at the rack is not very convenient, each time pushing-pulling out the periphery tires. If space permits, it is better to put a compact table nearby. It's not as aesthetically pleasing, but much more convenient.
4) It is better not to put a 3D printer on a server rack. Rack is not super solid, nor is the shelf, and the 3D printer can produce vibrations. The difference in print quality on the floor vs rack is small, but noticeable
5) ground the rack and cases, less dust will accumulate :)
This looks OOOOOOOOOOOOO, sooo clean!
so great to see how far you have come dude!
This is the nerd edition of MTV Cribs. I love it!
Amazing, looks wonderful!
love your spouse and/or kid(s), dog, whatever the way this guy loves his rack
I hope I get a homelab like this one day. Just for funsies.
Pretty sweet! I have a small data center in my lab (That support) eighteen servers and storage arrays for four enterprise (platforms) I am rebuilding my three racks (while recording the process...) from the ground up for a new layout... I like how you merge the tool cabinet as part of your back drop... Keep having fun and check out my stuff coming out soon... We need more guys like to help all the other out there... P.S. keep a eye on you cooling as you go...
I don't know why i'm smelling something is coming, will be great ❤❤❤
what a home lab... insaneee...
Looks amazing very nice job definitely a project to be proud of
Wow that is a beast of a computer
8:42 "Is this my new house?", _The Dog_
Most if not all KVM switches support keyboard hot keys to operate them, so you probably can switch sources without removing your hand from keyboard
dont worry about the wood, I've had a wood floor in my rack for over 2 years at this point, as I dont have rails for my server and I dont want the cables in the back to break if the back of the server falls in while pulling it out.
inspirational
show us some switching between hard working machines
that looks so freaking good
You could maybe put a shelf behind the monitor for more lose stuff or put the monitor on a arm,
otherwise would be cool if you built your own 1u monitor mouse keyboard combo :P
The KVM cables are NOT normal VGA cables, they have extra data pins connected to the unit end that are then broken out at the server end on the USB cable. You put your universal rails in wrong, they mount from behind vertical rack rails.
A clean rack.
expand your KVM with a PIKVM 3 - it would allow not only local to rack access but then network Access - i am doing this very soon for my tower rack just waiting for some mounts for the mac minis i have + a new storanator
Next year you have a super computer
Just wanted to throw in the football ad stuff you said was because those are usually used by broadcasters, especially at live events, in like tailor made vans or mobile studios.
I don't mind having towers at the bottom of the rack, in my experience this is quite common in home to small/medium business. Anyways this looks good and I'm jelly!
just got here
this is cool af
This should be in your living room.
It is where I spend most of my time so I get to enjoy it :)
@@sentdex I gotcha. I realize you know what I mean though. Good that you are not obsesses with showing off your belongings and do it for your yourself.
I can see The Boring Company's Flame thrower :D
Nicely done!
its like going back to the stone age.
New Subscriber, nice content. I thinks in a few years you might want to switch to Keystones for your Patch panel. Keep these videos coming !
Hey on my cheap little nine unit rack I use painted back plywood sheets as side panels 😂😂
I have a 1U KVM like the one you showed, but it was used and came with my rack. It's main problem is that it's so old that it's VGA and the older style PS2 keyboard/mouse connectors. Oh and the cables are about a billion feet long. I no longer use it because servers themselves all have IPMI or iDRAC interfaces that let you get virtual consoles.
Jeff from Craft Computing uses a rack mount kvm for his home lab. You can check that out.
looking very nice very jealous
What is the total power consumption of entire rack ?
I put a sticker on each machine mentioning how much a current it sucks at idle. And an ammeter at the rack top displaying the current in amperes. I will know when a machine goes bad it starts sucking more power. Or at least I will know when there is action taking place :)
Looks great
Awesome!!! 👍👍👍👍👍
This video justifies why i am 100% subsribed!
how do you do 10:47 ???? what software do you use?
This is the best setup I've seen in a long time! What is the 'top-like' process monitoring utility you have running there at 9:14? I have not yet used that.
I always mount my switches to the back... I know its not ideal for heat exchange, but pulling all cables neatly to the front is a PiTA.
Nothing more permanent than a temporary solution
Man, I wish I could do this stuff
I have a KVM switch that I got used. It has the built-in monitor that flips up. Unfortunately, the power button for the monitor broke. I don't use it any more anyway since everything else in my rack has iDRAC or IPMI now. Which is good because the KVM switch is old enough that it has PS2 keyboard and mouse connectors.
Not sure what you've done since this video, but I just commented on P1 and mentioned some 30-35" deep shelves you can get on Ama but, after looking closer at what you did with the wood, you might want to just stick with the wood in the bottom. Maybe cut another narrow piece to use the full width and maybe some joining brackets or other hardware on the bottom, so it is one joined piece of wood and just paint it black. I say this because a full-depth self would have to start at 1U and you're getting a little extra space doing it the way you have here. And also, there were not many full-depth shelves available at decent prices, and a sturdy one would be expensive. So, I think the wood idea might be better than a shelf if you just refine it a bit.
I had Nat Geo documentaries running on one of the servers in work on kvm monitor, nobody noticed until after I quit.
I would like to know some networking tips; switch/router/modem opnsense or whatever security stuff :P
Looks good man 👍 I’ve got a singular UPS battery in my rack: if you’re open to tinkering, you can run NUT (network ups tools) on a server (or raspberry pi), and even with a single battery it would last enough to safely save&shut down all your apps and servers, should anything happen
i guess the VGA and USB thing works like powerline, you have an analog signal between a frequency range and then you send digital signals on it using 2.4ghz or something similar and they never conflict.
Add Vertiv PDUs. Do you have two separate utility services? Or at least two independantly UPS'd circuits?
Real man use bare metal and build his own network/server lab.
In this case the monitor did have the VESA mount apparently only to be able to attach something like a mini PC or diskless client to the back of the monitor
These Amazon rack mounts work great. "Rackstuds P20 Rack Mount Solution Series II - No More Cage Nuts! The Easiest and Safest Server Rack Solution in 19" Racks with Square Punched Vertical Rails | 20-Pack, Purple, 3.2mm/0.126" Version"
Genius!
i once had a kvm with a OSD, which came up when pressing CTRL twice quickly.. maybe yours has something similar (?)
Which monitor and vesa adapter are these? I swear, I need the exact same model, because that just looks so perfect and after seeing this, I don't want to have anything else. I didn't care that I need to take the monitor apar to get rid of the leg.
I would recommend not pushing the back of the rack against the wall, but push it against a wall... sideways.
That way, when you pull it out, you can get to both the front and back. Or even get to both sides without pulling it out at all.
I can tell you with my desktop on the desktop, I always put mine sideways with the motherboard side facing outwards, with the back of the PC to the left, and the front to the right.
If you want it to still look impressive sideways, what I'd do is make a flat easily removable side panel for the full length of the case, and then emblazon your company or whatever logo on it 🙂
Your original fronts and backs become... left and right side... and there is no stigma to mounting stuff "in the back". Fill it all out.
It's not like you are going to have rows and rows of these things... like an IBM datacenter.
7:10 in the broadcasting world they may have the rack in a truck and having a feed displayed live so you do not cut the signal.
KVM over IP is the way to go, then you get to practice setting up your maintenance vlan, or physically separate network.
Somehow, I never thought of looking up a VESA mount adapter for a server rack... I am now looking at them on Amazon. lol
I firmly believe that the first sentient AI will be born in a home lab like these and not in corporate or federal supercomputers
is this rack in a garage? how do you cool it down, does it get hot in the summer?
That's looking pretty wicked :-) I presume that's gonna generate a lot of heat. How are you going to keep your room cool...enough?
I am in a space that I built for this purpose. Currently in the middle of a heat wave and things are more than comfy in here.
Most of the heat-generating machines I already had anyway, I just changed how they're stored. I might have even net-reduced my power draw with all the monitors I've removed from the equation :D
@@sentdex Could you touch on your power system, for example do you have the tesla wall or whatever it is called?
Any time I see this server case the rosewell 12 bay hotswap I hurt a little. I have this case. Started to have issues with drives all in one bay. Started to Google the problem. Tons of people have the same issues. I moved to there non hotswap bays and issues have been resolved. Watch it carefully.
Nice. Any updates?
you can get some ibm or hp rackmount consoles kvm for like 100-200$ on ebay which have easily replacable part
There’s a high chance you’ve mentioned it in one of the videos but I was wondering, how much did this all cost you? (including or excluding previously bought items, just a rough estimate) thanks!
Using Curl hehe!
what 10 gig switch did you get, its not listed?
Excellent.
Is it truly even done if it doesn't have RGB though?
The issue with a 42U rack is the urge to want to populate it. My first foray will be a rack at the most, half that size.
I have a question I would like to buy a fully managed refurbished cisco switch 2960s 24 ports, but is it better than for example buying a tp link? what would the advantages be besides cli configuration?
Your build is very efficient. Why you don't sell your old PCs and buy new one for that system? I think it would be way cooler with multi CPU, multi GPU and multi OS.
what is monitor size ? can you please tell
Me and the boys watching an nba game on the server monitor.. oh... yeah
I worry that the aquantia 10G NIC won't work with Truenas. Intel NICs are the best for compat with truenas/freebsd. Also, 12 discs in raidz3 outperform 4 discs in raidz1. Lastly, If one vdev in a pool fails, the entire pool fails.
excuse my ignorance. what porpuser would this take in a home? in other worlds what are the main tasks you use it for?
My colegue was at client site in the server room and they had small monitor in the rack and Golf was playing on that so..someone may be watching fotball on that :)
pretty neat!
imagine having a8000 in homelab wtf
All these set at ur home in one room ... Em, maybe you can save the heating cost in winter? :)