Home Lab – Part 1

Well, I, like most serious virtualization professionals, am taking the plunge into building a home lab. I’ve gathered pieces for the past few months from various sources and am now in a position to start. I decided what better place to chronicle my journey.

Let’s start with the inventory:

• 2 HP ML350 G5 /w 14GB RAM – ESXi 4.1 Host
• 2 HP DL380 G4 /w 6GB RAM – iSCSI Shared Storage
• Cisco 3550 XL 48p Switch – Loaded with Router Code
• Cisco ASA5505

Some would say overboard, but I also plan on using it for infrastructure at my house, and hosting of some personal websites.

Here is a list of VMs I plan to run:

• Windows 2008 R2 – vCenter 4.1
• Windows 2008 R2 – DC, DHCP, DNS
• Windows 2008 R2 – File/Media Server
• Windows 2008 R2 – SQL Server
• Windows 2008 R2 – Exchange 2010 Server
• Windows 2008 R2 – IIS/Web Server

I’m sure this list will grow as I look to master new technologies, but for now I think this is a good start. As soon as I get the lab up and running, I’ll post again and take a few pictures as well. Things are still in the design and planning phase so if you have any advice or recommendations, please feel free to share them.

UPDATE:
I went through and corrected some of the server models as I had mistyped them. I also swapped out my 3500XL for a 3550XL so I could load router code on it and handle my Layer 3 traffic on one device and not melt my Linksys.