Reason I ask is that I have a line on a Dell Optiplex 5060 SFF with 16 GB DDR4 / no drive, for around $175 USD (local IT guy). I’m getting an itchy finger. LOL

Optiplex

How’s that working for you? I don’t need 8 of them but after doing some passive research, the Optiplex seems to be a favorite in the homelab/selfhosting arena.

Dell T320 idles out at 54–99W, but typical use would be in the 101–158W range. In my locale, one Dell T320 will cost about $35 USD per month to run. I shut them down before retiring for the evening as I couldn’t justify running them while I’m sawing logs. I’m the only user and I have no late nite/early morning Linux ISOs downloads scheduled.

I use this fairly often. Simple, effective, no complaints really.

There are so many people in this world I’d rather not ever hear their voices. Lmao.

100%! It’s a pain in the ass when I create music tho. Some frequencies I just can’t hear well enough to make a decision. I lean on AI to assist me in the mastering process.

If your current machines are working fine and the $35 a month isn’t breaking the budget

Good point. The T320s are running fine. In fact I’ve not done anything to them since the beginning of the year except enjoy them. If I were to boil the ox down to the bouillon cube, I’m a little bored, and I’ve learned a lot since I first fired them up years ago, and I feel I could do things a lot better, cleaner, and more efficiently. Mostly bored tho. I like a good project.

What infrastructure or operational costs do you think people underestimate the most?

In a former life I was an Mech Eng specializing in HVAC. I was a designer, project manager, estimator, and ran the IT dept (deceptively small company) and trained old codgers to run computers and laptops. In my experience, most owners underestimate the cost of construction. When I did project estimates, I read the spec book cover to cover, even the sections that weren’t related to HVAC. I would do a nut and bolt take off and derive a cost + overhead and profit. I understand, everyone wants the best bang for their buck, but there is always a reason why low ball numbers will bite you in the ass, because you will be hounded by change orders until the low ball price will match mine.

Ever since you posted that, I’ve been tinkering with the notion of replacing one of my Dell T320s with just such a unit. The Dell T320 have been good servers but cost me about $35 USD per month to run, whereas the Dell OptiPlex 3050 Micro you recommended would cost me about $3 to $5 to run per month. So, just in power savings alone, would pay for itself in less than a year. The Dell T320s put out a decent amount of heat as well, and aren’t so quiet…which doesn’t bother me as much since I’m clinically deaf. LOL

Dude, I do not pretend understand the inner machinations of a Lemmy mod. Rule 3 seems a blanket coverage for a lot of threads. But, I’m still out here repeating your recommends. Seems like it would be a jammy server for Docker containers at a good price.

I think they nuked the whole thread.

Thanks man! Nice looking project BTW

I think the mods deleted under rule 3 which really doesn’t make much sense to me. If you are going to self host and you are starting with equipment recomendations, who better to ask than the people who selfhost. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Personal food database with photos, barcodes, categories, and custom labels

Where do you source your barcodes from? The reason I am asking is that I would like to give Grocy/Barcode Buddy a better barcode pool to draw from. As it is now, it’s kind of hit and miss. Most brand names are fine, but off brands or store brands are kind of iffy.

OP, Don’t let ‘em give you shit about your ponytail. Keep on rockin’.

@[email protected] recommended this on is the last similar thread to this one: Dell OptiPlex 3050 Micro. The price seems right and you could probably run good many other Docker containers in the future.

Anything much newer than that will consume less power per core (usually) but will cost more up front

I did a little passive research on the Dell OptiPlex 3050 Micro that @[email protected] recommended. For my locale you could run that 24/7 for about $2.00 USD per month. I like to stay in the DDR3 range of equipment because those are not nearly the same price for units using DDR4 or higher, and as far as performance goes, are still on the green of newer DDR4 & 5 units. Plenty enough computing power to handle a lot of Docker containers, etc.

Not sure where you are located OP but, eBay, CraigsList, Goodwill, local Refurb shops, befriend a local IT person…business are always throwing out decent stuff. Just stay away from enterprise equipment. In my locale there are ‘flea-markets’, FaceBook Marketplace. @[email protected] suggested a Dell OptiPlex 3050 Micro, and if you do some dilligent searching of Amazon, you can find some good deals on Used or Refurb computers.

or maybe ME)

That OS was terrible enough to make me shudder now to even recall it.

Come to think about it, it may have been just a PCI card. That’s too long ago for this old head to clearly remember.

I use a USB tuner like https://hauppauge.com/

I did that way back in the day, tho mine was not inline USB but a PCIe card and MythTV. Worked pretty well.

My first question would be, how familiar are you with the Linux cli? How much experience do you have with Docker containers? You are right, your list is quite extensive. and there is nothing wrong with goals, but I would caution to start small and slow. I would learn how to:

• Drive the Linux bus fairly well. I’m using Ubuntu Jammy for my servers, but there are other options. NixOS seems popular.
• Understand what reverse proxies are and how to deploy one. Caddy is pretty much dead simple with a small learning curve. There are many of them to choose from tho.
• Learn about various security implementations. Security is paramount. Fail2ban is a good start, but I would also explore Crowdsec, Wazuh, etc.
• Learn about Docker and how to set up Docker containers so that they are secure.
• Instead of mass deploying apps and containers, choose one. Get to know it on a personal basis. The installation process, the security aspect, etc. Things are easier when there is only one container to mother hen. Then as your knowledge base grows, add another…and so on.
• Document everything you do. Seriously. You can’t write too many notes. When you’ve successfully deployed your first app while documenting, go back and clean up your notes and make them a part of your 3,2,1 back up policy. I can almost guarentee you that 6 months down the road, you won’t be able to remember every command you typed in or what you’ve done. Documentation makes troubleshooting much easier.
• Speaking of backups, you’ll need a reliable way to make backups of your server. Borg seems to be quite popular, but there are others.
• Have fun!