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Network pics thread

The largest i could use was a 1500, because after that it changes the power plug and requires a 30amp plug, im renting right now so i'm not going to buy that till i get my own house then run a nice dedicated 30amp snake to the rack :)

You could do what I did ...

I made a power splitter, it plugs into the stove plug, runs to a junction box that has a stove outlet (so I can still cook !) and then a cable runs from there to my rack with a 30A twistlock connector for the 3000VA UPS. Voila :)
 
will it work with deep cycles tho ? ie charging issues or voltage drop and the psu charging them properly and or not giving proper read's...

From what I heard the charger in those higher end APCs is smart enough to charge properly and not overcharge. I'm guessing it does certain tests on the batteries or something at intervals.

Not sure how they calculate run time though, if it's a set timer or if it's based on voltage drop or some other figure that is battery specific.
 
From what I heard the charger in those higher end APCs is smart enough to charge properly and not overcharge. I'm guessing it does certain tests on the batteries or something at intervals.

Not sure how they calculate run time though, if it's a set timer or if it's based on voltage drop or some other figure that is battery specific.

its determined on current draw. less current drawn more run time, and vice versa :)

Last time i checked ( years ago ) up's didn't like deep cycle batts, but could have changed over time.
 
From what I heard the charger in those higher end APCs is smart enough to charge properly and not overcharge. I'm guessing it does certain tests on the batteries or something at intervals.

Not sure how they calculate run time though, if it's a set timer or if it's based on voltage drop or some other figure that is battery specific.

APC's have a 'battery constant' (or at least that's what apcupsd calls it).

The major issue is that a deep cycle takes much longer to charge, so therefore the charging unit should fast charge for longer. The battery voltage might hit the magic number that is fine for the SLA batteries APC uses, but is wrong for your specific type.

I have an HP 530 sitting in front of me now, and my friend bought three.

Alternatively, you could just build a UPS (large batt charger and inverter).
 
Actually I'm debating on building my own UPS later down the line. Starting with this:

http://www.xantrex.com/power-products/inverter-chargers/freedom-sw-3000.aspx

I would locate this along with a bank of batteries in some kind of fire proof containment. Maybe a poured cement "box" or something. The AC feed would go in, then out, and go to a small sub panel and key circuits would feed off it such as servers, perhaps the fridge and furnace, and a couple lighting circuits.

It would be outside the server room. May as well make use of the vast crawlspace I have.
 
The major advantage of a discrete battery charger/inverter setup is much larger battery capacity. APC makes good stuff, but they're just not designed to use deep-cycle batteries.

If you're looking for backup power for non-computer loads, I'd suggest getting a generator - that Xantrex unit can likely deal with crap power so it shouldn't have an issue running off one.

There's commercial battery storage boxes that you could perhaps use as a template.

Typically heavy power loads such as furnace etc. are run off a generator (easy enough to restart the motor) while the controls are run off UPS+generator.
 
Most gen sets still need you to have UPS though as it can take 60 seconds for the gen to kick in.
 
That unit supports a generator which is nice, but for my needs I'd probably be happy with 1-2 hours of run time I'd get with a small battery bank.


The generac generators at home depot are nice though, they are not that expensive. If ever I start hosting critical stuff at home I'd definitely consider it.
 
That unit supports a generator which is nice, but for my needs I'd probably be happy with 1-2 hours of run time I'd get with a small battery bank.


The generac generators at home depot are nice though, they are not that expensive. If ever I start hosting critical stuff at home I'd definitely consider it.

the generic ones are ok, but watch out lots of them short out and cause issues :( make sure its on some kinda serge supressor or ups or something to protect what's plugged into the gen.
 
IMAG0060.jpg


Updated my small network...
Top down:
On top of the rack: tool box
Crestron CNMSX-Pro processor for alarm clock
Extreme Network Summit 200-24
48 port RJ-RJ patch panel
Dell PowerConnect 5324 (fans removed and still runs strong)
shelf left: a random box for network monitor to ping to see if power is up or down
shelf right: Linksys WRT160n v3 running DD-WRT
Cisco 1720 (not doing much)
Crestron MP2E control the VLAN assignments on the Dell switch, also does some audio eq stuff when I need it
Going down the center of the picture, home made PoE injector for another linksys WRT160n

Its a mess in the back, this is just a temporary setup
 
I like the XLR's.

There was another poster using Crestron to control serial ports.

Personally, I'm a fan of a company called Opto 22 - they make industrial control systems but they're pretty nifty. I'm looking to use their automation gear to control a radio station.
 
IMAG0060.jpg


Updated my small network...
Top down:
On top of the rack: tool box
Crestron CNMSX-Pro processor for alarm clock
Extreme Network Summit 200-24
48 port RJ-RJ patch panel
Dell PowerConnect 5324 (fans removed and still runs strong)
shelf left: a random box for network monitor to ping to see if power is up or down
shelf right: Linksys WRT160n v3 running DD-WRT
Cisco 1720 (not doing much)
Crestron MP2E control the VLAN assignments on the Dell switch, also does some audio eq stuff when I need it
Going down the center of the picture, home made PoE injector for another linksys WRT160n

Its a mess in the back, this is just a temporary setup

Going to steal your PoE injector design as my HP 530 got here today. Thanks to the directions Flecom left I had it up and running in under 2 minutes.
 
Long time lurker, first time poster here.. I have to say that some really awesome and not to mention clean setups in here, [H] surely has some incredible gear hidden away in various basements out there.

For what its worth, heres my little home setup.. being a student my budget for gear is not the greatest, so Im trying to put my money where it counts, and saving where I can.

The rack, a 42RU Rittal:
500px-Network3_08.jpg


Servers:
1. 2RU - Webcluster (PennyroyalTea and TeenSpirit): Two dual-core Atom's (one D510 one D525) each equipped with 4GB ram and a 30GB SSD.
2. 4RU - Fileserver (Nevermind): Athlon64 3000+ with 2GB ram and ~15TB of storage. In an old LocalDirector for some of that networking nostalgia :)
3. 4RU - VM Server (Polly): AMD X6 with 16GB ram, 2x XT's (hybrids) in RAID1, 4x SSD's in RAID0, and 4x 7.2k's in RAID10. GTX460 for CUDA.
4. 4RU - VM Cluster (Lithium): 8x quad-cores, total of 32 cores and 32GB ram.
5. 4RU - VM Power unit
6. UPS #1: APC 1000VA RM (netups) feeding the networking gear.

UPS #2 (servups), APC 1500VA, no room for it in the rack, this one powers the servers.
500px-Infected3_04.JPG


Networking gear:
1. Syslog server (Blackbox): Transmeta Crusoe 533MHz with 64MB ram :) and 500GB for storage.
2. Core switch (inConnect): Cisco 2948G
3. VM Gbit switch (inTransmit): Dlink DGS1024 Green.
4. Servers pri. FW (inSense): Watchguard X, 1.13GHz P3 with 512MB ram and 4GB UltraX CF card, running FreeBSD/pfSense.
5. Servers sec. FW (stayaway): Watchguard X, 1.4GHz Cel. with 512MB ram and 8GB UltraX CF card, running Slackware/iptables.
6. Internal FW (inFilter): Juniper Netscreen 50 adv.
7. Perimiter FW (inScreen): Juniper Netscreen 50 adv.
500px-Infected3_03.JPG


Distribution layer, Cisco 3524. Replaced the fans with (somewhat more) silent ones.
500px-Distribution_01.jpg


The ass end of the servers :)
500px-Infected3_00.JPG


And if anyone should wonder what the operating system of choice is in this network :D
500px-Infected3_01.JPG


Thats it I guess, nothing really exciting I'm afraid. Its all still very much a work in progress, hoping to complete the setup by the end of the summer. Still got another 4U server (the 'SAN') coming in as well..
 
Well shoot, now someone bought the 10 pack of HP530's! I got back from my meeting this afternoon ready to make him a good offer, and BAM, its gone. Oh well!
 
man you guys are vicious lol

should have bought some more myself
 
[ Infected ];1037368000 said:
Thats it I guess, nothing really exciting I'm afraid. Its all still very much a work in progress, hoping to complete the setup by the end of the summer. Still got another 4U server (the 'SAN') coming in as well..
Again, things look backward to me. Are the fireboxes sucking hot air from the back, or pushing hot air to the back? Why not wire the network on the back side, where all the ports are?
 
What are the specs on that SAN?

SuperMicro 12 Bay chassis with X7DBE motherboard
As of now one Xeon 5140(have 2 procs but only one heatsink but I dont think the second is nessasary)
4 GB 667 DDR2 ECC FB-DIMM memory(damn buffered ram!)
Shitty 3Ware hardware RAID card
4 500GB 7200RPM drives in RAID5 for share and stuff that doesnt need to be fast storage
3 150GB Raptor 10000RPM drives in RAID5 for VMs and database
2 1TB for backups and archive
Gigbit fiber card for iSCSI
Running OpenFiler
 
We finally got almost everybody moved from the old 2003 Terminal Server to the 08:R2 Hyper-V VDI box.



We're using plenty of RAM, sort of like it's running out of style; so use more!
 
Student budget my ass :D

NO fucking kidding. I didn't have that much shit as a student.

Speaking of 2948g is that a 2948g-l3? I have one of those nice switch for what it is. Should boot it back up one of these days. I have 2 more of those 2948gs that I retired for a 3550 and a netgear 48 port gig switch. Man I want some of those fireboxes for pfsense..
 
Again, things look backward to me. Are the fireboxes sucking hot air from the back, or pushing hot air to the back? Why not wire the network on the back side, where all the ports are?

The fireboxes push air out the back, so does the rest of the gear, this is done with intent as above the rear of the rack will be a TermaVent extractor vent that will recycle the air coming from the server and use it for heating in the rest of the house, 'Green' computing :) Then again, this is Norway so the cold is more of an issue than heat is..

Student budget my ass :D
I dont mind living on noodles and beer for the sake of a firewall :D

NO fucking kidding. I didn't have that much shit as a student.

Speaking of 2948g is that a 2948g-l3? I have one of those nice switch for what it is. Should boot it back up one of these days. I have 2 more of those 2948gs that I retired for a 3550 and a netgear 48 port gig switch. Man I want some of those fireboxes for pfsense..
I wish it was the L3, but its only the G Im afraid. I know many people here are no fans of CatOS, but personally I love the "unix approach" how everything is reachable from everywhere :) The firebox'es are great little devices, only sucking 25-35 watts, and the features and stability of pfSense really speaks for itself, these boxes has been running for years without a reboot :)
 
Last edited:
[QUOTE='[ Infected ]I wish it was the L3, but its only the G Im afraid. I know many people here are no fans of CatOS, but personally I love the "unix approach" how everything is reachable from everywhere :) The firebox'es are great little devices, only sucking 25-35 watts, and the features and stability of pfSense really speaks for itself, these boxes has been running for years without a reboot :)[/QUOTE]

CatOS is an acquired taste. I don't think it's that bad honestly once you got use to what you needed to do with it. To me the 2948g-l3 is CatOS and IOS married together. Very interesting Switch.
 
Pics from one of our customers:

WLC-Core_Rack-1_Resized.jpg

BlueSocket!

My god I didn't think people actually used these. I did helpdesk for them for a year during highschool and after never seeing or hearing about them anywhere but at work I wasn't sure that anyone actually bought one.

What do they have for a setup?
 
wow I bought a cap-ton of stuff from blue socket for dirt cheap... got a nice box with an LCD and a soekris board for like $40
 
I'll buy some :)

did some neat stuff with those boards :D
 
What is the green thing on top of the 6500 chassis (looks like green hotswap bays).
 
These bitches are heavy :( dam 1500 apc unit!

DSCN2894.JPG


Front :

DSCN2895.JPG


There is a simple pdu in the back 10 port non managed just a regular one.
 
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