Almost a year ago, I shared details about my new home lab (here). My focus was primarily on network, security, and storage aspects. While prioritizing and planning various activities, I’ve put the computing side of the home lab on the back burner. Most of my servers are part of my collection, and I acquired dedicated modern and efficient mini-PCs for a few critical functionalities (such as those for my iTunes server and management console). This year, my wife gifted me a new rack for Christmas and my birthday to expand the home lab’s capacity.
We opted for a floor-standing 42U server rack by SYSRACKS, specifically the 35″ Depth (24″x35″x84″) 19″ IT & Telecom Cabinet SYSRACKS SRF 42.6.9 G. It was delivered quickly and very well packed. I encountered only one issue: a mounting hole on one of the main posts was too small. However, the support team was excellent and replaced the part immediately. Assembling the rack was straightforward, though the sheer size of it made things a bit challenging when working alone 😊.
I recommend carefully reading the build guide. In this case, I should have said to pay closer attention to the pictures in the guide since there is no or little accompanying text. This is a significant area for improvement for SYSRACKS: the quality of the photographs should be enhanced, and perhaps they could retake them using grey models. The poor quality of the photos of the black models made it difficult to understand some steps in the instructions. Since the pictures are your only source of support, I see how it can be easy to make mistakes during assembly, which can force you to redo certain parts later.
One challenge I encountered with the rack was that it was 4 inches too tall to fit through the computer room door (my bad). Since I had built it in the main office space, I needed assistance to flip and maneuver it into place. Thank you Tygh!
After assembling the rack, I moved my servers into it and set up the network, KVM, and power cabling. The PDU is temporary, as I am still waiting for my NEMA TT-30 socket for my dedicated 30A circuit. This limitation means I must use my 20A circuit for now and cannot start all the servers simultaneously, as booting one of them up draws around 1500 watts 😊. Overall, I love this rack and still have a few U spaces remaining for future expansion!
