Help planning server use

javve03 · May 1, 2021

I have two servers. Each has one xeon cpu and one power supply, 8GB ram. I have 4 drive slots that I can use on each one. I have the option of an internal micro sd card for boot or internal usb 3 ports and a decent flash drive.

Do I keep them as is, or combine the two into one with dual cpu, 16GB ram, and redundant psu?

HPE DL380 G9 LFF 12 Bay (4 Drive Bays)

If I combined the one, I could sell it and get faster xeons, better fans, and 800 Watt power supplies. I could also get a raid card and a 12 drive backplane. These servers (for those unfamiliar) have an on board raid solution which would work with the 4 drives.

Other option is do as above but not sell, and have one 4 drive bay and one 12 drive bay (Or leave as 4 and just use larger drives.)

I plan to get a Raspberry Pi 4 8GB for PiHole.

To better help with the above, some of what I plan to do.

Proxmox (think may be the best option)

Snort (setup as IPS)

pfSense or OPNsense

NAS (Store movies, music, backups)

Plex server

Eventually want to run IP cameras. I have seen there is a couple nice open source options or go the Ubiquiti route with their cameras and controller.

Two or three game servers

I'm open to suggestions on other things that I could run as well. I still have to get other things like PoE switch, Router, etc.

Is there anything that is better ran outside a VM?

I realize that no matter what I do, I'm going to need more ram. I like to try to plan everything out, then make a list of things I would need. I'm hoping to elicit some friendly discussion so I as well as others can learn more. I got a degree in networking which basically says there is still a lot I don't know!

Pixel5 · May 2, 2021

what exactly are you planning to run on these VM´s?

so far everything you have listed could run on a system with an i3 10100 without any issues.

javve03 · May 2, 2021

For NVR I plan to run ZoneMinder.

As far as the list above, that is it right now.

One of the game servers I plan to run is FeedTheBeast modded minecraft which can become resource hungry.

I combined the 2 CPU's and RAM into one machine. The other I will be looking at possibly getting V4 CPU's for. Possibly e5-2690 V4, then this one would run pfsense, snort, and probably ZoneMinder. If I set up a 10GbE network between the two servers I would look at running plex off this server then use the 2nd for the file storage.

Once built back up, the 2nd server would run game servers, be a file server, and backup.