A place to share alternatives to popular online services that can be self-hosted without giving up privacy or locking you into a service you don't control.
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The hypothesis is that $150 of equipment to avoid dozens of hours of software configuration
OK fair try, but you also need to sell me 20-25 TB of disk space on 5 spindles (plus a SSD for the bootdisk), 64 GB RAM (with a chance to go up to 128) and the CPU must have 16 threads or more.
What kind of workload do you run that makes you confident you need that much hardware? Do you think people just beginning could get buy on 4 cores and 8 GB RAM for a while? How long before you think most people need more?
This will be the spec for my next server. The current one is smaller, and several years old
I have several different requirements for my server, for example, my son does video editing and needs lots of storage. I want to experiment with more VM's and containers, therefore RAM and threads.
Do you think people just beginning could get buy on 4 cores and 8 GB RAM for a while?
For most people I think they just want to have some NAS and a reliable machine. But please grant them 16 GB, otherwise they would ask why their laptop has so much more than their server :-)
I probably would. However it has become increasingly obvious that the flaws with solutions so far have been in the organisation. Not so much the particular hardware or software. If I'm going to buy something I'd like some hope that it'll be there in 5 or 10 or 20 years. So please if you go serious with this, look into worker-owned organizations because I'm tired of dodging profit-maximizing traps and pretend-non-profit landmines. If the people building and supporting the thing aren't the ones deciding what to do with the revenue and profit, you're the only one doing it and you're going to make mistakes that will hurt them and us. And then you become a landmine to dodge.
An interesting customer base might be small communal organisations. At our local scouts troop I had a discussion with a friend, who is also in IT. His idea (not fleshed out) was to provide small local organizations with a stack of already configured open source software to support the typical needs of such organizations (like a wordpress website, a nextcloud for file storage and common calender, limesurvey for surveys and event registration, mailman3 for mailing lists,...). Depending on the needs you could sell the initial setup process (your personal work in setting up and skill transfer) or ongoing support. Though such organizations normally don't have much money to give away. So probably its not really worth your time financially (though probably really appreciated in the community).
Why not just have a script that sets up all of the software one would want to host?
Would only be worth it if you created a system for easily deploying applications on an already set up subnet with routing preconfigured.
Like set up a single server kubernetes distribution like microk8s or minikube on the server with metalLB and ingress already preconfigured on the server and router. You could also give instructions on how to install a GUI like Lens and how to use it to deploy a few things. Probably using workstation applications would be better than a web UI like Portainer to keep the server lighter, but either might work.
I admire the thought of lowering the barrier to entry to start self-hosting for "normies". Not sure where you are located, but where I am, this price point is not realistic even for used equipment, not including RAM or storage. I'm not really sure what value add you are bringing to the table that one wouldn't get from just buying used hardware from an office surplus and if one is very inexperienced in self-hostong, looking into something like LTT is partnered with like Hexos.
A small home media server running off a raspberry pi could be that cheap.
this price point is not realistic even for used equipment, not including RAM or storage
I'm doing experiments currently on a refurbished Intel i5-6500 with 8Gb DDR4 and a 0.5Tb SSD. It's tiny, quiet (~45 decibels) and so far runs ~8 watts idle, 25 watts normal usage. I haven't stress-tested the power draw. The router I'm testing with is a Mikrotik hEX lite 5. That's around ~$150, though clearly if you are accustomed to more "rack-mount" style homelab these will seem very modest.
What I'm testing for now is getting representative loads on the devices to see how they perform.
I’m not really sure what value add you are bringing to the table that one wouldn’t get from just buying used hardware from an office surplus and if one is very inexperienced in self-hostong, looking into something like LTT is partnered with like Hexos.
Oh, I totally agree, my value add just isn't there if you are experienced at hosting. The value add is to help people get started, and to keep them running at a modest level. Not everyone wants to experiment with Kubernetes at home or train LLMs. Some folks just want a password manager, a shared calendar, something to organize their tax documents, a pihole, and a Minecraft server for their kids.
I don't follow LTT, I was under the impression it was more hardware reviews for the experienced than tutorials to help people get started.
I've read a bit about Hexos, I'm thinking of some similar things, and it would make sense to work with them. I'm excited for their coming beta.
I recently upgraded my homelab/self-hosting server from an old Dell T410 with dual X5650's (2 - 6 core/12 thread CPU) and 24 GB ram to an old Dell Optiplex (7020 I think) with an i5-4590 (4 core/4 thread) and 32 GB ram. Its barely enough for a proxmox host with 5 VMs; but way faster than the old T410.
If you are offering some sort of self-hosting box, would it be bundled with some sort of software for someone to easily spin up whatever services they want?
Are you going to be able to make money at the $150 mark with all this hardware and configuration? If you are targeting people who are new to self-hosting, it will need to be a complete package (will need to have ram and storage installed).
The tech savvy will just buy a Raspberry Pi and install yunohost on it.
What is the aim? People who want to get into it, but does not know how, or experts? Think half of the attraction of selfhosting is the diy aspect.
What extra would this bring if people can just buy the parts cheaper?
And for those who only want the out of the box experience why would this be better than, let's say a beestation? (Yeah price, I know, but you obviously would not have the same support level.)
What is the aim? People who want to get into it, but does not know how, or experts? Think half of the attraction of selfhosting is the diy aspect.
I don't disagree, and I would imagine what I'm offering would only be useful to people who are very early and don't yet know they enjoy the DIY aspect.
The aim, though, is this: I've enjoyed self-hosting. It's given me some powers that most people don't get to have who aren't also technical professionals. I'm also deeply frustrated by the environment created by the various major tech companies. If I can, I'd like to lower the barrier for people to get some of those powers without having to become experts and to make it more feasible for them to do what they want to do, rather than just what they are permitted to do.
What extra would this bring if people can just buy the parts cheaper?
Much shorter time going from "how can I control some of my own data" to "I'm running NextCloud, and its kinda like iCloud/Google Drive/Whatever Microsoft does and it's running right here under my control! Not everyone knows the path from buying parts online to having a working reverse-proxy and reasonable firewall rules. Also, standardization makes it much easier to support people, which is really what the business would be doing.
why would this be better than, let’s say a beestation?
I knew about Synology, but as a NAS product, which assumes a certain familiarity with backup schemes, etc. Kind of a prosumer-only thing. The Beestation is new to me, thanks for the tip. Quite possible what I'm proposing would have some overlap and compete with it, I'll have to read up on it.
Needs serious market research to not flop out of the box.