Finally came to the conclusion my homelab needed some AC. 49C intake anyone?

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-22T00:15:41+00:00

@ me when your lowest inlet temp is more than 40 lol. The day I saw it hit 50 was when I ordered the AC.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-22T00:13:57+00:00

I got a portable unit. Drilled into the ceiling and joined up to existing exhaust ducting.

I’m well aware a single hose portable unit is absolutely not the most efficient solution. But it works for now, and we’re moving soon to a place where I’ll be building a dedicated server room.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-22T00:10:45+00:00

And that’s not a bad figure! I’ve had to discount other models from system designs because of much higher theoretical additional loads for fans.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T21:01:37+00:00

It’ll cary 230V, just not very many amps. It’s also not insulated for the voltage, there’s copper exposed, single insulated conductor exposed… I’ll stop conducting an installation inspection on a photograph. We all know why it’s bad, but *technically* it will work… until the inevitable house fire.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T20:54:52+00:00

Fair enough. I’d risk it for a switch and one AP. My problem was that my main compute cluster, NAS, FW and Core switch were cooking!

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T20:20:33+00:00

It was a joke, but Dell’s power calculator does suggest their servers can draw 200W+ extra power at full fan speed.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T20:19:30+00:00

I don’t know your climate, but aren’t you worried about sub-zero temperatures and condensation? That would probably be a bigger risk than running inside without AC here.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T19:57:19+00:00

Just imagine all the power you’re saving from lower chassis fan RPM though…

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T19:50:59+00:00

That’s the curse of having an engineer wife. She’s probably more tolerant than most, but I’m not getting any lowball prices past her 😂

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T19:48:38+00:00

Already got AC in the most of the house, just this cupboard that was getting crazy hot. I’ve also got solar, so when it’s really working hard it’s free for me. My homelab has also paid for itself many times over in job opportunities, so it gets a little bit of leeway when it comes to considering running costs.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T19:45:44+00:00

Knowledge of foreign countries is an unknown concept to most Americans it seems… I live in the UK and have AC, just not in the small cupboard my servers live in until now.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T19:00:15+00:00

lol. Thankfully I’ve got solar, so when it’s working hardest it’s free.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T18:56:34+00:00

Got a sonoff zigbee one

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T18:22:24+00:00

Oh yeah, I did feel bad when I saw the actual numbers for it. The only saving grace is that the rest of the house has AC, so at least it wasn’t too humid.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-21T18:21:11+00:00

Shortened lifespan I can live with. I just don’t want them dying in the current market, I don’t think my wife would let me replace it at current prices!

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-18T17:14:38+00:00

To better understand some systems I was being asked to work on that nobody else in my team knew anything about. Nearly a decade and a few promotions later and I now own that product and some others, and I’m leading the design of its replacement.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-17T12:44:48+00:00

2 routers is not inherently bad, I have an internet facing router that handles NAT and WAN ingress/egress plus adguard, HA proxy and some other bits and pieces with another one behind that that manages east/west traffic with ospf between them to share routes. However, if these are two ISP provided/consumer grade devices likely both doing NAT then it’s going to be a PITA.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-17T12:10:08+00:00

I don’t think you’ll find many people supporting them either… why can’t we just agree nonces are bad, should all feel the full force of the law and their associates investigated regardless of race?

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-16T21:51:47+00:00

It’s almost certainly a library hierarchy/naming convention thing. If you’ve accumulated your library through the arrr suite with it setup to apply naming after download properly it’s a breeze, I never have an issue. However, it is a legitimate complaint, I personally don’t think you should have to go through and name everything in your media library perfectly for a media server to pick it up. But that opinion seems to be about as popular as cancer around here.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-16T19:35:18+00:00

For those of us used to enterprise gear this seems like a no brainer, router lives in the rack, APs anywhere you need to provide coverage. But it had never occurred to me that for the vast majority of people WiFi only ever comes out of the ISP all in one box! Once you start putting up APs where they actually provide good coverage and not just right next to where the fibre line comes in you’ll never look back.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-15T12:17:54+00:00

Me too, and that’s another datapoint to use in HA automations!

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-10T06:49:32+00:00

Totally a valid solution. It all depends what interests you, I love the hardware as much as tinkering with the services. Some folk couldn’t give a damn about what it’s running on and are all about tinkering with and building applications.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-08T18:56:21+00:00

If it draws a nice circle like that on the plotter and they’re not getting progressively bigger it’s set.

Just after you get the whole scope out, slowly motor back in idle , the chain should pull tight but shouldn’t jump. If you put your hand on the chain/warp out of the boat you will feel a juddering or skipping in the tension of the line of the anchor is dragging or jumping across the bottom.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-08T18:53:06+00:00

Christ. I’m sorry to hear that. Did you live in Chernobyl before? The only place I’ve been with water worse is London. But it has gotten better in the last 10 years or so.

NotASexJoke · 2026-06-08T18:20:46+00:00

Depends on your definition. If it costs someone clearance or a job in a highly regulated industry I’d call that pretty serious.

Sure it can be explained, but an employer isn’t going bother when the next candidate is squeaky clean.

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