home server
I run a home server that runs its own Linux OS(Unraid). I started this venture by buying an old workstation from a website called Cash Converters it had a Xeon® CPU E3-1241 v3, which is a quad-core with 8 threads. 12GB of RAM. A 120 GB SSD and a raedeon HD6670. This cost me £100 and I had to make a few upgrades before I could use it. The first of these upgrades is storage as a storage server with 120GB wasn't going to cut it. I bought 2x 8TB Ironwolf Pro HDDs and used one as a parity drive and one as a data drive. Next was a new case, PSU, with more drives and more RAM. I upgraded the RAM from an 8GB and 4GB stick to 4x8GB sticks to give me 32GB. Currently, as of writing this has 39TB of storage with an 8TB parity and 2x500GB cache SSDs, 500w PSU, and a Silverstone CS380. Next, I will go into more depth about specific parts of the system. Unraid is a powerful, easy-to-use operating system for self-hosted servers and network-attached storage. Its main benefits are the ability to add drives as you go, No RAID (hence the name Unraid), UNIX-based, massive community, and easy setup. Out of all of these, my main reason for using Unraid was the "add as you go" ability in unraid meaning I started with 2 drives and added more later.
Docker Containers can be pulled, customized, and installed almost instantly with the community apps plugin installed. this allows for systems to be set up and run very quickly. Below are pictures of my docker containers (some are blurred for privacy-related reasons). The one I would like to speak more on is PIHole. PiHole is an open-source adblocking, tracker-blocking, and telemetry-blocking utility that I swear by. this docker version also uses DoT and DoH which stands for DNS over TLS and DNS over HTTPS. DNS over TLS is a network security protocol for encrypting and wrapping Domain Name System (DNS) queries and answers via the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol. The goal of the method is to increase user privacy and security by preventing eavesdropping and manipulation of DNS data via man-in-the-middle attacks. The well-known port number for DoT is 853. DNS over HTTPS (DoH) is a protocol for performing remote Domain Name System (DNS) resolution via the HTTPS protocol. A goal of the method is to increase user privacy and security by preventing eavesdropping and manipulation of DNS data by man-in-the-middle attacks[1] by using the HTTPS protocol to encrypt the data between the DoH client and the DoH-based DNS resolver. This device grabs the DNS queries from a publically available DNS provider securely then uses the resolution on its own and creates its own DNS database so I don't have to rely on external DNS providers. PiHole has so many features that I cannot tell you them all and I'd rather link you to their official website for you to have a look yourself. I also use a docker container of OwnCloud which is like OneDrive but it's stored on my server, not someone else's. This is used by multiple people outside my network too who connect via either a tunnel or reverse proxy depending on who it is, essentially making me run my own cloud service. a smaller thing is I also run my own game servers on this that people can connect to and are port-forwarded for people to connect outside my network.
You can also set up your shares in Unraid and it is compatible with Linux, MacOS, and Windows out of the box. The shares I use are MainShare, Backups, Media, OwnCloud, appdata, and isos. You can also set up users with different permissions.
Tunneling is a great way to access data and devices when away from the home. I have 2 tunnels set up on my server, one for me and one for my girlfriend. Tunneling is a method for transporting data across a network using protocols that are not supported by that network. Tunneling works by encapsulating packets: wrapping packets inside of other packets. (Packets are small pieces of data that can be re-assembled at their destination into a larger file). Tunneling is often used in virtual private networks (VPNs). It can also set up efficient and secure connections between networks, enable the usage of unsupported network protocols, and in some cases allow users to bypass firewalls. My tunnels are through a Wireguard VPN and are mainly used so me and her can route our phone traffic through my server, to the PiHole device to help keep our data secure even when away from home. But it could be used for file access and more.
I thought I'd also show how my drives are configured
