Setting up an epic emby server room.

[chef 3745]

Yeah, so the province I live in decided to shut things down again. Since my cooking skill won't be needed... again... ... I decided to rip apart my basement, and make an epic place to run my emby server!

Mind you, the basement of my little "1950's War time house" hasn't been touched since 1970.

I wired new 14/2, and a whole bunch of low voltage wire for my network setup!

I'm doing this by myself, learning as I go (with regards to low voltage wiring, I'm good enough with electrical), so any tips and tricks would be welcome.

I have run CAT6 thoughout the house. The retrofit took two days... because I'm learning. 

I have added two Ubiquity access points, and a main panel for my networking.

 

I wired in low profile spot lights. 

A little more framing, and some insulation (which has been on back order for two weeks due to the supply chain being messed up AF).

 

 

 

She'll never know...

My network panel

Those pot lights are super easy to install

 

Edited April 14, 2021 by chef

[rbjtech 4218]

Looking good   

Are you installing a 19" 1/2 or full rack ?

 

[Guest]

Notice a little mildew on the wall ( not that bad if it hasn't been touched since the 70's )... Might look at a moisture block coating if it does have that problem... If you don't and it does you may wind up with mold developing in the sheetrock paper... 

The only other thing... would be a proper Fire Exit for safety... Not for sure how easy for you it would be to do with the concrete walls... but I would suggest an opening big enough to get out of.. and then of course option block for the light for the theatre/emby room... Something that can also be secure as well ( Hilti fasteners, internally released bars ).

I say this in the even a fire starts upstairs.. Most alarms would notify us in time... In a media room however depending on how isolated it is.. and how well the sound would carry ( or if the system is networked throughout the house - setting off all points at the detection of one ).. Would be a thought in my mind.

EDIT: And spray bleach will help get rid of that on the wall too..

Edited April 14, 2021 by Guest

[chef 3745]

4 minutes ago, Hxemby001 said:

Notice a little mildew on the wall ( not that bad if it hasn't been touched since the 70's )... Might look at a moisture block coating if it does have that problem... If you don't and it does you may wind up with mold developing in the sheetrock paper... 

The only other thing... would be a proper Fire Exit for safety... Not for sure how easy for you it would be to do with the concrete walls... but I would suggest an opening big enough to get out of.. and then of course option block for the light for the theatre/emby room... Something that can also be secure as well ( Hilti fasteners, internally released bars ).

I say this in the even a fire starts upstairs.. Most alarms would notify us in time... In a media room however depending on how isolated it is.. and how well the sound would carry ( or if the system is networked throughout the house - setting off all points at the detection of one ).. Would be a thought in my mind.

EDIT: And spray bleach will help get rid of that on the wall too..

Like an egressing window? 

I'll start on the mildew immediately! Thank you! I was wondering about how to get rid of it!

[Guest]

Yes.. which would be a BETTER option but.. the one you already have there.. being made big enough to at least crawl out of... in an emergency...

[chef 3745]

1 hour ago, rbjtech said:

Looking good   

Are you installing a 19" 1/2 or full rack ?

 

i've got room for a full one... I suppose a full rack, and start to fill it over time. 

[chef 3745]

19 minutes ago, Hxemby001 said:

Yes.. which would be a BETTER option but.. the one you already have there.. being made big enough to at least crawl out of... in an emergency...

Wow! The walls cleaned up in under ten minutes with the bleach! Thank you! 

I have also found some roll on rubber coating for basements at my local home depot. Looks like I can curb side pick up a big bucket of it for 60 dollars. 

Thanks for the tips. 

Edited April 14, 2021 by chef

[Guest]

Some people will actually coat the wall and down on the foundation and out far enough to block moisture contact with the framing and sheetrock.. Not a bad idea IF you can get to it..

[chef 3745]

Added GFI's to this plug. I didn't pig tail the other three receptacles because I want the GFI to trip the rest of them if there is ever a short. This will host the network panel devices. 

4 port POE injector for the Ubiquity 5g access points, and my 16 port switch.

 

The Fiber internet connection gets moved to this location tomorrow afternoon.

Just gotta stay 6 feet away from the technician coming into my home. The lockdown got worse for us. We aren't allowed to leave our homes. We could get questioned by law enforcement. So best to stay inside and work on the network closet. 

 

Thanks again @Hxemby001, most of the the mildew issue seems to have been destroyed!

Edited April 17, 2021 by chef

[chef 3745]

Only took five tries to make my first working CAT6 cable

But green is good!

 

[rbjtech 4218]

On 18/04/2021 at 02:31, chef said:

Only took five tries to make my first working CAT6 cable

Did you get the 'passthrough' RJ45 plugs - the ones where you pass the wires straight through the plug and then chop all 8 of them off when you crimp it down ?  they are SOOOO much easier to work with .. 

[chef 3745]

17 hours ago, rbjtech said:

Did you get the 'passthrough' RJ45 plugs - the ones where you pass the wires straight through the plug and then chop all 8 of them off when you crimp it down ?  they are SOOOO much easier to work with .. 

I did! Yes! But I'm having some issues with them. When the pass through the rj45 plug, they aren't crimping right off, so they end up with little bits of wire at the end. 

[chef 3745]

I am not good at driving dry wall screws. I choose this area because it is small and I needed to practice. I need more practice for sure. 

Finally got my development computer back online, and the server. It was down for two days. 

 

I have a patch panel coming, but my rack is on back order. So I'll shove everything into this box for now.

 

Edited April 20, 2021 by chef

[rbjtech 4218]

15 minutes ago, chef said:

I did! Yes! But I'm having some issues with them. When the pass through the rj45 plug, they aren't crimping right off, so they end up with little bits of wire at the end. 

Hmm, maybe squeeze a few times (you can't 'over crimp' an RJ45 contact blade) as I guess the tool cutting blade might be a bit bent or out of position ?  Side cutters to cut them off as a last resort I guess, but you shouldn't need to.

Looking good - do I see corrugated cable conduit there for your power cables ? - very professional ... 

[chef 3745]

Welp, this whole project is bigger then I thought it would be . 

Edited April 22, 2021 by chef

[Guest]

The next thing I expect to see is an enclosed rack server ( floor to ceiling ) with its own HVAC - the heating.  

I thought about this once...getting around wireless issues and wiring in a new house.. building it from the ground up...

[chef 3745]

I have a question. I have five of these hard drive enclosurers:

Mediasonic ProRaid HUR5-SU3 2

I've got to get them accessable to the server from across the room

 

Should I build a NAS type pc that hosts the drives and is accessable to the server, or should I run USB 3 across the room?

 

 

 

Edited April 22, 2021 by chef

[Guest]

The only thing that I would say is that to match the USB 3 speed ( Version 2 ).. you would need to be using the NIC cards that support the speed ( 10 GB/s )...

They do make these though.. Light-Link USB, USB 3.0 over Fiber — Sewell Direct

EDIT: I'm jealous now..LOL

Also usually with a NIC , you can upgrade in the future where the MediaSonic is actually as is..

Edited April 22, 2021 by Guest

[rbjtech 4218]

Max length for USB3 (at max transfer rate) is realistically about 3m.  So if you want to re-use those devices, then you need to get them closer to the server  

Building a server and re-using the Mediasonic disks is an option - but if it were me, I would rebuilt using new high capacity disks (as direct attached storage) and re-use the Mediasonic devices as offline backup.

A 10+ bay 'NAS' is going to be expensive (if you were to mirror what you have today) - and unless you have 10Gbit networking (doesn't look like it in your pics..) then your bottleneck is going to be the single 1gig interface to it.

 

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, rbjtech said:

Max length for USB3 (at max transfer rate) is realistically about 3m.  So if you want to re-use those devices, then you need to get them closer to the server  

Building a server and re-using the Mediasonic disks is an option - but if it were me, I would rebuilt using new high capacity disks (as direct attached storage) and re-use the Mediasonic devices as offline backup.

A 10+ bay 'NAS' is going to be expensive (if you were to mirror what you have today) - and unless you have 10Gbit networking (doesn't look like it in your pics..) then your bottleneck is going to be the single 1gig interface to it.

 

What did you think about the fiber optic USB 3 cables? Any experience with those?

[rbjtech 4218]

9 minutes ago, Hxemby001 said:

What did you think about the fiber optic USB 3 cables? Any experience with those?

As a temp workaround - they are probably ok, but for a long term 'system' then they are just adding potential failure points.  If you are going to do it - then do it properly imo ...

[Guest]

I haven't started using fiber optic yet.. was wondering.. my thoughts too were long-term.. 10GB cards/systems/router and wiring.. ( not what he wants to here ).. SAS drives... If something faster comes along you usually can upgrade the other equipment..

I like the affordability of the MediaSonic Boxes and the speed.. not for sure what they allow for drives though

[rbjtech 4218]

You don't need fiber for 10gig over 'home server' distances - With Cat6 you can go 100m.  It'll even run over Cat5e for shorter distances, with the option of going 5Gb/2.5Gb if you are borderline.

That being said, with emby, the network I/O will seldom be the issue - even a 1 gig network has the capability to transfer/stream ~10 x 4K remux files (@ ~80Mbit/sec) at the same time...

So unless you have a large number of people streaming high bandwidth 4K, 10Gbit for the home network is completely unnecessary imo.

[Guest]

My thought.. ( I think this probably comes from how I use my storage ) is from a data access and usage scenario from the same drives/NAS/Rack Mount.. throughout the whole home.. not just for media.. but in the instance of processing data/files..

Operating/reading/writing - to/from those data repositories for development and systems access... with speed and something that will cover the data streams/traffic... So if your whole home winds up online or on the network.. with lighting control.. alarms.. fire/safety.. work systems.. entertainment systems... phones.. tablets - multiple people.. servers.. for both the systems and online personal/business... and using hard line vs. wifi where it can apply..

Maybe that is beyond what he is doing.. but I see a lot of wiring though... thinking I guess of covering the bases while it is all right there.

[sooty234 266]

10G is great for home networks that use large date files. I have a 10G network, and I'll never go back. If you rip a movie from disk and you want to movie it to your storage, having it transfer at 350 - 400 MB/s is massively better than 110 - 125 MB/s. Go 10G, and don't hesitate! It'll change your life!