Building a new lab host – Intel E5-2670 and 128GB of RAM
Hi all! I apologize for not posting more often! I have been working on a lot of new, interesting things but haven’t had a whole lot of time to write about it. You might remember my previous ESXi host build: Lenovo TS140 as ESXi and NAS box – with a twist! The transplanted Lenovo TS140 has served me well – it still performs great and didn’t break the bank. The specifications of that server are: Lenovo TS140...
DIY SAN/NAS – quest for fast, reliable, shared storage with a twist of ZFS! (Part 1)
Choosing prebuilt SAN is cheating – let’s build something from nothing and learn ZFS on the way! Read more about my FreeNAS/ZFS adventure using a Dell R510.
Sizing an ESXi host – a true balancing act!
Configuring vSphere hosts is not a simple task. Every environment is different. Read more in order to try and get it right the first time!
All of the cores please – Dell R710 Xeon E5649 upgrade
Speed or efficiency? The Xeon E5649 does a great job at landing right in the middle while bringing 6-core performance to my Dell R710.
So just how loud is a Dell R710?
Can you run your R710 on your coffee table without annoying your spouse? How about in the middle of the dining room? Read here to find out if you find the noise tolerable!
RAID Levels – Spans, Stripes, IOPS, Oh My!
“What RAID level should I use?” “Raid 10 is better than RAID 5.” These are all common discussion topics but the truth is that there is more to it than that! Check out this benchmark test showing the strengths and weaknesses of each configuration!
About Me
I am a Sr. Systems Engineer by profession and am interested in all aspects of technology. I am most interested in virtualization, storage, and enterprise hardware. I am also interested in leveraging public and private cloud technologies such as Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, and vRealize Automation/vCloud Director. When not working with technology I enjoy building high performance cars and dabbling with photography. Thanks for checking out my blog! 
