We recently upgraded out internet service to gigabit fiber from AT&T. The price is $5 more than we were paying for 300/100mpbs from Spectrum so it was really an easy choice. I have to say, the service setup and installation was super easy and the technicians were friendly and answered all my questions. Overall I had a great experience switching ISPs. But that did move up my network upgrade project much sooner than I had planned. I need to make a server rack and update my equipment.
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| Server rack mounted, ready for equipment. |
On my
woodworking blog you can see how I built the actual server rack enclosure and mounted it to the wall. I cut out some holes in the top to accommodate a 140mm fan for ventilation and a grommet for wires to pass through. A colleague at my previous job gave me a patch panel and that was the first thing to install. I rerouted and ran some new CAT5e cables from the media center and the office to the panel and then hooked them up to my new POE switch.
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| Blank panel to reserve room for the fan in the back top. |
I opted for a POE switch in order to make installation of access points easier. I have a
Ubiquiti AP Lite for upstairs that I still need to permanently install as it is just running on my office desk for now. The POE makes it convenient to only require a single network cable for installation. More APs will come later, most likely in the sunroom for outdoor coverage and possibly in the media center for stronger coverage in the main living space of the house.
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| Server in new IPC case installed. |
I moved my home server components into a new IPC case and installed it in the rack. This clears a lot of room on the home brew shelving where the server used to live. The new enclosure is also much quieter and provides significantly more room for disk storage expansion as my Plex library grows. A rackmount surge protector was also installed to clean up the wiring and keep everything consolidated within the rack.
