As a reward to myself for 6 months of regular posts - no mean feat given my previous history of blogging - I have allowed myself to splurge and purchase parts for a new 'server'. In this case I didn't use proper server components like my [NAS re-re build]({{< relref "/ops/2017-03-17-nas-re-rebuild.md" >}}), deciding that for the bang-for-buck I wanted wouldn't be found trying to source [Intel Xeon](https://www.intel.com.au/content/www/au/en/products/processors/xeon.html) processors. I also wanted to avoid the sort of over-sized rackmount or workstation monolith that comes with powerful SME machinations and go for something meatier than the small business builds you find in things like the [HP N40L MicroServer](https://n40l.fandom.com/wiki/HP_MicroServer_N40L_Wiki) (one of which [I already have]({{< relref "/ops/hardware.md" >}}) from years ago).

In the end I settled for the following build:

* Intel Core [i7 9700](https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/191792/intel-core-i79700-processor-12m-cache-up-to-4-70-ghz/specifications.html) 8-core 3.00GHz CPU
* ASRock [B365M-ITXac](https://www.asrock.com/MB/Intel/B365M-ITXac/index.asp) mini-ITX motherboard
* Corsair [Vengeance LPX 32GB](https://www.corsair.com/us/en/Categories/Products/Memory/vengeance-lpx-black/p/CMK32GX4M2A2400C14) (2x16GB) 2400MHz C14 DDR4 RAM
* Intel [660p Series 1TB](https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/memory-storage/solid-state-drives/consumer-ssds/6-series/ssd-660p-series/660p-series-1-tb-m-2-80mm-3d2.html) NVMe M.2 SSD
* Cooler Master [MWE 550W](https://www.coolermaster.com/catalog/power-supplies/mwe-series/mwe-bronze-550/) 80PLUS Bronze
* Cooler Master [Elite 110](https://www.coolermaster.com/catalog/cases/mini-itx/elite110/) Black mITX

It uses a bunch of off-the-shelf parts that I could assemble myself in a small form factor that is relatively quiet and powerful enough for my needs.

The server has been configured with [OpenNebula](https://opennebula.org/), a lightweight and simple to configure open source virtualisation platform (it uses [KVM](https://www.linux-kvm.org/page/Main_Page) under the hood). So far I've configured it with a [Taiga](https://taiga.io/) instance to work on project management, a [GitLab](https://about.gitlab.com/) server for version control and soon CI/CD, and a [HAProxy](http://www.haproxy.org/) VM to handle [routing TLS connections]({{< relref "/ops/2019-07-10-tcp-proxying.md" >}}) to all the web servers on my network.

I've named this box Snowy after my [plush toy panther](https://twitter.com/EmperorSnowy) and it joins:

* LBS - my [file server/NAS]({{< relref "/ops/2017-03-17-nas-re-rebuild.md" >}}) running [FreeNAS](https://freenas.org/)
* Claude - a [Raspberry Pi](https://www.raspberrypi.org/) 3 Model B+ running [OSMC](https://osmc.tv/)
* Leggy - another Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ running [Ubuntu](https://ubuntu.com/) 18.04 and acting as a server for my Gopher blog and projects

## What's next?

I think I want to start running some more applications on Snowy and Leggy, starting with:

* [Tiny Tiny RSS](https://tt-rss.org/), a lightweight RSS server on Leggy
* A [Runner](https://docs.gitlab.com/runner/) on Snowy to automatically test and deploy projects from GitLab
* Maybe move my [Minecraft](https://minecraft.net/) server to reduce my hosting costs
* A VM to handle [all](https://twitter.com/QueerFortune), [my](https://twitter.com/HPAnnouncements), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/140charADV) bots on Snowy
* Something to centralise all the logs generated from every project/server
* Various VMs to hold other projects of mine

I'm also considering breathing new life into some of my other, [older hardware]({{< relref "/ops/hardware.md" >}}) and maybe eventually acquiring a Raspberry Pi 4.