Advanced Home Networking Thread of Dominance

[thunderlounge 8039]

Didn't find a dedicated thread for this type of thing, so thought I'd make one as I'm in the process of planning out a new network build that I'm hoping to put into action at some point next year. I'll get to that setup in a minute, as I've had to put together a temporary network since my old router all but shit the bed last week.

Old network:

• Ubiquiti EdgeRouter PoE
• Ubiquiti AC Pro AP (UAP-AC-PRO)
• Cisco L2 16-port switch
• (4) Cisco 4-port switch

Intermediate network:

• Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Ultra (UCG-Ultra)
• Ubiquiti U6-Pro AP (U6-PRO)
• Cisco L2 16-port switch (reused)
• (4) Cisco 4-port switch (reused)
• Ubiquiti 4-port PoE Switch (USW-Flex)

 

This is a temporary setup, while I figure out exactly what I'm looking for in the new network. With the old-ass router going out on its last leg, and everything else going on around here, no way am I in a spot to drop the coin on the full network. So got what I got, and will get by for now. It's at least an improvement, if not the full super improvement the new one will be.

 

Now, for the network being planned.

• 24U Server Rack
• CyberShot UPS
• Ubiquiti Power Backup (not an UPS, but provides redundant power supply to router/switches/NVR if their internal fails)
• (2) AC Infinity 1U rack fans (one filtered intake, and one exhaust)
• Ubiquiti - Unifi Dream Machine Pro
• Ubiquiti - Unifi Pro Max 24
• Ubiquiti - Unifi Pro Max 24 PoE
• Synology RS1221+
• (8) Ubiquiti Cams (various types)
• Ubiquiti NVR Pro
• Ubiquiti G4 doorbell
• Home Assistant running on a miniPC server
• Multiple control panels to interact with home assistant

 

 

Still working out a lot of details, but that's the gist of it all.

 

[MonkeyDoughnut 10476]

On 7/15/2024 at 6:25 PM, thunderlounge said:

Didn't find a dedicated thread for this type of thing, so thought I'd make one as I'm in the process of planning out a new network build that I'm hoping to put into action at some point next year. I'll get to that setup in a minute, as I've had to put together a temporary network since my old router all but shit the bed last week.

Old network:

• Ubiquiti EdgeRouter PoE
• Ubiquiti AC Pro AP (UAP-AC-PRO)
• Cisco L2 16-port switch
• (4) Cisco 4-port switch

Intermediate network:

• Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Ultra (UCG-Ultra)
• Ubiquiti U6-Pro AP (U6-PRO)
• Cisco L2 16-port switch (reused)
• (4) Cisco 4-port switch (reused)
• Ubiquiti 4-port PoE Switch (USW-Flex)

 

This is a temporary setup, while I figure out exactly what I'm looking for in the new network. With the old-ass router going out on its last leg, and everything else going on around here, no way am I in a spot to drop the coin on the full network. So got what I got, and will get by for now. It's at least an improvement, if not the full super improvement the new one will be.

 

Now, for the network being planned.

• 24U Server Rack
• CyberShot UPS
• Ubiquiti Power Backup (not an UPS, but provides redundant power supply to router/switches/NVR if their internal fails)
• (2) AC Infinity 1U rack fans (one filtered intake, and one exhaust)
• Ubiquiti - Unifi Dream Machine Pro
• Ubiquiti - Unifi Pro Max 24
• Ubiquiti - Unifi Pro Max 24 PoE
• Synology RS1221+
• (8) Ubiquiti Cams (various types)
• Ubiquiti NVR Pro
• Ubiquiti G4 doorbell
• Home Assistant running on a miniPC server
• Multiple control panels to interact with home assistant

 

 

Still working out a lot of details, but that's the gist of it all.

 

Looks good, but not sure on need for the Ubiquiti Power Backup. How mission critical is the need? ie. I probably wouldn't be using Ubiquiti if mission critical and with Ubuiquiti what I've read/seen is the device failure not being a psu failure. I'd go with the dual RS1221RP+ at least if critial as that would be more problamatic on a PSU failure.

[thunderlounge 8039]

The backup is more safety, I guess. That’s the one part I’m not 100% sure will make the cut.

Nothing is “super” critical, but it would definitely suck if a power supply in one of the switches, etc went out, it could be a work stoppage depending on which piece of gear had the failure.

Anything critical on the NAS will have off-site and offline backups as well.

Still in the planning (to death) phase for it, and not looking to jump until next year at some point.

While it was unplanned, the temp network I have setup now will hold and be fine in the interim. Won’t be the setup I need/want, but will suffice for a bit. I was content to roll with the old one for another year, so this helps.

But I haven’t expanded things yet, either. Only 2 “servers” right now, and will end up with 2-3 more. Plus a decent amount of “smart” shit that I’ll have running through home assistant.

With me working from home (software development) and the wife now getting a couple days a week as well, it’s time to step it up to address current needs, as well as allow for some overhead for future growth.

At least moving from this setup to the next won't be as bad, and I can backup current and restore on the new.

[MonkeyDoughnut 10476]

You running any Synology units currently?  I'm a big fan of them. Using as drives for VMWare backends as well as ABB (Active Backup for Business) app for machine/data backups/Google/Dropbox, etc, hyper backup to USB connected drive array and Backblaze.  Makes it really easy to spin up another VM when needed and super easy for handling entire backup process.

[thunderlounge 8039]

Nice. Not running one currently. Running a smaller WD, 6TB total. They’ve been on my radar for a long time though. 

Don’t really need a complex setup for a nas, but need the space. All my vm’s and stuff are, or will be, on other servers. Although I might run a plex server on it. That part is still up in the air, but things change. 

[thunderlounge 8039]

Playing with the new router, and decided to spruce up the guest portal screen.

Before:

 

After:

[immamac 43584]

I guess my question has always been what are people doing at home besides NVR that would require anything sophisticated. This is more like a small business setup than a home network though. Nttawwt, for that much networking to be needed you need a lot of compute or a lot of data being sent to justify the cost. You could kit out a pretty sick 2U redundant compute cluster with 100TB+ of storage for relatively cheap nowadays and that would run everything from home lab to self hosted everything. 

[thunderlounge 8039]

Looking long term, I’ll have a dozen or so cameras, a good sized home assistant setup, local and remote backups, local streaming, etc.

Overall, a bit much, but it’ll all be 10G internal backbone, and 2.5G for each wired run.

So for me, there will be a lot of internal bandwidth needed, so might as well have some overhead for later and unplanned things that pop up.

plus: toy factor

[Sam Lin 3566]

Why the 2x 24port switches instead of a straight 48 POE? Saves you a rack unit. Also, consider either their smart plug or their PDU for automatic rebooting a modem if internet goes out.

[thunderlounge 8039]

It would save a slot, but I want my poe budget on its own switch, with standard wired clients on the other. Something happens to the poe switch, and I can put a backup injector on essential devices and move them to the other in the interim, or use the backup switch.

Some type of switch/smart pdu is on the list. 

[Sam Lin 3566]

Two 48 POE then, actually have redundancy. Or use a Dream Machine Pro or SE and pair with a POE switch (which is what I do), instead of the cloud gate.

[thunderlounge 8039]

I’ll be using a pro max at that point. 
 

Cloud Gateway Ultra is a stop gap. I was planning a new network out for next year, when my edge router poe fully bit the dust. So grabbed that for now, plus the flex and 6pro AP. I’ll deploy those in the full network when I get to it.

2 of the 48’s would be a lot more ports than I’ll need. At least for this network. At some point when I build and move, that will probably be what I end up doing. Will have a lot more stuff to keep track of then. 

 

Cloud Gateway Ultra has been solid so far. Hasn't even blinked yet. I'll yak about that in a separate post.

Edited August 25 by thunderlounge

[thunderlounge 8039]

So current setup being the Cloud Gateway Ultra, 2 cisco switches, and the flex switch.

Setup is running very well for what I'm doing with it for now, and is a big improvement from the previous iteration. It's not running all the automation and networking stuff I want to add, but that's down the line a tick yet.

Aside from equipment, the biggest change I've made with the new, transition phase, setup is having moved from self-hosted DNS, over to using NextDNS. I have a profile setup for my private, IoT, and guest networks, and am running the cli version directly on the router. All requests go through it, and it's been excellent. I have it tweaked to about where I want it, and have only had to add maybe half a dozen urls to the allow list. It does add a tick bit of latency when it's has to fetch a non-cached domain, but it's not bad. Just barely enough to notice, and it's not distracting.

Second biggest change was separate guest network. Previously I just put company on my IoT network, but this works out better, and allows for a separate DNS profile from IoT that has different settings and block lists in use.

I've also picked up a mini pc (geekom, 1T, 32G, Ryzen 7) about a month ago, that I'm messing with as a desktop for a bit. It will end up being one of my container servers in the long run. Not sure how I'm going to use it specifically, but either as part of a k8 cluster or a proxmox box with a few specific network containers, then a few n100's for home lab stuff and local development.

Right now I have a small windows 11 partition, since it came with it (although I reinstalled from scratch), and Kubuntu on the main partition. Haven't used the windows partition really, but have it just in case. I will dump that partition before long, and once I have a container environment setup, I might think about setting it back up for browser testing. Other than that, no real use for windows. It's pretty easy on power, which is nice, and seems to be holding together well. I do have an external fan (USB, AC Infinity) blowing air directly into the bottom to help in case of any heat issues.

Fun little gadget so far.