ESX home lab hardware shopping list
I’m not sure where this originated, but I got this email today from a coworker. It’s a shopping list to build an ESX home lab with compatible hardware for as cheap as possible. There are 2 host designs.
- a dual core AMD host for $337
- a quad core Intel host for $695.
The coolest part about this email is it gives you not only the parts but also the links on sites like newegg.com and allstarshop.com. I haven’t verified all the links nor built either of the systems. The few links I checked have been good, but the price has fluctuated slightly - which is expected.
Here’s the email in it’s entirety as I received it. Let me know if anyone knows who created it.
Here is some information I got through the grapevine on building a VI3 home lab.
General things to make sure you do
- Get a CPU that supports 64-bit guests - this is generally an Intel CPU that starts with the letter “Q” not the letter “E” (or just check the specs). Any Athlon 64 or opteron works.
- Get a motherboard that supports a minimum of 4 GB of RAM - 8GB is nice (all ESX servers are generally constrained by RAM)
- Get a decent (but still super-cheap) GigE switch - something that supports VLANs so you can create configs that work with less physical NICs.
- Make sure you have a motherboard that has onboard VGA - you don’t need a good graphics card, but you need something for initial config.
AMD ESX configuration (as cheap as it gets, but you have everything you need) = $337
This config leverages the fact that ESX 3.5 supports Nvidia NICs - and there will only be one NIC for VMotion, network, and IP storage. Name of the game = how cheap can you go
- Athlon x2 4000 retail - dual core (comes with the heatsink/fan) = $55 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103774)
- Generic ATX Motherboard - based on the 430, 6100 or 6150 chipsets - just MAKE SURE it has the Nvidia NIC, not a Realtek NIC = $54 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157108) NOTE - THIS ONE HAS A REALTEK NIC, so you need to by an additional intel NIC (good catch Dan Baskette)…. I use an old ASUS A8N-VM CSM socket 939 motherboard, and it has a Nvidia MAC and works great - but you need to find an older Athlon that fits that socket 939 form factor…..
- cheap as dirt HDD = $49 for a 160GB drive (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136075)
- cheap as dirt ATX case/PS = $23 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811164073)
- big 2GB DDR2 memory sticks (you can start with 2, and add another 2 later) = $72(2 x $36) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820141300
- cheap as dirt DVD/CD (to install the ISO) = $29 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106228)
- If you’re not sure what MAC the NIC uses on the motherboard, or just want to be safe - add 1 Intel GbE NICs (these are a trick - you need specific ones for the Intel e1000 driver that comes with ESX 3.5 to work - hard to find, and DON’T buy the server MT versions - find the cheapo desktop GT PCI or PT PCIe versions - hundreds cheaper and work fine) = $42 http://www.allstarshop.com/shop/product.asp?pid=16016&ad=pwatch
Intel ESX configuration (a super cheap quad core, 8GB, lotsa GbE powerhouse) = $695
This config leverages the fact there are ridiculously cheap multi-core CPUs and RAM these days. the NICs on Intel motherboards are usually based on older Intel or Realtek chipsets, (no driver support in VMware) - so you need to find some fancier (but still cheap) NICs. Name of the game here = how cheap can you build a powerhouse that you can run 10 VMs at once?
- Lots of CPU Intel Q6600 retail - quad core (comes with the heatsink/fan) = $270 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115017)
- Intel G33/P35 based motherboard (you want ram slots and PCIe slots) = $54 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121099)
- cheap as dirt HDD = $49 for a 160GB drive (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136075)
- cheap as dirt ATX case/PS = $23 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811164073)
- Lots of RAM - big 2GB DDR2 memory sticks = $144(4 x $36) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820141300
- cheap as dirt DVD/CD (to install the ISO) = $29 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106228)
- 3 Intel GbE NICs (these are a trick - you need specific ones for the Intel e1000 driver that comes with ESX 3.5 to work - hard to find, and DON’T buy the server MT versions - find the cheapo desktop GT PCI or PT PCIe versions - hundreds cheaper and work fine) = $126 http://www.allstarshop.com/shop/product.asp?pid=16016&ad=pwatch
OK - what now?
- You will need to buy two of whatever model you get - for VMotion, VM HA, DRS, Storage VMotion, etc… (so AMD total cost = $674, Intel cost = $1390)
Most importantly - HAVE FUN! Post your experiences, what you did, neat tricks you find, questions if you run into trouble….
March 15th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
what about the cost of ESX?? are you saying your willing to spend 5K for the enterprise version of esx to do things like vmotion?
March 15th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
Duane,
True, this post is about the hardware only.
You do have the option of running VI3 for 60 days in eval mode. https://www.vmware.com/tryvmware/?a=l&eval=vi3
March 19th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
If this is a test you can use 60 days trial version of ESX 3.5 but I dont’ think you would pay for that $5K license fee.
March 20th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
I believe you still need external storage to be able to use VMotion, HA, DRS, etc.. another PC to act as an iSCSI target will do nicely (open-e DSS lite, openfiler)
March 21st, 2008 at 8:05 am
[...] from CD - bios.bootDelayKyle on Tricks for getting a VM to boot from CD - bios.bootDelayjtkv on ESX home lab hardware shopping listVM /ETC » Blog Archive » Tricks for getting a VM to boot from CD - bios.bootDelay on [...]
March 22nd, 2008 at 8:30 am
For approx. the same money, I bought 2 HP DL380 G3 off of Ebay with dual Xenon 3 GHz and 4GB and 4 72GB drives each. I install ESX on one disk, and use an iSCSI target running in a VM on each host to offer up the other disks in a RAID-5 as shared storage. I’ve also installed VC in a VM and it bounces nicely across the cluster. DRS and Vmotion work fine, but HA and DPM wouldn’t be possible as failing the host would also fail the storage.
Other downside is that the DL380s will consume more power, and noise and cooling will be an issue if you don’t have basement to put them.
March 31st, 2008 at 10:11 am
Newegg has deactivated the cheapy mobo listed (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121099, however I was able to find an “open-box” that should do the trick (even has the Nvidia NIC:) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157108R
Using the rest of the spec from the $337 list, my shopping cart adds up to 263.41 including shipping!!
April 5th, 2008 at 11:59 am
Also, Newegg has deactivated the cheap intel motherboard. Has someone come up with a substitute that meets the requriements for ESX 3.5 in the same price range?
April 18th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
You can get the intel board at directron.com. I loaded the esx 3.5 on a cheap AMD mobo combo that i purchased at Fry’s last year and it worked fine. The install saw the drives, NIC (nvidea) and onboard video just fine. I am going to build a 3 machine ESX host farm this weekend using whatever frys has on sale.
April 22nd, 2008 at 8:57 pm
John,
Did you have to configure boot MBR on the Dl380 g3?
Can you let me know how you installed it
Thanks
Chris
May 23rd, 2008 at 8:33 pm
[...] XVS is the perfectly priced storage solution for the home ESX test lab. [...]
June 6th, 2008 at 6:51 am
[...] been about installing ESX on a whitebox server. Two of the most popular posts on VM /ETC have been ESX home lab hardware shopping list and Cheap ESX solutions for testing which are both about finding and using hardware not on the [...]
June 15th, 2008 at 10:49 am
LOL - this is my original post (if you want a picture of the lab as it stands, go to http://virtualgeek.typepad.com.
I’m EMCs point guy on all things VMware, and I posted this so all our Technical Consultants could doink around with VMware (most EMC products are available as VMs - so it’s also good for the purpose of hands-on time)
For those of you trying - there are evolutions of this design. lots of internal EMC’ers have taken this idea and run with it.
- People have had good luck with the Nvidia 780i chipset (more expensive, but on the upside, has two onboard NICs that work).
- If you make a bootable ESXi USB key, the support configs broaden out considerably, and it means you can “repurpose” on an as-needed basis your primary machine.
- For shared storage (as one poster said, you need this for all the fun stuff like VMotion, VM HA, DRS, Site Recovery Manager, etc….) - you have a couple options. 1) buy an array (HA HA!); 2) download the Virtual Celerra - this is a VM version of one of EMC’s arrays - works like the real deal (you can even replicate them to each other - **note that while these are similar to the real thing, performance is slower of course, and it’s not supported in a production environment***; 3) use openfiler; 4) EMC makes a little home NAS device that Intel OEM’s called LifeLine - it’s about $500, and it’s been shown to work.
Have fun!!!
June 15th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
Chad,
Glad to here from the originator of this great info! Thanks for that and for reading VM /ETC!
June 15th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
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June 27th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
[...] VM /ETC tiene una lista para hacer la compra de un WhiteBox.. http://vmetc.com/2008/03/14/esx-home-lab-hardware-shopping-list/ [...]
June 29th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
can anyone give me a reasonably priced motherboard that is 100% ESX 3.5 compatible for SATA RAID and NIC?
No preference for Intel or AMD..price is somewhat a consideration… Looking for something on Newegg..
Thanks!!
August 19th, 2008 at 3:06 am
Thanks for the tips. Can these setup work with ESXI?
August 31st, 2008 at 9:31 pm
I have succesfully installed ESXi on the following, Runs great. I will be building a second to work with vmotion and other VM apps.
I purchased all the above items from a local computer store(www.extrememicro.net). I found all of them online for about the same prices (USD) or a few $$ less.
ASUS M2A-VM 690G motherboard -72.00
AMD AM2 4800+ 2.5ghz - 70.00
Kingston 2g 667 DDR memory x2 - 92.00
CDR+DVD - 28.00
WD 160G SATA II - 53.00
Case w 420w PS - 28.00
Intel PCIE GT NIC - 45.00
Promise SATA 300 TX2 (frys electronics) 69.00
The oboard NIC and SATA Controller do not work. Install worked with the CD plugged in to the onboard IDE
It seems that ESXi would not install with the CD plugged in the same controller as the SATA Drive. This board does not support boot from USB.
September 2nd, 2008 at 8:26 pm
Mike,
Thanks for the working hardware list and the set up process for the IDE CD!