How to Build a Budget Home Server and WHY You Should!

almost everybody watching this video

including pc flippers or even people on

a really tight budget can benefit from

having a home server and this project

doesn't have to be expensive at all

trust me when i say that building a nas

or a centralized storage solution that

you can access from anywhere in your

house saves so much time when you're

trying to transfer files from one

computer to another or if you just want

to keep a big download like a steam

library on your nas so you don't have to

download it from the internet every time

you want to benchmark a game on a new pc

flip you can also be the cool guy at

home or even in your friend group that

hosts the plex server or the media

server that has a bunch of movies and tv

shows it's actually a super satisfying

position to be in and you can indeed

even use your server for gaming like how

i'm gonna be doing by hooking the server

up to my projector in my home theater

we'll also talk about how to set it up

to be a virtualization playground so you

can dabble with other operating systems

like linux distros that you want to try

out without having the risk of messing

up your main system we have a lot to

talk about today a lot of people don't

know this but i actually used to work in

it specifically in building and

configuring servers so i have a lot of

knowledge about this and i'm super

excited to share it with you just like

always everything that we talked about

today will be linked down in the

description let's get into it

okay so i want to break down the

different parts of this video first in

case some of you aren't interested in

the whole thing and just want some

specific information about something for

the first part we'll talk about some

specific purposes of why i built this

budget home server for myself and the

reasons why you might want to build one

for yourself as well and after that

we'll talk about the specific hardware

choices that i made and how you can keep

your own server nice and cheap all of

that though after a quick word from

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sponsoring today's video starting with

the main purposes there's actually four

of them that i'm gonna go with today

first is being an ass a plex or media

server just a home theater gaming pc and

finally a virtualization playground and

just as a quick note this video is

indeed going to be geared towards

beginners that don't know a ton about

home servers in general this will be

super easy to follow and understand if

you want to try any of this for yourself

okay so starting with the first purpose

which is nas or network attached storage

this concept allows you to share your

hard drive or multiple drives in your

computer to any device that's connected

to your home network and honestly if

you're still using like a usb drive to

transfer files from one computer to

another please listen up this is

actually super simple to do but i'm not

going to be giving specific instructions

because it depends on which operating

system you're using but you can indeed

use something like windows 10 pro and

that's exactly what i recommend doing if

you're a beginner in windows it's

actually as simple as right-clicking

your hard drive clicking properties and

going to the sharing tab and then every

device that mounts or connects to that

share drive will have access to it for a

budget home server like this i recommend

just putting any 3.5 inch spinning hard

drive that you can get for cheap and

using that as the nas i personally

recommend just using a smaller nvme

drive as your boot drive and then like i

just threw this two terabyte used hp

spinning hard drive on here that i found

on ebay for like 21

now all of my computers have easy access

to two terabytes of storage all right

but now that you have that hard drive

ready to roll you're starting to keep

some files and backups from other

computers on there now it's time to load

up some movies and tv shows which you

may or may not have downloaded illegally

and you want to share them with other

people as of right now there's three

main pieces of software to use for

hosting a media server you've probably

heard of at least plex already and

that's what i recommend starting off

with but just know there's certainly

some advantages of using the other two

plex is super easy to set up and i

recommend just following their online

documentation on how to do that and once

you're up and running you'll now have a

super clean almost like a streaming

service that you're hosting for your

friends and family or honestly even just

yourself plex allows you to fully

organize your library with opera artwork

set all sorts of transcoding settings so

you can watch your media on different

devices and it even allows you to set up

your server so you can access it outside

your network when you're on the go trust

me when i say it's a really fun and

satisfying experience setting this up

for your friends and family i just love

being able to provide this resource for

my own family but just know once people

start to rely on your plex server you're

gonna have to maintain it and make sure

it stays up and running if you're using

windows 10 pro like i recommended

earlier then definitely be sure to

disable that sleep option so your server

stays up and running and i would

definitely recommend getting into the

habit of keeping both windows and your

plex server software fully updated so

your server is secure and doesn't start

crashing or anything and before getting

into that virtualization playground

where we're gonna spin up some virtual

machines and all that this may sound

obvious to some of you but you can also

just use your home server as a normal

gaming pc while it's also functioning as

like a nas and a plex server as well

here in my own home theater i have this

massive server rack which i want to make

more videos about in the future so click

that subscribe button if you'd be

interested in that but the projector

that's displaying my movies and games

and all that is simply plugged in

directly to the back of this server that

we're looking at today and it's simply

just functioning as a normal computer

plugged into a monitor don't let this

weird-looking case or elaborate home

server rack fool you this is still just

a normal gaming pc that's also

functioning as a server if you use a 2u

case like this you are pretty limited in

gpu choices but i was able to snag up

this gtx 1650 low profile and that's

enough for me doing some light gaming on

a 1080p 60hz projector being able to

grab a controller and play games like

forza from my couch is a super fun

experience and it's a nice change of

pace from just sitting at my desk and

chair all day i highly recommend

building a setup like this even if you

don't have a dedicated home theater

setup but now i want to talk about some

virtualization stuff that you can do

with a build like this hopefully you

guys saw that linus tech tips series

where they tried linux gaming for like a

month or whatnot it was actually super

entertaining you check it out up here

but maybe you now after watching that

have the itch to download like a new

linux distro and just try something new

out you certainly could try to replace

windows with linux and survive like

linus and looked it but a much safer and

less permanent way is to simply create a

virtual machine on your new home server

you don't need super high-end hardware

to do this and you don't even need

special or difficult software because

windows 10 pro actually has an option

built right in it's called hyper-v and

all you got to do is press start and

type in hyper-v you'll most likely have

to install this specific feature but

it's still natively just a part of

windows and most people don't know about

it do keep in mind that there are other

options like virtualbox that you can use

as well but if you have windows 10 pro

already i actually like using this

better once you get the feature

installed you have to learn this

interface a bit but it's not difficult

at all everything that you need is in

the upper right hand corner such as

creating a new virtual machine you'll of

course also have to download your linux

operating system iso file of choice but

after you get these basics down you'll

be able to easily spin up destroy

rebuild back up and just play with

whatever type of system that you want to

experiment with if you haven't tried

this on an old laptop or desktop or

anything ever in your life this is also

a super satisfying experience and trying

out new linux distros like popos is

super fun and you'll learn a ton while

you're doing it my specific it job that

i had before i quit and became a content

creator required a lot of linux work

that i definitely wasn't prepared for

when i first took that job and just

spinning up linux vms like this is

exactly how i learned and got up to

speed for that there's also the added

benefit of being able to build even more

servers virtually of course inside your

home server this is actually how a lot

of servers are run these days and the

basic concept is that you can create a

dedicated virtual machine to each

individual task like the nas or plex

server that we talked about earlier and

then once they're separated you have

even more flexibility i'm not going to

dive any further for this video but for

now i recommend just playing around with

building some virtual machines and

learning this concept this is super

valuable out in the it world if that's

something you're interested in or if

you're just looking to dabble when

you're bored hopefully at this point in

the video you aren't too bored though

but the whole point of that was just to

open up your mind and see the

possibilities of what you can do with

even just a super budget home server

like this but now let's talk about the

specific hardware in mind and some

considerations that you should consider

when building your own first up which is

easily the most important just know that

you don't have to build a dedicated

machine like i did and you can literally

use any system that you already have

such as an old desktop or my favorite an

old laptop the home server video that

linus uploaded recently talked exactly

how you can turn something like an old

dell optiplex into a home server with

some similar concepts that i'm talking

about today but even better than that in

my opinion is using a laptop a laptop

functions just like a desktop and it can

host all the same home server things

including the virtualization platform

but it also has a monitor a keyboard and

a mouse built right in and technically

it even has a battery backup as well

remember that once people start to rely

on your home server specifically that

plex server they're going to get upset

if their service ever goes down to

easily maintain some uptime just use a

laptop with a good battery in it that

way whenever the power goes out in your

house the plex server stays online until

hopefully the power comes back on again

but just know you'll also have to have

your networking gear like your router on

a battery backup solution as well to

make it worth it regardless i'm just

trying to say that you can basically use

any system that you already have but now

let's talk about what's specifically in

mind all right so starting with this

case this is a 2u chassis from rosewill

which only costs around 130 but you can

throw this entire system into a normal

desktop case if you wanted to but i

specifically wanted to get this build

inside my server rack the cool thing

about this unit is that it allows for a

standard micro atx motherboard like my

gigabyte

b460mds3h which i picked up for just 61

used on newegg and the case also allows

for a standard atx power supply like the

evga 650 gt that i picked up off evga b

stock for 45 bucks keep in mind that

some 2u cases like this may require some

server specific power supplies or have

some funky motherboard compatibility

just make sure you do your research if

you're buying a 2u case like this also

inside my build is the intel i3 10 100 f

which is just a 4 core and 8 threaded

budget chip remember that although it's

super budget it only costs like 100 on

amazon it's still enough for everything

that i've listed out today for a home

server for ram this wasn't the most

budget selection but it was honestly

kind of an accident on black friday

k-meriodi and our discord server link

what we all thought was a two by eight

gigabyte g skill rip jaw ram kit which

was out on a really good deal naturally

i bought five of them because they'd be

perfect for flips but they ended up

being 1 by 16 gigabyte stick so now i

have five of them that i don't know what

to do with i used two of them for this

build just because i had them but you

can certainly go with a much more budget

option for a home server build like this

and finally for the gpu because i'm

using this build for gaming like i said

earlier i threw the gtx 1650 low profile

in here the 1650 is currently the best

gaming graphics card on the market that

has a low profile option like this but

if you aren't gaming then you can either

use integrated graphics with a different

cpu or you can use something really

cheap for display out purposes like a

gt710 or gt 1030. now everything else in

here isn't really worth explaining i did

spend a few extra bucks on the noctua

nhl9i low profile cpu cooler just

because you gotta have some noctua

colors inside a home server build and i

also upgraded the fans to the be quiet

purewings which are 80 millimeters and

they'll be much quieter and better

performing than the stock molex fans

that the case came with for storage

you'll have to decide what your goals

are ahead of time like i said earlier i

think it's a good combo having a smaller

nvme drive as your boot drive for

windows and maybe even some games but

then also throwing a cheaper spinning

hard drive in there to be your nas if

that's what you want to do hopefully you

got some value out of this or maybe even

just some ideas i've been wanting to

make this video for so long and

definitely let me know down in the

comment section if you want to see other

home networking or home server style of

videos like this one also feel free to

click the video that's on the screen now

to see a different home server build

that i built a long time ago but just

like always i hope you enjoyed this

video