Our New Web Server
Look, I know it is not as cool or as powerful as a conventional server, but I’m trying to save a buck.
What Is Raspberry Pi?
The Raspberry Pi computer is a tiny, single board computer. They cost around $35, and run on Linux. I have owned around a dozen, and keep three of the newest ones in my server rack. They are one of the big reasons that I became interested in both Linux and servers to begin with. Below, you can see that the computer is not much bigger than a credit card.
A Place to Keep It
When I planned out my server rack, I knew that I wanted to have an area for a bunch of Raspberry Pi computers. I found a basic 3D print file to mount the computers here, and modified it to meet my needs. Pictured above you can see one of the 3D-printed trays that mount my Pis alongside an older model. I also dedicated a power distribution unit that could switch each RPi off and on from the front of my rack. For a more detailed look at the 3D-printed rack, here is an excellent demonstration video.
Why Migrate?
Fair question. I already had the website up and working on more powerful hardware. The problem is that I wanted to refresh my server to an enterprise-grade operating system. By switching from Proxmox to vSphere, I would be able to get more experience with an environment I could encounter at work. Doing this upgrade would mean that I have to lose and remake all of my virtual machines. Furthermore, the electrical consumption of the big Dell server is around 100x that of the Raspberry Pi. Hypothetically, I could use the big server for experimenting and work when I needed it, while the website can hang out on a weaker computer.
Unfortunately, even with good motivation to change the way I was hosting the website, I never got around to it until now. The reason? My big old server died :'(
Figuring out what happened, why, and if I can fix the server will have to wait for another day. Today, I finally migrate the site to Raspberry Pi.
I will spare all of the technical details of standing up a new web server. I am not an expert, and you likely aren’t the audience. Instead, here is a closeup of the new server hosting this website. It is simple, quiet, cheap, and I hope interesting to you.
