This weekends project, from loose networking kit and stacked servers into a rack. I recently upgraded from Dell PowerConnect switches in desktop configuration to TP Link Omada switches. Firstly I upgraded to a SG3428 switch which was much bigger than the Dell 2724 and so wouldn’t fit in my neat under the shelf corner spot right under my Microserver stack. I then spotted a great priced SG3428MP which being a POE switch was even bigger than the none POE version. This caused me to lose desk space to this mahusive switch and a mess of cables. I also moved away from a consumer router RT-AC66U over to the Omada ER605 v2 and have 2x EAP650’s for wifi.

I decided its time to get a cabinet to house the microservers, POE switch and router. After finding a good priced wall mounting one, with 2x full depth shelves, a brush plate and was deep enough to mount the POE switch.

I decided to mount the switch at the bottom, with the usual 1U gap below the switch, brush plate, then the two shelves with a gap to mount the ER605 on velcro(this is a trick we use at work to mount loose kit) and the top shelf holding the microservers.

Having mounted all the kit and routing the cables through the back and up to the top and out to under the desk on cable trays. It soon became clear that the temperature inside the cabinet would struggle in the UK summer with both servers and switch running. It also became quickly apparent that the size of the switch caused it to sag quite substantially. Amazon next day delivery comes to the rescue, one mains powered 120mm fan with speed controller and a pair of 1U blanking panels on order. Fitting the fan dropped the temps inside the cabinet even just on the lowest setting and thw controller on the outside of the cabinet. With one blanking panel fitted to the back under the switch and the sagging was sorted, the other was just to blank the space under the switch at the front.

Not sure why I haven’t done this for ages, nor why I hadn’t moved over to SMB/enterprise kit for years and the old Dell switches were just OK for basic use but for more substantial tinkering/setup.