I used to be all white box, and now I am all business class cast offs… If I lose a motherboard I can get one on ebay or a complete system for next to nothing if it is common like Dell. And now I just treat the boxes like cattle rather than pets. One dies and I move the hard drive to a new one.

This is incorrect and bad advice. A Dell or Lenovo business class motherboard will not bolt into an ATX case, nor connect to an ATX power supply.

When you turn your NAS into a hosting platform, it is no longer just a NAS.

Yes, but the other computers I listed have a person behind them that will click things. Like a “close” button that actually installs malware. A NAS does not click things.

Much more likely to gain access via a compromised desktop, or smart phone.

The quality of APC has really drops to pathetic levels. This is another example. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIEM2bG8mOQ We dropped them years ago for Cyberpower. Got tired of RMAs.

Depends on how you buy it. If you keep power consumption at the top of mind, and you stay about 3 years back in the early refresh cycle, you can do very well.

You have to understand the priorities of the rack server market.

#1 is dependability. It needs to keep running no matter what. Evenrthing is built around overbuilding it. More cooling, dual CPUs, Dual power supplies, lots of drives in RAID…

#2 is size. Colo space is expensive! So keep it small. So everything is densely packed, which is bad for airflow. And you get stacked small fans running at the speed of sound.

#3 is performance. Yeah, you would think it was first, but it ain’t. But that means 10k and 12k spinning drives. These are loud and noisy!

Way down the list is power… When you consider the cost of the hardware new, the cost of the colo space, and the cost of the people maintaining it, the power cost is next to nothing. The only thing less important than power consumption is sound which is not even on the list…

Now, compare that with workstations. They have a lot of the same components like Xenon CPUs, lots of ram, raid… But they sit on a desk, so noise, heat and power are a real concern. And they are often overlooked in the used and refurb market. So for less money, you get server like components and performance, in a quieter and more power friendly form factor.

More spindles means better performance. But also more power use. Only you can decide which is more important.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/254845248977

Cisco Catalyst 2960-X WS-C2960X-48FPD-L 48 Port GigE PoE 2x 10G SFP+ Switch

2 SFP+ ports, and 48 1gig Poe+ ports. A solid switch that has a lot of help and documentation on the web. Also, learning Cisco will not hurt your job options.

Edit: Note that this is cheaply stackable if you need more ports. Yes, that will be a bit power hungry.