Today I set up a new DeskPi RackMate 12U model, the T2, and compared it to the other existing models (T0 / 4U and T1 / 8U)... and I have to ask: at what point are these racks not 'mini' anymore?
I posted a short video about the 12U in case you're interested in it—though many mini homelab enthusiasts have taken to 3D printing the entire rack, or just buying two cheap rack rails and using equipment to screw them together! (It's certainly easier to stomach $10 in parts for a DIY mini rack instead of paying $150+ for a premium mini rack like DeskPi's!)
Since launching Project MINI RACK a few weeks ago, I've seen 38 new builds submitted to the Build Showcase, and the r/minilab subreddit has seen a nice surge in growth—and new ideas!
Pictured above is helmarw's SDR-Station, which includes a rackmounted NanoVNA, a fold-up display, a 2.5/10 Gbps PoE switch, 2 Raspberry Pis, a Red Pitaya, two RTL-SDRs, a HackRF, and more!
One thing I think many people don't consider is how a mini rack can fit in many contexts besides just 'homelab'. There are other interesting radio and RF-related builds, and my Dad and I are working on rack setups for personal broadcast engineering and timing labs!
Comments
The single thing I'd love the most is the opposite of this - a neat way to turn rack-format setups into deskside machine. HP did that with some of their late Itanic workstations, and it was a very neat solution, but, since that, I haven't seen anything marginally pretty. For that, I'd also avoid the slimmest servers, as they tend to be the loudest.
It's all very interesting I guess and many are very good looking, but a pi/switch/AP in a liftable box is not a lab. It's just a pi/switch/AP in a liftable box. Heck I have all my gear (pi4, pi5, i3 nuc, 8-port PoE switch, opensense procectli gateway, hue bridge) on a $7 wire shoe rack. Works equally well if you don't look at the hellish set of power bricks behind it :-)
Very cool!
I was looking at the framework website at their upcoming AMD Ryzen AI 300 mini itx motherboard and they have an example of four of them in a 10” mini rack!! I think getting more than one of them, at all would take a bit, and not be worth it for a single video. But I’m sure someone will make a cool local LLM cluster in a mini rack with them!