I’m in the process of designing a home server and am curious how many ethernet ports are required at minimum and how many people recommend. The single board computer (SBC) I plan to use has two built in and has a pcie slot to add four more if necessary. If I don’t need the four extra I’d like to use the pcie slot for a pcie Coral Edge TPU (preferred over the USB variant but still an option).

I expect to plan to use the server to connect to my home network so any device on the network via WiFi can access NextCloud. Besides that I want to use Frigate in another container for home video surveillance. I don’t know if I can or want to yet also add a Plex or Jellyfin instance to then connect to my TV or use a separate SBC for that.

What are your thoughts? I’m new to all of these things and just don’t want to waste money on the wrong hardware. Thanks!

  • @[email protected]OPEnglish
    1•1 year ago

    #1 seems like something I understand and could use but doubt I really need that. The other things you mention I don’t fully understand what they are and since you say I probably don’t need to worry about them then I won’t.

    I believe I’ll need to use a second port to add an ePOE hub for a few cameras though.

    Thank you!

    • @peregusEnglish
      2•1 year ago

      I would segregate the CCTV stuff on a separate VLAN since most likely it will be available from Internet. Since you are planning to use frigate and not connect directly to each single camera, place a firewall rule that block Internet access to them (or at least don’t add the gateway).

    • thejevansEnglish
      1•1 year ago

      I believe I’ll need to use a second port to add an ePOE hub for a few cameras though.

      You mean a POE network switch? You can run POE powered devices on the same network as everything else, so you don’t need an extra port for that.

      • @[email protected]OPEnglish
        1•1 year ago

        Specifically POE security cameras. So those can be connected to my all-in-one router and thus to my server running Frigate? That’s good to understand. Thank you

        • @[email protected]English
          1•1 year ago

          They can only be connected to your router if the router has POE support. If it doesn’t, you will need a separate switch that has POE ports. Many POE cameras etc are sold with power injectors. You plug the Ethernet from the router into the injector, plug the injector into a wall outlet, then run Ethernet from the injector to the device. If you don’t want to get a whole new switch with POE ports, you could get POE that way.