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!
Im using 10gb network cards in my homelab. My vm server has an extra 1gb port for an outside interface on multiple pfsesne vms that i use to route traffic over vpn tunnels.
Then on my nas i have 10gb to a switch with the vm servers. It has another 1gb interface that i run directly to another nas. It uses that direct link to backup data nightly.