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Planning a Home Network for Projects and Servers
A planning overview of home network layout: what the router, switches and access points do, how to organise addresses, and where project devices belong.
Build Lab
Home Network Lab
Networking, storage and backup concepts for people running their own gear at home.
Containers Versus Virtual Machines in a Home Lab
How containers and virtual machines differ in isolation, overhead and convenience, and how to choose between them when you self-host services at home.
DNS Explained for Home Lab Builders
How DNS turns names into addresses, what options exist for naming devices on a home network, and the usual reasons lookups fail and how to narrow them down.
Network Storage Planning for a Home NAS
What to weigh when planning shared storage at home: capacity, drive count, noise, power use, access needs and growth, without assuming one build suits everyone.
Network Wide Ad Blocking With a DNS Sinkhole
How DNS-level filtering blocks ads and trackers for every device on a network, what benefits to expect, and the ways it can break pages or apps.
RAID and Backups Are Not the Same Thing
Why RAID redundancy keeps a storage system running after a drive failure but does not protect against deletion, corruption, malware, fire or theft.
Remote Access Without Exposing Your Home Network
Compares ways to reach home services from outside, including VPNs, tunnels and reverse proxies, and explains the risks of opening ports on your router.
Separating Smart Devices With VLANs and Guest Networks
Why isolating smart gadgets from your computers limits the damage of a compromise, and the concept-level options: guest networks, VLANs and separate routers.
The 3-2-1 Backup Idea for Hobby Data
What the 3-2-1 rule means: three copies, two kinds of media, one off-site. Includes how to apply it to project files and how to test a restore.
Understanding IP Addresses and Subnets at Home
A builder's guide to private IP addresses, DHCP, reservations and simple subnets, so you can reason about which devices on your network can reach each other.
Wired Versus Wi-Fi for Always-On Devices
How to choose between Ethernet and Wi-Fi for fixed, always-on devices, covering reliability, latency, placement, interference and power considerations.
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