Enterprise server for home lab -- HPE or Dell?

I want to buy a new pc for lab experiments and learning purposes. I almost went with Dell until seeing the level1techs video about the problems they had with their Dell.

But more feedback is always welcome, so I’m wondering what some thoughts are on this.

The server I’m looking at now is the HPE DL385.

Dell unless you have someone that can hook you up with paywalled HPE updates.

Any specific reason to not consider Supermicro?

What? How much do they charge?

Are you buying new server hardware, or used? I don’t recommend new for learning on - servers are far more useful when they are specced with a specific goal in mind. You could easily spend $10,000 just to have access to features that you want to learn, but have no actual goal with that will justify their cost.

If you go used, I’d recommend that you read over this hardware guide:
https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/wiki/hardware

In short, for learning, it’s tough to recommend anything but a 12 generation Dell (RX20). What specific one depends on your needs. The reason I’d recommend Dell is because they sell more, and so there’s a greater abundance of parts on eBay and other used second hand stores.

If you’re buying new hardware, it’s tough to recommend anything but the cheapest stuff to learn on, so I’d go SuperMicro.

I also highly recommend LabGopher to check out prices on eBay.

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HPE charges for software updates on their servers, like system bios, raid controller firmware, etc. You need an active support agreement with them to access these downloads.

The costs vary. If you buy a new Gen10 Microserver from them for $600, you get a three year support agreement and can download updates for anything else you wanted as well.

I’m partial to Dell but mainly because its what I’ve used, and i find them easy to manage. I agree with @COGlory’s assessment on everything hes said.

I’ve bought several used dell servers, and would do it again. Can recommend the rX20 series in general, very happy with my t320 and r720xd. Don’t forget to look at their towers too, not too bad, converts into 5U rack also

hem, Thats what im doing. The rack mountable towers. They look downright beastly. LIke the servers that would run the Matrix.

If you want for storage, look at the t630, good options for storage amount. I’m doing t320, when that one’s filled, I’ll get md1200 and hba controller. Found out one thing with the storage arrays from dell. Md1200 can take any disk, where md3200 disks must have dell firmware.

Well Dell is definitely more popular. I’d get a refurb R720 or something since it’s cheap. For the drives just get something from water panther, they have good options

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