"... so, I thought, why not?"

My Aunt and I recovered these images from slides that were squirelled away in my Grandfather's attic. He lived his whole life in Pennsylvania; but, these were taken on a vacation. Living in the D.C. area myself, I thought others might get as much of a kick out of these as I do.

I enjoy dreaming about those "simpler" times: Pennsylvania Avenue was open to traffic, and an abandoned backpack wouldn't bring a bomb-squad.

These images are not to be reproduced in any form without written consent. For non-commercial permission, and high-resolution images, just contact me via the menu item to the left (visible once you've registered and logged in). These images can also be licensed or purchased outright for commercial purposes. All proceeds will go directly to the photographer's estate (my Grandmother).

You're welcome to link to this page; but please, DO NOT link directly to the images themselves.

This started as a "little project" which has taken much more time, attention, and money than I'd originally imagined.
 
It's still ongoing; but, it's stalled now that things are functional, and I've been concentrating more on my network topology, including learning about Windows Server 2003 and Exchange mail services.
 
Since I'm not sure when this will be "complete", I thought I'd get some photos posted so that my friends can see what I'm talking about.
 
The goal was really simple... I wanted an enterprise-level server and storage system at a consumer-level price (and noise level). A lot of money was spent (details later, perhaps); but, it was easy to do once I started looking at the pre-built equipment which would meet my needs. I mean, after you come to believe that $4,000 is a good price, $2,000 seems like a bargain you can't refuse :-)
 
I also wanted it to fit in. In addition to the noise it generates, rack-mounted server equipment tends to have a large footprint. Most serious server equipment is far too deep to just tuck under a desk. I also looked at unusual commercial offerings from Chenbro and Lian Li; but, they didn't seem to use space as well as I thought they could or should.
 
Above all, after progressing through a ton of server equipment over the years, I wanted to build something that would meet the long-term requirements of our house and my work. In fact, I expect this to be "overboard" within five years as SAS and SATA hard drives gain capacity much faster than our needs will grow.
 
The short version: This is two CM Stacker cases mounted to a rolling chassis. It contains two computers, one of which hosts two 16 port RAID cards. Right now, 5 of the hot swap bays are dedicated to the second computer; but, that's likely to change. The case currently houses three power supplies, though it's beginning to look like a fourth might be required.
 
I took what may be a unique approach to ventilation: Large fans suck air in from underneath the chassis, and the remaining 5 fans in each case blow air out. Channeling the air this way allows me to use two filters on the bottom, and leaves the case blowing filtered air through the hot-swap bays, instead of the drives becoming dust-catchers.
 
Enough talk -- here's some photos... Each includes fairly detailed comments about the construction.