I have a few Dell R720 servers in my basement. One of them recently became a dedicated remote dev box due to a client project that had some hefty requirements.

I have a few Dell R720 servers in my basement. One of them recently became a dedicated remote dev box due to a client project that had some hefty requirements. It's got 2 processors (24 cores total), 64GB of ECC memory, and 6 SAS drives in a RAID configuration. It'll build the linux kernel in 179 seconds, lol (I genuinely do not know if this is good or bad, but probably not great) Idle it consumes about 120-130 watts of power. This beast does all the heavy lifting, and then I use my other machines as thin clients to code. Lately my setup includes VS Code w/ the remote SSH extension for developing on the server. I have a love/hate relationship with VS Code. I don't use the built-in terminal, instead I will use iTerm connected via mosh or ssh to the server, where I use tmux to keep a long running session of all my crap. I usually have a few windows for a repl, various app processes, a psql shell open at all times, etc. It's very nice to be able to roam from my macbook on the couch to my mac mini in my office with zero interruption in flow. I have my own vpn and also run tailscale, so I can hack from anywhere with this setup. Locally, latency has been almost imperceptible. So this has worked out really great. The only real shortcoming is that the processors are kinda old and run hot, but for $200 I can get a matching pair of newer chips that are a lot quicker. Just haven't pulled the trigger, because I am trying to ascertain real-world benchmarks on just how much my life would improve. Part of me wants to build a monster Ryzen 5900X workstation to have under my desk, but I enjoy the fact that this server is in my basement where I cannot hear or see it. I don't need a new workstation, these servers are so great, but it would def be fun to have some lightning fast raid/nvme storage.