====== Hardware ======

Let´s talk about budget...

Clusters have nodes, if we assume one node is one server total cost of the cluster is mainly the cost of nodes. I have a low budget so one good choice is Raspberry Pi.

If you want to experiment with Kubernetes you need a minimum hardware. Checking minimal requirements we need at least Raspberry Pi 3. There are newer versions (current Raspberry Pi 5) but the software available (for instance Rancher) is not tested or experimented with in newer versions. Besides I have some spares from other projects.

A cluster can be composed of only one node so one Raspberry Pi is enough, but it´s difficult to experiment for instance with Ansible with only one node. So I took a compromise solution: a cluster composed of 1 Master node and 3 worker nodes.

So I began with:

  * 4 Raspberry Pi (4 RPI4 8Gb and 1 RPI4 2Gb and 1 RPI3 1Gb)
  * 8 USB disk 64 Mb as boot/storage
  * 4 POE hats for Raspberry Pi 4
  * A cluster case to keep it more or less tidy
  * A switch with POE
  * Network and supply cables

Can be cheaper as my second version

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Not a nice view but it worked

But with a nice case the results are better

{{images/case.jpg?direct}}