Need a datacenter rack but don’t have one? Never fear, someone figured out that the Ikea “Lack” side tables work perfectly with 19″ hardware like Ethernet switches.
The LackRack is the ultimate, low-cost, high shinyness solution for your modular datacenter-in-the-living-room. Featuring the LACK (side table) from Ikea, the LackRack is an easy-to-implement, exact-fit datacenter building block. It’s a little known fact that we have seen Google engineers tinker with Lack tables since way back in 2009.
The tongue-in-cheek LackRack website offers a number of tips and hints, some of which are (seem?) serious.
28 thoughts on “LackRack: Ikea server racks for living room datacenters”
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For $8.00 US, not too shabby
This is also a great way for a home studio.
I think I’ll buy one and mount my recording equipment (amplifiers, equalizers, cd,…) in it an put it under my desk.
Here in Germany it costs 8 Euros, about $11, okay..
The Lack table is 17.5 inches inside the legs (I measured one here at the house.)
The mounted equipment, I’ve decided after two minutes of research, is a Dell PowerConnect 5324, which is 44cm wide (17.32 inches).
http://community.spiceworks.com/images/products/0001/3229/Dell_Power_Connect_5324.jpg
You’ll notice that the mounting ears in the photo are black, and the router is gray, so they are undoubtedly using rack mounting hardware from something else, which happened to be the right width to screw into the Lack’s legs when attached to the Dell unit.
So, it will fit anything that size or smaller, with properly adapted mounting ears.
@Thomas Jordan, please explain how I managed to fit all these 19″ things, then http://wiki.eth-0.nl/index.php/Image:5x_lackrack.jpg :).
The distance between the legs is 17,64″. That’s enough for each and every piece of 19″ equipment that we have over here. That’s two dozen different devices, and they all fit.
The gap between the posts of a normal 19″ rack is 17.75″, but practically every rack mountable machine is a bit smaller than that, and can be mounted in a LackRack without any modification to the enclosure or mounting brackets. (Only with the 3com SuperStack III 4400 series you need to change the screws because they stick out too much.)
Most rails don’t fit because the legs of the LACK are so thick, in contrast to the thin strip they were designed for. This is easily solved with shelves or by simply stacking the LackRacks as in the 5x_lackrack picture.
I’m pretty sure the 19″ refers to the distance between the mounting screws. It doesn’t refer to the overall width of the box.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/LackRack/267773044028
:)
I found that the rast side tables make a pretty good rack as well. I have a picture of one that I built here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cjw333/29627416/
Don’t discard its cousin, the Ikea RAST for 19″ equipment.
you should probably point out that this isn’t the first time ikea has been computer friendly – the Ikea Helmer cabinet was ATX compatible! – remeber “helmer” the 24 core, 48GB rendering monster? do take a quick google…
Hey I kind of like this! and it’s really not expensive at all. Ethernet connections…hmmm.. so that mean if wanted to I can have internet connections in my living room?
http://www.specialdiscountcouponsandgiftcards.info
This is almost as good as GoDaddy’s use of bread racks for their servers!
Cool instructable for making a portable rack: http://www.instructables.com/id/20-units-instrument-rack-from-Ikeas-Lack-tables/
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