Most of the IT folks have the question, “Is homelab really necessary?”. My answer to this question is yes.

In order to prove ourselves in today’s challenging IT environment, it is really necessary to have hands on experience on the latest products along with having knowledge on the old versions of those products as well. Learning everything in our office might not be possible at all times, coz, we may not use the up-to-date products in our production environment immediately when they are released. So, we can setup a homelab using the trial keys or eval setups and  gain some knowledge and know what is what. This knowledge will help you a lot in your production environment(in your office env). So, my suggestion is to have a good lab setup at your home.

What infrastructure do I need to purchase for this?

It again depends on your budget about what infrastructure to purchase. I am talkin about the physical hardware here. If you have enough funds to buy branded products, go for em. if not, use assembled hardware which might cost you bit cheap. So, whatever is the mode of your purchase, setup a lab at home and keep practicing on the products.

To choose which hypervisor to use while setting up your lab, check out my page, Best Hypervisor for Homelab

All the best!!

Keep calm and have Happy Learning.