Architecture: the lab at a glance
Five x86 hosts and an eleven-node ARM cluster: what runs where, with the full hardware below.
heterogeneous compute multi-factory fleet virtualization storage tiers
Click the map to enlarge.
Host specifications
| Host | CPU | RAM | GPU | Storage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mothership | Ryzen 7 5800X · 8c/16t | 32 GB | Radeon 7900 XTX 24 GB | ~4 TB SSD |
| BigHonker | Core i5-9600K · 6c | 16 GB | RTX 3070 8 GB | 2 TB HDD + 1 TB SSD |
| Softserve | Ryzen 7 5700G · 8c/16t | 48 GB | RTX 3070 Ti 8 GB | 46 TB HDD + 1.5 TB SSD (shared) |
| Rigby | Core i7-3770 · 4c/8t | 24 GB | GeForce GT 730 · 2 GB | 1 TB SSD + 1 TB HDD |
| Mordecai | Core i5-3470 · 4c | 8 GB | none | 500 GB SSD |
Fellowship node classes
| Class | Processor | RAM | Nodes |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | 8-core ARM64 · 2.8 GHz | 3 GB | gandalf, aragorn |
| B | 8-core ARM64 · 1.8 GHz | 2 GB | frodo, sam, legolas, gimli, boromir, faramir |
| C | 4-core ARM64 · 1.8 GHz | 2 GB | merry, pippin |
| D | 4-core ARMv7 · 1.4 GHz (32-bit) | 1.4 GB | sméagol |
No two of these machines are alike: a 24 GB Radeon training box, two 8 GB chat cards, a pair of decade-old Ivy Bridge desktops, and an ARM cluster with 2 GB a node. The fleet grew one box at a time, and it works as one pool because each job is placed on the host whose capabilities fit it, not because the hardware matches. Softserve, the main server, anchors it: Plex, the network-shared array, and the Hyper-V layer that carries the Home AI orchestrator and the media stack as VMs. Heavier model work spills onto the other boxes because no single one holds it all. The other four maps break the fleet down from here: what runs on it and how work is placed are the AI and compute and scheduling maps, how the AI changes its own code under human gates is the self-engineering map, and the zero-trust front door is the network and security map. The current lab page has the host-by-host detail.