[TriLUG] Home lab setup recommendation

[vikram sai balaji ulaganathan via TriLUG]

Hi All,

Available hardware:

I have an old HP DV6700 laptop with intel core 2 duo 2.16 GHZ and 3GB RAM.
This has ubuntu in it.

I also built a small desktop of AMD Athlon X4 860K (quad core) 3.7 GHZ with
NVidia GT 610 graphics card. This has ubuntu as the primary os while arch
Linux is used when blender is needed.

Requirement:

Learning Blender:

I wanted to learn blender and only Arch Linux was the best option to enable
proprietary cuda driver to speed up my rendering. So I have to be
physically on my desktop to do the rendering. The problem is that my
desktop is connected to my TV (Only TV at home) in the hall and I have to
be close enough to do all the work and it affects everyone else.

I wanted to see if I can cluster the HP laptop and desktop and run VM's on
them.

The idea is to use the laptop as a mini server to first create my blender
files with low resolution rendering and once I am satisfied with my
changes, move it to the desktop and start the rendering there with more
fine tuning.

Running DLNA & learning sys / app containers:

Also I wanted to run dlna server on my laptop to save power. And multiple
VM's on my desktop to try different OS / servers, just to gain experience
in system and app containers.

Questions:

1. Has anyone clustered two different architecture based machines and
created servers as a home lab?

I have seen videos of XenServer (Xen Project), Proxmox, Pelican HPC,
OpenVZ, archivista.ch (did not work) & bhyve. I have yet to understand
clustering multiple architecture. I am a newbie when it comes to clustering
/ home lab setup.

2. What would be your recommendation on servers at home and is there a gui
/ web based software similar to proxmox or xen that I can use on my
personal laptop (not the HP) to control their start / stop and connections
to VM's created in them.

My primary preference will be free of charge software / one-time fee.

Thanks to all in advance for your advice

Vikram