Current planned use cases are Pi Hole, Bitwarden (password manager) server, probably general network storage and torrenting, whatever other “homelab” things I think of later (which is why the specs probably seem a bit overkill)
Lenovo ThinkCentre mini desktop, eBay refurbished, $184 before tax
8GB RAM, 500GB SSD
Intel Core i5 6th Gen. (they don’t specify but I’m assuming it’s a 6000 series, which was released in 2016)
Direct link to the listing: https://www.ebay.com/itm/293526962748
It’s a fine start. The computer is a thinkcenter m710q, here is Lenovos interactive user guide and hardware maintenance manual.
You get: two stocks of ram, one nvme device, one 2.5 inch sata device.
I think you’ll be happy with the cheapest base configuration, once space or memory begins to become an issue you’ll most likely install an nvme for the os and incoming scratch space and put the biggest spinning hard drive possible in and get on the ram upgrade train.
The problem you’ll run into is that there are no options for internal storage expansion. There’s no place to plug in a drive controller that could handle more drives, so even if you transplanted the motherboard in a bigger case, there’s way to attach more storage to it internally.
That means you can’t stuff more drives into there without replacing most of the computer.
It’s not the end of the world, and just meant you’ll need to use external usb drive bays or drives to add more storage or make what you do have redundant in some way. Or scoop someone’s old gaming rig sans video card and make that your storage server and let the thinkcenter do other stuff.
E: I wasn’t thinking laterally enough. You could mount it in a new case with long enough standoffs to use an nvme to 6xsata adapter and have plenty of storage.