I'm creating/implementing a private ethereum network for a group of friends to "play with" the blockchain, develop dapps on top of it.

during my google searches, I found the "blockchain as a service" offer from Microsoft that's basically presented as the AWS of the blockchain with some ready to use environment.

can I get some feedback on that? what are your "go-to" if you wanted to create a private ethereum blockchain?

What is the minimum required hardware to run a private network (how many servers? minimum CPU, RAM, Hard disk etc etc)?