Ask HN: I'm setting up a biohacker space. What equipment should I buy?

I'm a 4th year student at the Rochester Institute of Technology. We are creating a brand new hackerspace and I am in charge of purchasing some equipment for working with biology, splicing and analyzing genes, etc etc. I'd like to mostly gear the space toward synthetic biology. I have about $3000 to spend. What do you suggest I buy to get started?

I'm looking for recommended equipment types (incubators, centrifuges, etc) as well as brands and distributors that I can by from and are reputable.

Disclaimer: I'm self-taught in biology and have taken only a couple labs in microbiology. I know more about analyzing genomes using Perl and R than splicing genomes with electrophoresis. So, I'm asking the experts that can help me. Thanks in advance.