Generally speaking you only really need to worry about consoles once you've hit 50th level. You can get them from your fleet's store, from doing reputation, from zen store ships, from lockboxes (usually bought off the exchange)
If you are not in a fleet and are going to use the regular consoles, craft (or buy) the VR mk II consoles ( a few of them) use ONE upgrade on them if you get it to UR, then keep going if not, move to the next one.
Comments
Some missions give them as rewards as well.
Delta Quadrant
https://sto.gamepedia.com/Fleet_Research_Lab