r/homelab

Hey, i have been a lurker in this sub until now. Inspired by all of you, I got myself a beautiful piece of technology.

Specs:

Dell poweredge r730 16 bay SFF

Dual Intel xeon e5-2697A v4

32 gb quad rank 2133Mhz Rdimm DDR4(x2)

1 tb consumer grade sata ssd (x2) [couldn't afford more, will upgrade later]

1100w dual psu

Nvidia quadro k1200 (got for really cheap)

idrac 8 enterprise licence

1 gigabit 4 port nic

H330 mono mini raid card

Installed proxmox for now

Kindly review, drop advice, suggestions, what to run, what to do next, just anything.

All comments are welcome, really love this sub, want to be one of the community now!!

I am an amateur homelabber at best, and I like using old parts that get the job done, especially if recycled.

This eBay special had some modifications I didn't notice until recently. It appears that it wasn't always a half height card.

For those curious, this Intel CPU-D33682 has worked flawlessly in my dell optiplex 790 with a core i5, 12GB of RAM, running OPNsense. Using this as a router, my limited 400Mbit internet connection routinely hits 500Mbit on speed test, so I am happy.

I pulled it out to dust the computer while replacing the CMOS battery, and then noticed how odd it looked.

Figured I’d share my little homelab because it’s come a long way over the last few months.
It all started as “I just want Plex,” and now my bedroom closet has become my network/tool closet.

Current setup:
Dell G7 (i7-8750H, 32GB RAM) running Proxmox
Home Assistant OS
Frigate
Plex Media Server
Sonarr / Radarr / qBittorrent
Satisfactory dedicated server
NAS with ~11TB RAID 5 storage
Eaton UPS
Netgear PoE switch
SKB rack case
Cox ISP (1000/40)
Edge router 12 (not currently in use)

I’m currently working on integrating everything into Home Assistant and plan on mounting a Windows touchscreen tablet on the wall as a dashboard. The long-term goal is for it to become a “mission control” panel that shows my cameras, Plex status, Proxmox, NAS storage, server status, and smart home devices.
Still planning to add:
RustDesk server
More IP cameras
Smart thermostat
Better cable management
More automation with Home Assistant

I’m only 19, so this has been a fun project to learn Linux, Docker, Proxmox, networking, and self-hosting. I’d love to hear any suggestions for improvements or services I should add!

So lately I was using this machine for keyshot cpu rendering and now its sitting on my table not using it frequently. I was wondering what other things I can do with this machine
The specs is:
Epyc 7713 64c
asrock rack rome4id2t
128gb ddr4 ecc
3070fe
Cheap 500gb ssd( I was having trouble running a gen4 nvme)

Finally got everything off my desk. Not ready to do a full breakdown yet still building some stuff. The top is a 8000 series thinkcentre running proxmox (learning/test machine) 16 gigs ram. Next is an m720q running Ubuntu server 32 gigs ram, 13000 Intel series CPU. Networking shelf ASUS wifi router, f12 barracuda firewall appliance running openwrt, under that is a 24 Port unmanaged NETGEAR switch. Next shelf isp cable modem and some books. Bottom gaming rig now running Ubuntu server cuz I only play retro games now is a 12000 series Intel CPU 32 gigs of RAM and an RTX 3060 for local LLM stuff. The f12 Barracuda I bought for $20 off of FB last night. Still setting that up.

I am a 37 year old cyber security student and I am working on building a homelab to practice my networking and documentation skills. Here’s what I came up this past year.

Most everything is stuff we had and I just started connecting it. The only difference was my husband had an old hp laptop with a corrupted start up that I wiped and put mint Linux and Casa Os. It’s 10 years old, but she’s chugging along.

Any comments or suggestions are welcome. I am hoping to continue to build onto it. Especially any info on building a music library and sharing it with both Macs and Androids.

My spending on this project so far has been:
Raspberry Pi 6 (180$) - I got a fun chassis when I initially built it for a school project
Ethernet switch - it was about (40$)- my in-laws gave it to me for my birthday
Shelving unit-(35$)on Amazon

~~~~post update~~~~~

I am so thankful for all the feedback and suggestions!!! So I have had a ton of questions asking if I had a software that I am using for the map... no, it's AI generated and it is incorrect. I updated it, and at the suggestion of others I am going to start learning Drawio. I am putting the updated map here for the meantime.

The centerpiece here isn’t the hardware. It’s that I’m standing up my own Autonomous System (ASN + IPv6 /48) to announce from home over BGP. Paperwork is signed. I’m waiting on the final invoice and my ISP’s go-ahead to light up the BGP session. The lab underneath already runs 24/7.
Connectivity
• WAN 1: ~900 Mbps (PPPoE)
• WAN 2: 150 Mbps symmetric, dedicated, with a /29 (3 usable public IPs)
• Dual-WAN in OpenWrt. One link for domestic, the other as the public/lab link
• Own ASN + IPv6 /48. Signed, BGP session pending
Network
• Router: TP-Link ER605 on OpenWrt. Dual-WAN (mwan3), SQM/cake on the public link
• Core switch: MikroTik CRS326-24G-2S+RM (24x GbE + 2x SFP+)
• Border/BGP router: still deciding between an RB5009 and an x86 mini-PC running VyOS/FRR. Opinions welcome
• Spares: Asus RT-AC1200, TP-Link Archer C64, T4U Plus USB adapter
Compute (Proxmox cluster)
• node1: i3 / 24 GB RAM. Always-on, runs the persistent services
• node2: powered up on demand for ephemeral labs (AD, deliberately vulnerable VMs)
• Raspberry Pi 3 as the QDevice for quorum
Workstations and misc
• MacBook Air M3, Asus VivoBook K3500P, ThinkPad E14
• PC #1: i5 / RTX 3060 / 32 GB / 256 GB SSD + 2 TB HDD, liquid cooled
• PC #2: i3 / GTX 1660 Ti / 16 GB / 256 GB SSD + 1 TB HDD
• 2x ESP32 + LoRa RYRR30D, still in the someday pile
Services running now
• AdGuard Home for network-wide DNS filtering
• Tor middle relay
• Prometheus + node_exporter + Grafana, alerting to Discord
• RIPE Atlas probe, spinning up
• The usual *arr media stack
• Considering a low-power SBC as a dedicated contribution node (Tor + RIPE Atlas + NTP)

Pushing my old custom PC to its limits :D

My tiny Homelabs

➡️ Intel Core-i3 N305 - 16GB DDR5 - FTTH GPON ONT SFR with nftables snat routing.

➡️ Intel Core-i7 4785T - 16GB DDR3 - Run from RAM (tmpfs) TESTING

Both are bare metal hypervisor that run fully in RAM with Xen kernel and Alpine Linux host. Incredibly fast en small footprint (27w idle).

Persistant on demand (snapshot like) Instant rollback !

⚡Incredibly Fast!

I have been researching which NAS I would buy in 2026, so I put together a comparison of current-ish x86 NAS models from brands like AOOSTAR, UGREEN, Minisforum, Beelink, ACEMAGIC, TerraMaster, LincPlus and ZimaCube.

The goal was not to crown one universal winner. I wanted a practical shortlist depending on number of bays, price, CPU, network, M.2 slots and whether the machine is flexible enough to run something like TrueNAS, Proxmox, Linux, etc.

Criteria

• x86 only. No ARM.
• 2 to 6 main 3.5" drive bays.
• Must have a clear way to install the OS on eMMC, SSD, NVMe or a dedicated system drive without sacrificing a main data bay.
• No Synology, QNAP, Asustor or UniFi in this comparison. I wanted more open/flexible x86 boxes.
• No all-flash / 0-bay units in the main table.
• No models above roughly 1,200 EUR once normalized.
• Prices were taken from official manufacturer stores.

Price normalization

One annoying part of comparing these devices is that some come ready to use, while others are barebone.

So I used a minimum baseline:

• 2-4 bay NAS: at least 8 GB RAM + system storage path.
• 5-6 bay NAS: at least 16 GB RAM + system storage path.
• 8 GB DDR4: 85 EUR.
• 8 GB DDR5: 125 EUR.
• 16 GB DDR5: 250 EUR.
• 256 GB NVMe: 50 EUR.

This is not perfect equivalence. If a NAS already includes more RAM, more system storage, better networking or more M.2 slots, I leave that as an advantage. I only add what is needed to reach a basic usable baseline.

Value metric

For a rough CPU value metric I used:

Global/EUR = sqrt(Geekbench Single x Geekbench Multi) / normalized total price

I used the geometric mean so single-core and multi-core both matter without manually deciding a weighting. This is not an official Geekbench score and it is not a universal "best NAS" score. It is just a value indicator.

Also, comparing a 4-bay and a 6-bay NAS purely by CPU/EUR is not perfectly fair. You still need to choose based on bays, networking, OS, expansion, noise, power consumption, support, etc.

Top results by CPU performance per euro

Rank	Model	Bays	CPU	Normalized price	Global/EUR
1	Minisforum N5 Air	5	Ryzen 7 255	769.00 EUR	7.24
2	AOOSTAR WTR Pro	4	Ryzen 7 5825U	467.49 EUR	7.07
3	Beelink ME Pro N95	2	Intel N95	332.49 EUR	6.02
4	AOOSTAR WTR Max AMD	6	Ryzen 7 PRO 8845HS	878.12 EUR	5.76
5	UGREEN DXP4800 Pro	4	Core i3-1315U	679.99 EUR	5.40

Cheapest models after normalization

Rank	Model	Bays	CPU	Base price	Normalized price	Global/EUR
1	Beelink ME Pro N95	2	Intel N95	332.49 EUR	332.49 EUR	6.02
2	UGREEN DXP2800	2	Intel N100	379.99 EUR	379.99 EUR	5.12
3	ACEMAGIC N3A	4	Ryzen Embedded R2544	279.00 EUR	414.00 EUR	4.45
4	UGREEN DXP2800 GT	2	Ryzen Embedded R2514	429.99 EUR	429.99 EUR	4.00
5	LincPlus LincStation S1	4	Intel N97	459.00 EUR	459.00 EUR	4.34

By category

2-bay

Model	CPU	RAM / system	Network	M.2	Normalized price	Global/EUR
Beelink ME Pro N95	Intel N95	12 GB LPDDR5 + 128 GB SSD	5GbE + 2.5GbE	3x NVMe	332.49 EUR	6.02
UGREEN DXP2800	Intel N100	8 GB DDR5 + 32 GB eMMC	1x 2.5GbE	2x NVMe	379.99 EUR	5.12
UGREEN DXP2800 GT	Ryzen Embedded R2514	8 GB DDR4 + 64 GB eMMC	1x 10GbE	2x NVMe	429.99 EUR	4.00
TerraMaster F2-424	Intel N95	8 GB DDR5 + added NVMe	2x 2.5GbE	2x NVMe	462.31 EUR	3.94

4-bay

Model	CPU	RAM / system	Network	M.2	Normalized price	Global/EUR
AOOSTAR WTR Pro	Ryzen 7 5825U	Barebone + RAM/NVMe added	2x 2.5GbE	2x NVMe	467.49 EUR	7.07
UGREEN DXP4800 Pro	Core i3-1315U	8 GB DDR5 + 128 GB SSD	10GbE + 2.5GbE	2x NVMe	679.99 EUR	5.40
UGREEN DXP4800 Plus	Pentium Gold 8505	8 GB DDR5 + 128 GB SSD	10GbE + 2.5GbE	2x NVMe	619.99 EUR	4.96
ACEMAGIC N3A	Ryzen Embedded R2544	Barebone + RAM/NVMe added	2.5GbE + 1GbE	2x NVMe	414.00 EUR	4.45
LincPlus LincStation S1	Intel N97	8 GB DDR5 + 128 GB eMMC	2x 2.5GbE	2x NVMe	459.00 EUR	4.34
TerraMaster F4-425 Pro	Intel Core 3 N350	16 GB DDR5 + added NVMe	2x 5GbE	3x NVMe	723.73 EUR	3.44
UGREEN DXP4800 GT	Ryzen Embedded R2514	8 GB DDR4 + 64 GB eMMC	2x 10GbE	2x NVMe	559.99 EUR	3.08

5-bay

Model	CPU	RAM / system	Network	M.2	Normalized price	Global/EUR
Minisforum N5 Air	Ryzen 7 255	16 GB DDR5 + 64 GB system SSD	10GbE + 5GbE	3x M.2/U.2	769.00 EUR	7.24
Minisforum N5 Pro	Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 370	16 GB DDR5 + 128 GB system SSD	10GbE + 5GbE	3x M.2/U.2	1,199.00 EUR	4.93

6-bay

Model	CPU	RAM / system	Network	M.2	Normalized price	Global/EUR
AOOSTAR WTR Max AMD	Ryzen 7 PRO 8845HS	Barebone + RAM/NVMe added	2x 10GbE SFP+ + 2x 2.5GbE	5x NVMe	878.12 EUR	5.76
AOOSTAR WTR Max Intel	Core i5-1235U	Barebone + RAM/NVMe added	2x 10GbE SFP+ + 2x 2.5GbE	5x NVMe	790.39 EUR	4.03
TerraMaster F6-425 Pro	Core i3-1315U	8 GB DDR5 + added RAM/NVMe	2x 10GbE	3x NVMe	1,017.17 EUR	3.61
ZimaCube 2 Standard	Core i3-1215U	8 GB DDR5 + 256 GB SSD + added RAM	TB4, no 10GbE according to FAQ	SSD + dedicated 7th SSD bay	825.94 EUR	3.55
ZimaCube 2 Pro	Core i5-1235U	16 GB DDR5 + 256 GB SSD	10GbE + 2x 2.5GbE + TB4	4 SSD slots / 7th SSD bay	1,139.57 EUR	2.80

My current takeaways

• Best raw value in my table: AOOSTAR WTR Pro, but it is barebone.
• Most interesting 6-bay / all-in-one option: AOOSTAR WTR Max AMD, mainly because of CPU, 5x NVMe and 2x SFP+ 10GbE.
• Best "cleaner" 4-bay option from a more mainstream NAS brand/store: UGREEN DXP4800 Pro.
• Cheapest interesting 4-bay: ACEMAGIC N3A, but I would treat it more like a direct NAS rather than assuming Proxmox + virtualized TrueNAS will be painless.

For example, a NAS can score very well on CPU/EUR and still be a bad choice for someone who wants something quiet, plug-and-play and supported for years.

What would you pick?

If you were buying an x86 NAS in 2026, what would you choose?

Would you prioritize:

• lowest price,
• 10GbE / SFP+,
• number of bays,
• Proxmox/TrueNAS flexibility,
• low power consumption,
• or a polished ready-to-use OS?

I also made a video about it (Spanish but English track available) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mc2rRS8GxAc

Just want to share my server after lurking on this sub for about a year. Getting to the point where this feels solid.

Ubuntu Server PC1:

- Lenovo M73 Mini 12GB RAM, i5 Processor
- 5 Bay ORICO USB DAS attached
- 2×6TB WD Red Pro drives (RAID)
- 2×2TB WD Red drives (RAID)
- 250GB SSD for the OS
- Docker Compose for everything

Ubuntu Server PC2:

- Lenovo M72 Mini 8GB RAM i3 Processor
- Handles networking and light apps

Windows PC3:
- Dell Optiplex 3090 32GB RAM i5 Processor Radeon AMD GPU

Windows PC4:
- Custom gaming rig with i7 7700 Processor, 48GB RAM, 12GB 3060 GPU

ASUS RT-AX58U Router - running Asuswrt-Merlin (the custom firmware gives the Asus logo a wizard hat and a ton of other useful features)

Each PC is paired with a JetKVM and everything is connected via a 8 port switch.

Thrift shopping, eBay doom scrolling, FB marketplace all got me these things at a great price. I don’t have a tally for everything but I’m most proud of getting my router for only $5.

Adding these fans to the front of my DAS to get my HDD temps down.

Gaming:
PC3:
- Minecraft server
- Glorified Steam Link
- Can play light indie co-op games

PC4:
- This is my gaming PC that is a ship of theseus. I’ve had it for a very long time.

Media Stack

PC1:
- Jellyfin for movies and TV
- Jellyseerr for requests
- Sonarr for tv
- Radarr for movies
- Lidarr for music
- Prowlarr for search indexers
- Bazarr for subtitles
- qBittorrent (behind VPN) for downloads
- FlareSolverr
- Navidrome for music
-MusicSeerr for music requests
- Soulseek (slskd) music downloads
- Explo for music discovery
- Kavita for ebooks
- Audiobookshelf for audiobooks
- Shelfmark for automated book requests

This stack lets me get the media I want on demand and I actually own it.

Photo & Personal Cloud

- Immich for photo backup
- Nextcloud for files and document sync
- FileBrowser for quick filesystem access

Network

PC2:
- Pi-hole
- Unbound DNS
- Nginx Proxy Manager
- WireGuard (wg-easy)
- DuckDNS
- Uptime Kuma
- Homarr dashboard
- Portainer
- Dozzle
- WatchYourLAN

Right now I just have Nginx set up for my password manager. I’m going to be adding 2FA to my stack and start adding more.

Monitoring

- Beszel monitors both servers
- Uptime Kuma monitors services
- Dozzle for container logs
- Homarr as the central dashboard

I only really use Beszel to check HDD temps.

Backups

I have a script running that:
- Backs up Docker configs
- Backs up databases
- Backs up personal data
- Stores local backups
- Uploads encrypted off-site backups to Backblaze B2

I choose not to backup my movies/tv/music media to reduce storage costs. Only my cloud and photos get backed up. My other media can be downloaded again and is stored on a backup external drive. That’s good enough for me when it comes to my copy of “Dude Where’s my Car”.

Privacy Goals

I’ve noticed less targeted ads coming my way. Switching email providers is my next step. Creating an aliases for certain types of accounts. It feels futile but I’m going see if it helps with big tech getting less data from me for free.

So far I’ve replaced:

- iCloud Photos -> Immich
- Kobo library management -> Kavita
- Google Drive -> Nextcloud
- Netflix, HBO, Hulu -> Jellyfin + JellySeerr (+ Streamio w/ TorBox - this is paid but fills in the gaps for Jellyfin nicely for me)
- DNS -> Pi-hole + Unbound

I still can’t pull away from Spotify. I’m going to be gutting my music stack and just keeping Navidrome + a Spotify downloader. I’m just going to be archiving my CD’s. But I found that these services just don’t replicate music sharing or discovery like Spotify can. I could say more but I’ll leave it for another post.

But I actually use my media stack, Immich, and Nextcloud on a daily basis. One of my favorite parts is automated book downloads. It makes getting new books on my reader so much faster.

Future Plans

- Move everything into Proxmox
- Add automated VM snapshots
- UPS with network shutdown support
- CrowdSec
- Wiki for documentation

I’m sure I’ve made some questionable decisions. I’d like to hear more about what you would improve or remove.

Edit: That is a faux fireplace! It does have a space heater but I only use that in the winter.

"You can rebuild a server in an hour. You can't rebuild the reasons you built it that way"

That's why I started my homelab with a handbook instead of a cluster.

A lab I did but can't point to is a lab I never did. The commands are easy to repeat. The thinking behind them, the mistakes, the "why this and not that", is the part that quietly disappears if you don't write it down.

So Phase 0 gets documented from the first command up:
- 3 mini nodes, one Kubernetes cluster
- Talos Linux on all of them (no SSH, no shell, config is the only front door)
- 1 control plane + 2 workers

Anyone can flash a node. Fewer people can hand you the reasoning that made the node worth flashing.

It all starts here.

What's a decision in your setup you'd struggle to explain today because you never wrote down the why?

Hi guys !
This is my brand new homelab with :

1x raspberry pi 5 8GB who gonna be a little nas and a testing environment

1x raspberry pi 4GB with HAOS

1x little netgear switch (who gonna be replaced soon when i have money

1x gateway ultra from Ubiquiti

1x SLZB-06 MG24

Spent eight months taking my lonely homelab server rack and turning it into a workroom fit for a NC ‘runner.

The Setup:

Frontend: Custom React/TypeScript panel running access control.

Backend/Automation: The reTerminal fires local API endpoints to trigger the physical hardware and passes webhooks through Node-RED into Home Assistant to handle lighting.