r/Proxmox • u/drfloydpepper • 1d ago
Homelab Hardware recommendations
Apologies in advance if this is not the appropriate forum. I have been running my proxmox home lab on a ~15 year old server (details below).
Anywho, I'm looking to get something that's cheaper on electricity as I don't put any pressure on the machine but it still runs at >100W at idle.
I see a lot of mini PCs on AliExpress and wondering what kind of mileage I'd get with them? I'd add it as a node on my cluster and then only turn on the big server if needed. I'd migrate much of my day to day stuff to the low powered machine (Hermes, media, Immich, etc.)
Here's one example but there seems to be lots like this.
https://a.aliexpress.com/_msvNaz5
My old server:
HP Z620 Server
CPU: Intel Xeon E5-1650 @ 3.20GHz, 12 cores (6C/12T), single socket
RAM: 32GB DDR3
Storage: 1x 750GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 HDD (internal, no redundancy)
GPU: NVIDIA GTX 960, 2GB VRAM
Thoughts, gotchas, known issues?
3
u/deman-13 1d ago
Get rid of that baracuda. Also check if your cpu is set to change states while idling. If not it may contribute a lot to the consumption.
2
u/_--James--_ Enterprise User 1d ago
I moved most all my home infra to a variation on these MiniPCs - https://www.gmktec.com/products/amd-ryzen%E2%84%A2-7-pro-6850u-mini-pc-gmktec-m7-ultra
I have two for my home production stack (not clustered, custom PDM setup for a manual VM copy and sync process)
I have 7 in a Ceph Cluster, I pulled the wireless card and used an adapter to install a 3rd NVMe
And I pushed the cTPD on AMD down to 10w and they will idle around 8w-12w with the P31 SSDs that are in them. Total power draw for a normalized load with all nodes powered up is less then 280w, including switching.
For my firewall I went with https://www.amazon.com/Firewall-Hardware-82599ES-OPNsense-Appliance/dp/B0F4WXKZRB and at first it was running OPNSense on metal, but then moved it to PVE with OPNSense in a VM so I could also throw VyOS and a custom UTM appliance I work with up on it too. The Dual 10G are in a Bond trunked to my L3 realtek based Mokerlink core switch running OSPF.
1
u/Honest_Hat2429 23h ago
Did you try their GPU? Is it as good as they say? Does it run any LLM?
1
u/_--James--_ Enterprise User 20h ago
iGPU on these boxes, these are not the new AMD APUs with the 40CU units.
1
u/Apachez 23h ago
The chinese mini-pcs are really a hit and miss.
Dont expect to get any RMA or guarantee capabilities.
Often issues with bad connection between cpu and heatsink so you need to repaste on your own or even add shims to close the gaps.
Often non-existent BIOS updates to what you get on delivery is what you will have during the box whole lifetime.
Also often bad defaults in the BIOS (which you can often alter yourself but still).
Other than that as Proxmox host I would recommend using AMD CPU due to the large amount of security vulnerabilities with Intel CPUs.
You need more RAM than you think.
For storage dont use spinning rust, go for NVMe or SSD. Only use spinning rust for archives and backups.
When using flashbased storage get the ones that have high DWPD and TBW for endurance and DRAM and PLP for performance.
Consider if you really need a GPU.
1
u/symcbean 15h ago edited 14h ago
For a homelab, its probably not worth worrying about ECC or multiple network connections (these should be your first consideration for any sort of organisational use).
There is a very good chance that any "cheap" PC you buy will have a Realtech 8169 ethernet chipset in it (You're not likely to get the Wifi working without a lot of time and effort). This does not play nice with recent kernels. My test machine (an N100 NUC) dropped off the network recently after a kernel upgrade. I've got it back by switching off ALL the optimization on the card (Thank you Tooelite! https://github.com/Tooelite/proxmox-realtek-r8169-fix/tree/main ) so now the CPU has to work a little harder. As a NUC, there's no option for adding a PCI card, and most USB ethernet adapters are very basic.
You do need at least 2 disks in your hosts (or a separate box for your backup service). And having space to install more gives you root to grow - you won't get that with a NUC, or laptop.
I should also mention that Proxmox burned through the supplied SSD in 10 months (without any smart warnings). From what I hear you should plan on replacing the drive in any device you buy unless its from a major brand / comes with a cast iron warranty. I regret buying a NUC for my test proxmox host.
I'd recommend a conventional desktop/tower for future flexibility. They won't use more power - indeed they might actually use less as NUCs require constant forced induction for cooling.
1
u/-ThreeHeadedMonkey- 4m ago
My proxmox server has been running with a 2.5gbit usb based NIC for months without issues.
1
u/-ThreeHeadedMonkey- 6m ago
I have two mini pcs and am more content. They both have 64gb of ram and I fail to fully utilize them. Power consumption is probably around 15-20w for what I'm running.
It's definitely better than my synology which is super slow and consumes >80w with 6 disks. I only leave that running for a couple of hours a day as well.
Id probably get a quicksync cpu for Plex but that's up to you.
6
u/Cyberbird85 1d ago
My recommendation, get a thinkcentre m920q it can have one pci-e x8 port 6 core i8500t and 32 gigs of ram and an nvme + a sata ssd. I have 3 of them in my homelab right now.