Hey there,
I am making a Home Lab set up to run a number of application. I have been having a hard time trying to digest everything.
My needs are as follows:
- NAS (looking at unRAID, FreeNAS)
- Plex server (using the NAS also Linux OS)
- Home Assistant (Linux OS)
- Security Camera Application ( Considering Blue Iris, Windows app, Also using the NAS)
Wants:
- Have the different VMs/Applications only running when needed (Dynamic allocation of resource). From my understanding, this can be done with containers.
- Spin a VM up for whatever needs (Windows, Linux)
What I am struggling with:
- I am unsure what application will fill my needs: unRAID, Proxmox, Docker, VirtualBox, VMware, FreeNAS?
- How should I build the foundation of this server/home Lab?
- I have a bunch of hard drives of mixed sizes I have collected, What would be the best application to take advantage of them for the NAS? (unRAID, FreeNAS Zpools ???, RAID 5)
- Right now I want to do this with just the spare computers I have laying around the house. The main computer that I want to run these specific applications from has 4 real 4 viral cores. Would this be enough? If not could I use another computer in a cluster or something (this is where I am really not sure)?
Any help on how to build out a system like this would be great! I have watched many videos on how to do a specific task like a NAS build (unRAID, FreeNAS) or a PLEX server but I don’t know how to warp them up and package them in a single server. Also, I am super confused about how to use Zpools vs unRAID and the like.
Thank you for any advice in helping me get started with my home lab!
PS: I would love to be at this level: https://youtu.be/wwpRtC5nywM
I don’t have the computer power to get there yet I think.