Self-Hosted, Homelab-based, and Locally-Governed Home Servers

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Jul 13, 2025

• HowTo Geek ☛ How I Replaced Audible With a Self-Hosted Alternative

  If you're anything like me, then it's very possible you're sick and tired of paying for Audible just to listen to your audiobooks. I found a better way to enjoy my audiobooks without Amazon's hand in my cookie jar, though, and that's with AudioBookshelf.

• XDA ☛ I use Proxmox Backup Server to save my VMs and LXCs to TrueNAS over NFS - here's how

  Considering the experimental nature of home labs, I always take a couple of precautions to safeguard my virtual guests from my projects. For example, I’ve documented my network architecture in a NetBox instance and stored detailed notes about my home lab projects inside a TriliumNext Notes container, with both services running on a separate machine to mitigate the risks of losing my documentation due to a failed experiment.

  But aside from the documentation containers and uptime trackers, I’ve created regular backups for my Proxmox home server. Thanks to the Proxmox Backup Server utility, I can schedule frequent backups for my arsenal of virtual machines and containers. But since I run a TrueNAS Scale server 24/7, I wanted to send the backup files from my PBS instance to my NAS. While it wasn’t an easy undertaking by any means, it works fairly well for my setup, and here’s a general outline of the overall process.

• XDA ☛ Hear me out – a GUI distribution isn’t all that bad for an entry-level home server

  Over the last couple of years, home labs have become a lot more accessible to consumers. On the hardware front, you’ve got everything from budget-friendly mini-PCs capable of running most DIY projects to dual CPU workstations that can crush any multi-core workloads without breaking a sweat. Likewise, virtualization platforms and container-hosting tools have mushroomed in recent times, and there’s so much documentation online that even the most technically-challenged folks can build their own home servers.

  However, I’ve noticed a trend where beginners are often discouraged from using GUI-based operating systems, and there are plenty of good reasons for sticking to a CLI setup even as a greenhorn. But if you feel discouraged by the extra difficulty curve of a terminal-heavy interface, building a server on an OS with a desktop environment (or heck, even inside your Windows 11 machine) is perfectly valid and shouldn't be treated as heresy.

• XDA ☛ I installed Proxmox on a decade-old laptop – here’s how it went

  If you’ve been a member of the tech community for a while, chances are you’ve already got a spare rig that ended up gathering dust once you moved to a new system. I’ve got a couple of outdated systems, but my Lenovo G510 laptop from 2014 takes the crown as the oldest device in my house that’s still somewhat functional. After unearthing it from the recesses of my home lab last month, I tried using it as my primary Home Assistant node. With the experiment being a huge success, I wanted to see if I could restore my obsolete computing companion to its former glory by arming it with Proxmox.

  After all, Proxmox pairs well with most hardware, and unlike Harvester, it doesn’t require a war machine just to run a couple of virtual machines. Now that I’ve spent half a day tinkering with the laptop-based Proxmox setup, I have to admit that it’s actually quite usable – as long as I keep my expectations in check, that is.

• XDA ☛ Despite Broadcom's recent licensing shift, I'll never migrate my home lab to ESXi

  Over the years, I’ve experimented with numerous server operating systems and have built home labs on everything from good ol’ (barebones) Debian and containerization platforms to the community-favorite Proxmox and the behemoth that's Harvester. Heck, I daresay GUI distros – and even Windows 11 – have their niche uses when you’re just starting out as a home lab enthusiast.

  But as someone who fantasized about running a powerful ESXi rig as a nerdy server-loving kid, I’m absolutely disappointed with VMware’s bare-metal virtualization platform. While I could list several reasons why I wouldn’t make the switch from my beloved Proxmox machine, Broadcom’s anti-consumer approach is my biggest gripe with ESXi, and it’s the primary reason why I recommend newcomers to avoid centering their home lab around the supposedly free platform.