this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2025
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229
Rate my one year old homelab. (media.piefed.social)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
42 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

How it started: mp80
I bought a MiniPC (Blackview MP-80) to run Home Assistant and some lights etc. to go with it.

It's now exactly one year later this is what my setup looks like now:
BMAX B2 Pro --> Home Assistant OS Blackview MP-80 --> Proxmox --> Nextcloud-AIO & Immich
ODROID H4+ --> Proxmox --> TrueNAS

How it's going: odroid
With the heatwave in Europe I've now installed cooling to keep my HDD's from heating up.

I know it's Janky as hell, but I love it. The plan going forward is to buy a 3D Printer so that I can 3D Print a custom 10" rack, and I'll build my own cooling and temperature monitoring system with ESP32 and create a dashboard for it in Home Assistant and sorting out networking.

It's a work in progress, having a lot of fun learning and adding new things.

top 42 comments
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[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 hours ago

A+

[–] [email protected] 4 points 14 hours ago (2 children)

Just needs a 10" cardboard box with proper holes

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 hours ago

Does she have a sister?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

Don't get too carried away, it's just a homelab

[–] [email protected] 4 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

but, think of it... RACING STRIPES!!!! or FLAMES!!!

You use bamboo skewers to mount the things off the bottom and dampen vibration. mabey use an internal flap and bent the disks out the front and the PSU out the back. If you have enough cardboard, you could even bend it a bit and do like a jet engine with the fan sticking out the front.

cardboard papercraft homelab... I almost want to get rid of my 42 U rand and make a voltron now.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

There would definitely be flames if you forgot the proper holes!

Lol a jet engine shaped cardboard case held together with bamboo skewers would actually be pretty rad

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 hours ago

Not gona lie, I'm very tempted it'll get me lots of Internet points, and definitely a few haters

[–] [email protected] 2 points 14 hours ago

a proper hobbyist setup, well done!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago) (1 children)

10/10

What's the black pcb on top of the odroid?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Thanks!!

It's a 10 Euro fan controller, that I'm temporarily using till I can build my own with ESP32 fancontroller

[–] [email protected] 1 points 16 hours ago

Aaah, that explains the potmeter. Thanks!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Nice setup. I also started with a mini PC but couldn't find a reasonable way to add drives, how are yours attached? In general I would love to find some reasonable prices DAS/JBOD options

[–] [email protected] 1 points 15 hours ago

Thanks. ODROID allows 4 drives with sata, it's a really nice solution.

You could attach even more with using nvme

https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h4-plus/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 16 hours ago

Lol, brilliant.

At first you are thinking "this is going to be so nice and compact and tidy" and then....

Love it though

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago

11 out of 10

[–] avidamoeba 3 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

It's great but that fan is an overkill. 😂

[–] [email protected] 4 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Very much so, but I do enjoy gross overkill.

I'll build them into a future case then they won't be as overkill

[–] [email protected] 4 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

If it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing!

[–] avidamoeba 1 points 14 hours ago

There's nothing that could possibly go wrong with this strategy. 😂

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

I adore every piece of this

My OG system had the whole side panel on the case ripped out where I stuck a fan because the CPU fan died, that was over a decade ago I love your setup <3

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A lesson I learnt along the way:

HDD's on your desk are loud AF when you're constantly writing to a database
Solution: Everything except backups and Media run on SSD's

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Depends on the drive too, I have some insanely loud Ironwolf drives and you would never guess they're from the same manufacturer as my practically silent Exos X18s.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 23 hours ago

The other HDD I have is a WD Gold, it's definitely the louder of the two, both of them are ~5 years old. Now that I moved the databases off of them, they are quieter than my work laptop, so they don't bug me.

But oh boy, it really did sound like a train yard at one point.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 day ago

All homelabs are 5 star

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Nice, 8/10. Don't buy bambu lab, they will suck you soul.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yea not super thrilled with bambu lab for the privacy concerns but the printer itself is good. I just use it in lan only mode and block any outgoing network traffic on my router.

But there are other brands that are good. Ive heard prusa is nice but never tried them.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 hours ago

I have bambu printer they are good, but my printer stopped printing until I've allowed it to phone home for a bit, this repeated twice already.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Thanks <3

I'm going to go with the Sovol SV06 Plus ACE , I'm a big advocate for Open Source, so anything that requires proprietary software isn't really an option for me.

I live in a tiny apartment, so my biggest hurdle with getting a 3D printer right now is space.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

I'm waiting for one of those right now as well!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I think u friki and i like u a lot. Hehehhe you should see mine, is all made of old repurposed garbage. Wtb Corsair peripherals ftw!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago

Function over form, I love it!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

10/10 best value

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That's beautiful but I don't understand why two pair of cables go into the fan (is that a PSU?) and only one yellow wire comes out. Also where the motherboard. Need answer

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

The black box is the mini PC (note the Ethernet cable going into it) and the yellow/red/black cable is a single SATA power cable, that is daisy chained. Going from the PC to the drive and then going back to the fan control board

Edit: looks like it's actually 3 SATA cables. Not daisy chained

[–] [email protected] 1 points 23 hours ago

It's 3 SATA power cables yes, plugged into the H4+ https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h4-plus/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

And is that an Ethernet cable going into what looks like PSU? (I found the Ethernet cable you mentioned)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 23 hours ago

It looks like a PSU, but it's actually just a case for the odroid H4+ https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h4-case-type-1/

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (3 children)

Yeah, it's fine ... wait, IronWolves in a living space? Paired with that acoustic desk it must be like a train yard, but with more vibrations :D.

Edit: wrote this before I saw your comment acknowledging the same.
Well, with HDD there is the noise of the drive itself (the constant one & the searches, spin-ups), and the vibrations which can get acoustically amplified. For the former you need a case, any case, maybe a case in a case (ventilated ofc), for the latter I've always (since late 90s) had my HDD on full rubber, no non-rubber connection to the case.

My current NASies all use these (in desktop cases, I don't like server hardware if it isn't necessary, like with disks):

(They cost like 2 monies with shipping.)

So if going the 3D-print way, as you mentioned, I would def add the suggestion of incorporating thicc rubber pads or rubber straps into your design, like these ones (I've used them a lot decades ago, the only commercial option for silent PC enthusiasts at the time, but I've built then myself too):

(It's rigid, the disks won't fall out.)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

Hi, which is the name of this kind of cases? I'm looking a similar way in order to add an external HDD on my local server which is a Lenovo Thinkcentre SFF, so with 3 disks of space (1 hdd 3.5" + 1 2.5" + 1 nvme). Thanks!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

The key search words in your (Chinese? better than rewarding Amazon with even more extra fees) store of choice I wound suggest:

3.5" to 5.25" Internal Hard Disk Mount Rubber

But don't get the ones where the inner mount (of the 3.5" drive) is the same piece or bolted/screwed into the outer mount (5.25").

The ones in my pic have fairy big rubber nips in between (each secured on both sides), 4 at the bottom (that support the weight of the disk too), and two on the sides.

Also such 5" brackets you can mount anywhere rally, even on the outside of the case, lol.
In one case without the 5.25" bays (at my parents, quick job) I mounted two disks on such mounts on that metal mesh between the PSU compartment and the main compartment.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 23 hours ago

The one is a Iron Wolf, the other is a WD Gold, both of which are ~5 years old, they were LOUD when I had a database running on them. They are now a lot quieter than my work laptop so they don't bug me anymore.

Thanks for the advice, I really like these solutions I'll definitely look into them

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago

Ooo. That hdd solution looks like a mic shock mount. That's brilliant.