Proxmox vs. Debian: Running media server on older hardware
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I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
Proxmox is Debian under the hood. It's just a qemu and lxc management interface.
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I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
Your CPU should be perfectly capable of that. I ran Proxmox with some VMs and containers on an i5-2400 with 16GB RAM just fine.
You could run on bare Debian as well but virtualization will give you more flexibility. If you get a Zigbee Dongle or the like, you can pass it through to the VM Home Assistant is running in.
I don't know MergeFS but usually the recommendation is ZFS.
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Proxmox is Debian under the hood. It's just a qemu and lxc management interface.
yeah, and qemu and lxc are very much legacy at this point. Stick with docker/podman/kubernetes for containers.
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I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
None of your listed use cases will even come close to taxing the 6600k. It's going to probably sit happily in idle states most of the time.
Proxmox also has great snapshotting and backup features. Makes it easier to mess around with your containers/VMs without worrying too much.
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yeah, and qemu and lxc are very much legacy at this point. Stick with docker/podman/kubernetes for containers.
Agreed.
I run podman w/ rootless containers, and it works pretty well. Podman is extra nice in that it has decent suppor for kubernetes, so there's a smooth transition path from podman -> kubernetes if you ever want/need it. Docker works well too, and
docker composeis pretty simple to get into. -
yeah, and qemu and lxc are very much legacy at this point. Stick with docker/podman/kubernetes for containers.
right tool for the job mate, not everything works great in a container.
Also Proxmox is not legacy as its used a lot in homelabs and also some companys
I use proxmox to carve up my dedicated host with OVH, 3 of the vms run docker anyway.
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Your CPU should be perfectly capable of that. I ran Proxmox with some VMs and containers on an i5-2400 with 16GB RAM just fine.
You could run on bare Debian as well but virtualization will give you more flexibility. If you get a Zigbee Dongle or the like, you can pass it through to the VM Home Assistant is running in.
I don't know MergeFS but usually the recommendation is ZFS.
would agree the hardware would run everything fine
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Agreed.
I run podman w/ rootless containers, and it works pretty well. Podman is extra nice in that it has decent suppor for kubernetes, so there's a smooth transition path from podman -> kubernetes if you ever want/need it. Docker works well too, and
docker composeis pretty simple to get into.Yeah, Kubernetes is more automated and expandable, but docker compose has a ton of good examples and it's really easy to get into as a beginner.
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right tool for the job mate, not everything works great in a container.
Also Proxmox is not legacy as its used a lot in homelabs and also some companys
I use proxmox to carve up my dedicated host with OVH, 3 of the vms run docker anyway.
I'm not saying it's bad software, but the times of manually configuring VMs and LXC containers with a GUI or Ansible are gone.
All new build-outs are gitops and containerd-based containers now.
For the legacy VM appliances, Proxmox works well, but there's also Openshift virtualization aka kubevirt if you want take advantage of the Kubernetes ecosystem.
If you need bare-metal, then usually that gets provisioned with something like packer/nixos-generators or cloud-init.
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Yeah, Kubernetes is more automated and expandable, but docker compose has a ton of good examples and it's really easy to get into as a beginner.
Kubernetes is also designed for clustered workloads, so if you are mostly hosting on one or two machines, YAGNI applies.
I recommend people start w/ docker compose due to documentation, but I personally am switching to podman quadlets w/ rootless containers.
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I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
Promox runs on debian. But anyway you will be surprised about proxmox can run in limited hardware. I have it running in a garbage mini PC and an old notebook
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I'm not saying it's bad software, but the times of manually configuring VMs and LXC containers with a GUI or Ansible are gone.
All new build-outs are gitops and containerd-based containers now.
For the legacy VM appliances, Proxmox works well, but there's also Openshift virtualization aka kubevirt if you want take advantage of the Kubernetes ecosystem.
If you need bare-metal, then usually that gets provisioned with something like packer/nixos-generators or cloud-init.
Yes, but no. There is still a lot of places using old fashioned VMs, my company is still building VMs from an AWS ami and running ansible to install all the stuff we need. Some places will move to containers and that's great, but containers won't solve every problem
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I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
Proxmox is Debian.
I do always suggest installing Debian first, and then installing Proxmox on top. This allows you to properly set up your disks, and networking as needed, as the Proxmox installer is a bit limited: https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Install_Proxmox_VE_on_Debian_12_Bookworm
Once you have it up and running, have a look at the CT Templates. There's a whole set of pre-configured templates from TurnkeyLinux (again, debian+) that make it trivial to set up all kinds of services in lightweight LXC Containers. -
I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
ZFS is probably what you want
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Proxmox is Debian.
I do always suggest installing Debian first, and then installing Proxmox on top. This allows you to properly set up your disks, and networking as needed, as the Proxmox installer is a bit limited: https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Install_Proxmox_VE_on_Debian_12_Bookworm
Once you have it up and running, have a look at the CT Templates. There's a whole set of pre-configured templates from TurnkeyLinux (again, debian+) that make it trivial to set up all kinds of services in lightweight LXC Containers.I would just install Proxmox since it is way easier
Also last time I checked the Debian installer didn't support ZFS
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yeah, and qemu and lxc are very much legacy at this point. Stick with docker/podman/kubernetes for containers.
What are you going to run containers on? You need VMs to power everything.
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I'm not saying it's bad software, but the times of manually configuring VMs and LXC containers with a GUI or Ansible are gone.
All new build-outs are gitops and containerd-based containers now.
For the legacy VM appliances, Proxmox works well, but there's also Openshift virtualization aka kubevirt if you want take advantage of the Kubernetes ecosystem.
If you need bare-metal, then usually that gets provisioned with something like packer/nixos-generators or cloud-init.
You are going to what, install Kubernetes on every node?
It is far easier and more flexible to use VMs and maybe some VM templates and Ansible.
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Proxmox is Debian.
I do always suggest installing Debian first, and then installing Proxmox on top. This allows you to properly set up your disks, and networking as needed, as the Proxmox installer is a bit limited: https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Install_Proxmox_VE_on_Debian_12_Bookworm
Once you have it up and running, have a look at the CT Templates. There's a whole set of pre-configured templates from TurnkeyLinux (again, debian+) that make it trivial to set up all kinds of services in lightweight LXC Containers.I do always suggest installing Debian first, and then installing Proxmox on top.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Proxmox it's own OS unto itself? What would be the advantage of installing Proxmox 'on top of' Debian when it's Debian already as you pointed out?
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I'm still running a 6th-generation Intel CPU (i5-6600k) on my media server, with 64GB of RAM and a Quadro P1000 for the rare 1080p transcoding needs. Windows 10 is still my OS from when it was a gaming PC and I want to switch to Linux. I'm a casual user on my personal machine, as well as with OpenWRT on my network hardware.
Here are the few features I need:
- MergeFS with a RAID option for drive redundancy. I use multiple 12GB drives right now and have my media types separated between each. I'd like to have one pool that I can be flexible with space between each share.
- Docker for *arr/media downloaders/RSS feed reader/various FOSS tools and gizmos.
- I'd like to start working with Home Assistant. Installing with WSL hasn't worked for me, so switching to Linux seems like the best option for this.
Guides like Perfect Media Server say that Proxmox is better than a traditional distro like Debian/Ubuntu, but I'm concerned about performance on my 6600k. Will LXCs and/or a VM for Docker push my CPU to its limits? Or should I do standard Debian or even OpenMediaVault?
I'm comfortable learning Proxmox and its intricacies, especially if I can move my Windows 10 install into a VM as a failsafe while building a storage pool with new drives.
OP, I'm running Proxmox on and old Dell T320 /32gb RAM. I am not having any real issues doing so. I run Docker and a handful of Docker containers. I'm really not into the arr stack, but I wouldn't think you'd have much issue.
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I'm not saying it's bad software, but the times of manually configuring VMs and LXC containers with a GUI or Ansible are gone.
All new build-outs are gitops and containerd-based containers now.
For the legacy VM appliances, Proxmox works well, but there's also Openshift virtualization aka kubevirt if you want take advantage of the Kubernetes ecosystem.
If you need bare-metal, then usually that gets provisioned with something like packer/nixos-generators or cloud-init.
Why would you install a GUI on a VM designated to run a Docker instance?
You should take a serious look at what actual companies run. It's typically nested VMs running k8s or similar. I run three nodes, with several VMs (each running Docker, or other services that require a VM) that I can migrate between nodes depending on my needs.
For example: One of my nodes needed a fan replaced. I migrated the VM and LXC containers it hosted to another node, then pulled it from the cluster to do the job. The service saw minimal downtime, kids/wife didn't complain at all, and I could test it to make sure it was functioning properly before reinstalling it into the cluster and migrating things back.
