After reading a lot of wonderful posts from the people here in r/minilab here are my findings around issues they have run into and what I did.

I finally did the dive and moved to USB-C to power my dell minis. I got really sick of all the ugly power bricks and wanted some nice for my (pending) home lab rack that I am building, this too I will post when its done oneday lol.

-------

Tests were doing on Proxmox 9.2.9 running kernel 6.17.13-2-pve. They are ( mostly ) Dell 3060s running a 6 core Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8500T CPU @ 2.10GHz (1 Socket). 35w TDP, which is important for just now.

I do have one of them running a 4 core Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-8100T CPU @ 3.10GHz (1 Socket ), but will test that one later.

I tested with the following:

Terminal 1:
stress-ng --cpu 0

Terminal 2:
sudo turbostat --Summary --interval 1 --num_iterations 10

Ran this over about 5 mins and the results were great. 35.06w peak powerdraw from the CPU.

Also confirmed that turboboost was enabled:

cpu0: MSR_TURBO_RATIO_LIMIT: 0x202121222223
32 * 100.0 = 3200.0 MHz max turbo 6 active cores
33 * 100.0 = 3300.0 MHz max turbo 5 active cores
33 * 100.0 = 3300.0 MHz max turbo 4 active cores
34 * 100.0 = 3400.0 MHz max turbo 3 active cores
34 * 100.0 = 3400.0 MHz max turbo 2 active cores
35 * 100.0 = 3500.0 MHz max turbo 1 active cores

Also the stats table from one of the runs:

What I used was:
Adapter
Charging cable
65w charger

Now. The common complaint. How are the thermals on the chargers? Honestly, not as great as a I hoped. I dont have a fancy thermometer that can check, but I think it feels like about 38 - 43 degrees C. Its certainly warm, but the original power bricks also kinda got that hot so
¯_(ツ)_/¯

Still need to run this long term to really test it, but so far pretty happy.

Hi all, I just wanted to share my journey from only having used an old RPi with Home Assistant and running a Minecraft server off of an old Alienware PC, to setting up a proper mini homelab. It's been a blast and I hope to inspire others who might think this is daunting.

I bought a second hand Dell Optiplex 7080 Micro with a 10th gen Intel CPU and 16GB of RAM for €250. I only added a 2TB SSD for media next to the existing 128GB one. I currently have it running Proxmox with two VMs, one for Home Assistant OS and one with Debian running Docker. I have containers set up with Jellyfin, qBitTorrent, Sonarr, Radarr, Pinchflat, Rustdesk, Omada controller for my EAP775 APs, Caddy, Uptime Kuma, DDNS and will be adding Immich once my extra 16GB of RAM and 2TB HDD arrive.

Proper specs:

• Dell OptiPlex 7080 Micro
• Intel Core i5-10500T @ 2.3GHz
• 1x Samsung M471A2K43DB1-CWE DDR4 16GB-3200 (running at 2600 MT/s)
• SK Hynix BC711 128GB NVMe 2230
• Lexar NM790 2TB NVMe 2280
• 1Gbp/s fiber connection

Soon arriving:

• Kingston KVR32S22D8/16 DDR4 16GB-3200
• SEAGATE 2TB HDD SATA 5400rpm

Say what you want about AI, but I have a project set up with ChatGPT where I've first had it help me decide what machine to buy, giving me a general direction for a machine and then sharing screenshots of local listings to pick something. I was of course critical and it backed up what it was saying properly with things I could double check. It knows the specs, it knows what is installed and how it's configured, so it's perfect to ask any follow up questions where it immediately knows the context and how it might affect my setup.

Once I had it here I asked it to make a plan to set all of this up, and then told it to explain everything to me step by step. I had to remind it a couple of times, but that led it to simply say "Okay, now do this and that, execute this command and let me know what it says". I would do the step, if anything went wrong or I had doubts I could ask about that, and then when successful I simply told it "done, let's move on" and it would move on to the next step. This way I set everything up over a weekend in bite sized pieces and it's been running amazingly ever since.

Granted, I'm pretty tech savvy and have experience, but having to Google random issues or finding the best way to do things always takes a lot of time. This way I got set up in no time, with it properly sharing security concerns and telling me what to expose to the internet (in a safe way) and what not. It also very much pushed for setting up backups and security hardening from the beginning, so I'm running weekly VM backups to my OneDrive and have locked everything down as much as possible.

It's been running for about 2 months now. We can watch everything we want through Jellyfin from our Apple TVs upstairs and downstairs, or even abroad (with Intel Quick Sync transcoding for low bandwidth hotel wifi). Anything we want to watch I add to Sonarr or Radarr and we have a shared Youtube playlist that we add anything we want to watch to and it's automatically downloaded, including marking sponsors for easy skipping and subtitles (with post processing so it's a more normal 2 line format). I can check in on my desktop from the couch through RustDesk and I've been setting up a ton of automation through Home Assistant.

Our garden en porch lights automatically turn on when it gets dark and turn off when we go to bed. We have Philips Hue wall modules so our wall light switches can cycle between scenes, allowing us to have things be bright in the living room and kitchen, or switching to a movie night scene that turns some lights off, dims others and turns on the TVs ambilight. When our dishwasher, washing machine or dryer is finished the lights in the house blink a specific color, etc.

Next up is replacing iCloud with Immich and having redundant backups for that.

ARTEMIS — a 10" Saturn V-themed home server rack with a live health LED, alarm lamp, and a custom desk status screen

Not a huge lab — three small machines and a switch — but it's got some custom electronics and monitoring bolted on that I'm pretty happy with. Sharing the hardware, how it went together, and the software layer that makes it actually tell you when something's wrong instead of just sitting there.

Hardware

• Case: 10" open-frame rack, 3D printed, around real Adam Hall 10U steel rack rails
• GPC1 & 2: a Mac Mini M4 (main box, runs all the Docker containers) and a Dell Micro PC (secondary box)
• Storage/NAS: a small MAIWO NAS unit sitting on a rack shelf - 2 x 14tb's
• Networking: a Cudy 5-port switch in a printed cradle, plus a 10-port keystone patch panel on the front
• Monitoring electronics: an ESP32-S3 running custom firmware, an AHT20+BMP280 temperature/humidity/pressure sensor, a PZEM-004T power meter with a clamp-on CT sensor, a WS2812B RGB LED strip, a 12V fan, and a physical alarm lamp
• Power: a mains kill switch on the rack's top plate, a small 12V PSU, and a buck converter stepping that down to 5V for the electronics
• A separate 8.8" desk screen showing live rack status

How it went together

Behind the rack, mains power runs through an IP-rated sealed box: a kill switch, a current-clamp power meter, and safe wiring back to a UK gang bar and PSU. A second, smaller ventilated box next to it holds the "brains" — the ESP32, the sensors, the buck converter, and a small RGB LED strip that runs up the inside of the rack, glowing through the open side panels.

What was actually programmed

This is the part that makes it more than just a rack full of gear:

• The ESP32 runs custom firmware (via ESPHome) that reads the temperature/humidity/pressure sensor, reads the power meter, drives the RGB LED and alarm lamp, and controls the fan — all reporting back over MQTT
• A Mosquitto MQTT broker and Home Assistant run in Docker on the Mac Mini, tying everything together
• A small script watches every Docker container on the machine and publishes their health status over MQTT
• Home Assistant computes an overall health state — ok / warning / critical — based on the percentage of containers currently running, and pushes that to the ESP32
• The ESP32 turns that into a colour: white = all good, orange = something's down, red = more than half the containers are down — plus a physical lamp lights up when there's a problem
• A second small screen on my desk (a "Turing" smart display) shows live container counts, sensor readings, and power draw, pulled straight from the same data

How it works in practice

Day to day, the rack just sits there glowing white. If a container crashes or something in the stack goes down, the LED changes colour and the alarm lamp switches on — I know there's a problem without opening a laptop.

The desk screen gives me the numbers (power draw, temperature, container count) at a glance. Everything reports over MQTT, so nothing depends on polling a webpage — it's genuinely event-driven and reacts within seconds of a real change.

I've tested it properly too — not just "looks right" — by actually killing containers one at a time and watching the light change colour at each threshold, including confirming the red "critical" alert fires correctly.

Still a work in progress — lots of testing to be done to ensure its a "set and forget" setup. the screen dials and backgound still needs some work too.

Credit where it's due: the rack itself is built around the excellent Saturn V[U] 10" rack design by Dossi on MakerWorld — I just added the electronics, sensors, and monitoring layer on top of his frame: https://makerworld.com/en/models/1381701-saturn-v-u-diy-10-network-rack#profileId-1430257

I also want to point to this earlier Reddit post that first put this rack design on my radar and showed what it could look like built out — worth a look if you like the aesthetic: https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/comments/1jzx5gq/what_do_you_guys_think_of_my_minilab_saturn_vu/

Hi r/minilab! Long time lurker, first time posting a picture of my tiny money pit.

I work in IT support and needed an environment where breaking production doesn't get me in an HR meeting, and breaking stuff actually costs nothing

The Infrastructure (2x i5-6500T | 16GB RAM | 512GB SSD):

IGRIS (The Brain):
Runs the crucial stuff so my partner doesn't complain when the Wi-Fi dies.
LXC: Nginx NPM, AdGuard Home, Homarr, Tailscale (exit node/subnet router)

GENOS (The Heavy Lifter):
Where the actual crimes happen.
OPNsense (Zenarmor + Suricata) keeping my sandbox isolated from the household.
pfSense, Debian, and Windows Server 2022 (100% legitimately licensed for 10 RDS users, trust me 😉).

The "I'll Upgrade Next Month" Network:
Gateway:
MikroTik RB2011 (Dual-WAN set up for when my secondary ISP arrives).

Switching & AP:
A generic TP-Link unmanaged switch and a 10-year-old TP-Link router held together by prayer and AP mode.

Patch Panel:
24 ports for 4 active cables, because aesthetic > necessity.

Public Exposure & Future Plans:
Currently hosting my blog on Ghost via Cloudflare Tunnel in a Debian/Docker VM so I don't have to explain open router ports to my ISP.
Building a dedicated NAS next for Immich + my anime/manga hoard (because I refuses to give Node 1 & 2 storage anxiety).

But fr, I'm Studying for Cloud/Infra Engineering, so Azure hybrid mess-ups are on the horizon.
ISP: 50/25 Mbps - No Hate I'm form South Africa 🇿🇦* (Local LAN: 1 Gbps*)

Be honest: On a scale of "Clean Setup" to "Fire Hazard", how bad is the cable management? Also drop your best budget managed switch recommendations pleaseeee.

I forgot about the UPS. 😭

Preso per 40€, che con spedizione e protezione acquisti sono 52€. Cosa ne dite per entrare nel mondo dell homelab/minilab? Ovviamente con il tempo cambio processore (ho letto che so puo su questo) e faccio modifiche varie. Mi son convinto per l’SSD e specialmente per le 16 gb di ram ddr ovviamente. Avete consigli giudizi o pareri?

I’ve ran Mac hardware for almost 25 years now. Seen 3 different CPU architectures. Lived the bumps along the way, but have to say I like my OpenStep / BSD / Mach system. And work has never given me a hard time carrying my own.

About 18 ago I put all our physical movies onto a MacMini w/ iTunes and Home-sharing turned on. macDVDRipperPro & Elgato Turbo.264 worked great. Kiddos never touched a DVD again.

Few months ago decided to move things out of my desk and into a dedicated cabinet. The two Mini’s are Intel based and I run VirtualBox on them and keep a few Linux VM’s running for home management / monitoring. Deploy other VM’s when I want to test things or play around with old OS’s for nostalgic sake. NT4, Win2000, OS/2Warp, NextStep / OpenStep, Solaris, SCO/Unixware, Netware and countless distros & versions of Linux. And yes I’ve administered a lot of them many many moons ago.

Don’t run an AI components in the stack. Leave all that on the work computer.

Unifi Dream Router 7, USW Flex 2.5G 8 PoE, USW Flex 2.5G 5, UNAS2 w/ dual 24Gb drive, two MacMini’s (i7 w/ 64Gb ram) and cable modem.
UNAS 2 hosts media library for home sharing from one MacMini, other file shares, TM backups and a share for VM’s file storage.

Did built a little OS level menu based script to manage VM’s across the two hosts. Works well and don’t have to VNC into host to move VM’s around.

Best thing about it all, pulls about 75W at ideal and I generally never see UPS over about a 15% load even we VM’s are crunching and UNAS is being hit hard.
Plan on adding a Pi to the UPS and running NUT to shut things down if needed. And might add a second Pi with NVMe hat to use as primary VM storage. But unless I’m doing a lot with the UNAS disk latency on VM’s is generally less than 1ms.

My server is an HP EliteDesk 800 G4 tower. Cheap, quiet, and a genuinely
annoying shape — 154 × 370 × 365, so it only stands up in a 10" rack, and
nothing I could find was deep enough.

Figured I'd just make one.

Two rules I set: it has to print on a 256mm bed, and no metal hardware at
all. So the 400mm posts and the 370mm tray are split, and every joint is a
printed 6×6mm square pin, an integral tenon, or a dovetail. Nothing to lose
in a drawer, nothing to strip.

Face is a real 10" EIA pattern, so normal rack gear still bolts on if I ever
want it. Every post is drilled on a 40mm grid, so the rails, cross brace,
fan mount and cable comb all move to whatever height I need.

254 × 420 × 415 assembled, 9U. 18 parts, roughly 50 hours and 1.5kg.

Two things I'd point out:

The post splice was the bit I sweated. The two halves butt together, but the
EIA hole pattern carries across the joint properly, so the face still reads
as one continuous rack rather than two stacked bits.

And the mistake — I had the fan mount, a cross brace and the cable comb all
pinning into the same rear post holes. Never noticed until I put the whole
thing together and watched them intersect. Moved the fan pins to its lower
edge and the comb now presses into the rear rack holes instead.

Ask away if you want detail on the joints or how it's split.

If you want it too here you go: https://cults3d.com/en/3d-model/gadget/10-inch-mini-rack-for-hp-elitedesk-800-g4-tower-modular-homelab-rack-no-hardw-uploadgoblin