Inspired by “What’s a good piece of hardware to run a jellyfin server?” I wanted to get the communities thoughts on how to set up my home media server.

Current hardware: Apple Mac mini “Core i7” 2.3 (Late 2012) with 8GB RAM (2x4GB) and 1.0TB Mercury Electra 6G SSD that I upgraded

OS: OMV6 (6.9.14-1 (Shaitan))

Docker containers:

Goal:

  • Use this old Mac Mini for as long as possible as a media server. Be able to download with Transmission over VPN and then add them to a Plex media folder via SMB on my Mac Studio. I want to manage the containers in Portainer and I’ve used Stacks/Compose to add most of the containers. Use the discrete GPU for hardware accelerated transcoding, mostly so I can download movies to my iPad quicker, less so other people can use it remotely. The containers should restart if they stop and I want to keep them updated automatically if possible. I’ve not experimented with Servarr yet (Radarr, Sonarr), not opposed, but also happy to drag them over.

Problems:

  • I don’t love OMV, I seem to have a recurring DNS issue with containerd that causes Plex to stop whenever I’m watching a movie. I can run a test and leave something playing all day and not have a problem, then whenever I want to watch something with my wife, the whole system becomes unavailable and I have to watch a ping until it comes back. I’m considering a new OS, it should be accessible via VNC/SSH and have my internal and external drive shared as a SMB share to my Mac. I can’t figure out how to get the GPU to be seen by OMV so everything is on the CPU, an OS where this is easier is preferred.

Questions:

  • Any OS recommendations to use instead of OMV6?
  • Advice on getting the discrete GPU seen in whatever OS I use?
  • I can’t tell if it’s Haugene causing the DNS issue, I’m using public Google/CloudFlare DNS to avoid using my PiHole that runs on a Pi3b. Can I set up Docker to use a different network so it doesn’t bring my whole system’s IP down? It might also be Watchtower updating a container and bring it down, any advice to troubleshoot would be appreciated.

Disclaimer:

  • IT guy, but mostly Mac. I can Google my way through most things, but I am NOT a Linux or Docker expert. So please go easy on me if I have any follow up questions!

Thank you in advance!

  • robalees@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
    0·
    5 months ago

    This is incredibly helpful CurbsTickle!

    Sorry this is probably a super dumb DNS questions, should I be setting my OMV DNS to the IVPN DNS or just my Transmission/OVPN Docker stack? I tried using the OpenVPN DNS here and it doesn’t connect when set in the stack, OMV or both. I also have PiHole on a Pi (maybe I can move that to Proxmox and use 1 system?), which is why I was using the Google Public DNS in OMV and the Haugene stack which seemed to work, apart from the weird issue I’m seeing randomly.

    Honestly, I might scrap this configuration and put the time into getting Proxmox setup on this machine, try to get it in a good working order and then look at a tiny/mini/micro for later down the line. I’ve started watching more Anime and honestly the subtitle transcoding worries me a bit!

    Any personal preferences or suggestions on hardware outside of the beelink s12pro which I’m checking out? I’m also hoping to cannibalize the SSD which isn’t that old, the RAM might be useless at this point.

    Also any guides/tutorials you can suggest for getting a working Proxmox setup running similar to yours?

    • CurbsTickle@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      5 months ago

      Only your container with VPN connection and transmission would be using the VPN’s DNS

      With regards to the pihole, yeah I’d run that as a container on proxmox (there are some handy scripts by [tteck](https://tteck.github.io/Proxmox/, though I’m not generally a fan of running shell scripts off the net like this it is easy). But I wouldn’t get rid of the pi, I’d keep it as your secondary. Single point of failure means it will drive you nuts if you have to reboot the server, everything will be down.

      Outside of the beelink, it’s just the tiny/mini/micro options from Lenovo/HP/Dell, and then by generation of CPU. The beelink is a popular choice, but personally I like the power that an i5/i7 will give me, and I’ve got a couple of machines with 32GB and 64GB of ram - throwing 16GB at a VM I can access remotely for Windows apps is super useful, and I can otherwise live in my Linux desktop.

      I’d also say you don’t have to toss the 2012 Mac mini, you can grab some bits you want (SSD), but you can drop in a replacement and make it another proxmox host. Even run your second pihole there.

      In terms of guides, sorry don’t really have any on specifically my setup no. But there are ones out there to learn how to set up an LXC as a docker host, docker networking, guides to the *arrs being set up, etc.

      Such as this one for a VPN container, and docker-compose samples for having other containers use that network: https://www.naturalborncoder.com/linux/2021/02/19/making-a-docker-container-use-a-vpn/

      For a good start on how to set up (after the containers are running) sonarr/Radarr/etc, check out: https://trash-guides.info/

      And you can always ask questions in the various home server communities here (and elsewhere on the fediverse obviously).

      Good luck!