Hello , dear lemmy users , I am starting to really like self-host because they are really fast and mostly i use open source stuff (like lemmy /photon etc) which were sometimes slow but after self hosting it now on the pc i am on using , i really like it
Now , I would like to host some stuff like jellyfin , navindrome , photon , adgaurd home and just leave it running on a device in maybe near future (i can convince my brother to pay for it , after he gets his job maybe)
TLDR : I wanted to ask What’s your favourite alternative to raspberry pi for simple self hosting or maybe possible near home automation
Edit: thank you all for helping me , I am starting to believe that i should look into using dell wyse or the likes which are meant to be used for hosting or a old laptop (since i dont own a laptop anyway , i just own a pc ) and since i run linux anyways , i am thinking of owning a laptop dual booting it with alpine (that has docker) and a simple minimalist os like hyprland on it just in case i need to travel with it (which to me seems very unlikely , I dont travel much so…) I am confused about it
Edit 2 : I am very new to self hosting so currently i would run stuff on my pc only (using portainer) , However when needed to buy , i am thinking of buying the cheapest thin client maybe a nuc or dell wyse
I am already trying searxng , shiori(bookmark manager) , portainer,freshrss , photon , froodle-s pdf tool which i have all closed except portainer currently I am also thinking of shifting to podman as well but cant find a good gui for it like portainer , (portainer really just blew my mind with its templates)
If you want embedded boards Rockchip and Sunxi/AllWinner are pretty well supported by the Linux kernel. Go have a look at boards with full Armbian support, that’s usually a good shortcut to finding one.
My preference runs to the Nanopi boards, they’re better built than Orange Pi hardware. You’re going to see a lot of Orange Pi recommendations based on cost but be aware that they’re not all that well made and occasionally have reliability problems. I was pretty chuffed for my $20 Orange Pi zero until I realized that the WiFi basically had zero chance of working reliably. Pick models carefully after reading about people’s experiences with them on the Armbian forums so you can avoid duds.
If you don’t need embedded arm check out the thin client selection on eBay. You can buy a J5005 Dell/Wyse thin client for like $100, some models even have a low profile pcie slot (these cost a bit more because they’re desirable as pf/OPNsense platforms.) These make pretty solid Proxmox or container host platforms, or you can use them for their intended purpose and jam in a low profile graphics card.
My personal “I don’t feel like spending $150 on a 4gb pi” favorite is the HP T630 thin client. On a good day you’ll find an 8gb RAM model with the power brick for <$60 shipped. Do the eBay thing with any of these and try to best offer the price down a bit if it’s an option.
If you want to step up a notch check out the HP T730, this one comes with a pcie slot and makes a fairly decent Proxmox virtualized router host. They’re usually available for <$130/shipped or less. The HP T740 is the same thing with a Zen1 embedded SoC, those run ~$220 or so and support NVMe. The Wyse 5070 offers Celeron or Pentium options and is a <10W machine, the J5005 version actually works pretty well as a hardware transcoding PLEX host (provided you’re not transcoding 4k.)
The T730 and T630 use SATA m.2 storage, the 5070 and T640 support NVMe. All of these have an m.2 A+E key slot for WiFi or an extra 2230 NIC.
I know you want an upgrade over rPi but If you want a cheaper option, you can buy an android box and install linux on it. most of them have unlocked bootloaders. you can usually find a ready to use .iso on Armbian community forums by searching the SOC model there.
Personally I run a 5$ android box. it has a quad core cpu + 2GB of ram. I use it for hosting my music library on an external hdd and streaming 1080p video. I also set it as my vpn gateway. It’s enough for my use case so I didn’t upgrade it.
The RK3566 and RK3588 alternatives are pretty good, and there are a bunch of them from different companies.
I have a 3566 myself as a compatible alternative to a CM4, and it does its job just fine.
Used an rpi4 for a year as a media server and was quite happy but wanted to run a few more things so I switched to an i3 NUC11 and I really like it. Running an arr stack + plex + jellyfin + nextcloud and its using 7w ‘idle’ (mentioned services running) with a headless debian 12. Fit a 5TB HDD in it and a 1TB nvme. 16GB or ram. It definitely runs faster and jellyfin is actually usable. Still though, rpi4 can handle the load (sans jellyfin). The rpi5 will also fit into this market very well.
My current server runs on a fan less embedded Celeron board from ASRock, it runs really well… But since I’ve upgraded my desktop, I’m building a Ryzen server now
OrangePi is pretty nice. Built in 8gb eMMC module is a huge performance boost. Only $60 with case and PSU.
Orange Pi is pretty hit and miss in my experience. I had a number of them a few years ago that either had horrible reliability or problems with their WiFi.
On the other hand my Orange Pi Zero Plus 2 made a great retro emulation machine, I’ve had zero issues with that model.
Do due diligence per model if you’re buying one, some aren’t great.
Yeah I have an orangepi5 running pihole and a suite of home assistant related docker containers and it’s been working flawlessly. Even has an m.2 slot
Edit: actually read the OP lol. For Jellyfin I think I’d opt for something a bit more powerful than an SBC.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
Fewer Letters More Letters DNS Domain Name Service/System HTTP Hypertext Transfer Protocol, the Web NAS Network-Attached Storage NAT Network Address Translation NUC Next Unit of Computing brand of Intel small computers NVMe Non-Volatile Memory Express interface for mass storage PCIe Peripheral Component Interconnect Express PSU Power Supply Unit PiHole Network-wide ad-blocker (DNS sinkhole) RPi Raspberry Pi brand of SBC SATA Serial AT Attachment interface for mass storage SBC Single-Board Computer SSD Solid State Drive mass storage nginx Popular HTTP server
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Pine64 single board computers. Rock64, Rockpro64, Quartz64.
Cheap chinese SBCs/TV boxes on Allwinner.
I really Dont know I am Ok with running chinese boards and also https://pine64.com/product-category/rockpro64/?v=0446c16e2e66
the boards you are showing me are 80-90$ which to me is maybe a lot since raspberry pi prices have started to slow down as well
Plus some dockers may not work and jellyfin is saying its not recommended to run it on rasp pi so i dont know actually
Second hand thin clients (like the dell wyse already mentioned) are often cheap and easy to use https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/
I’d recommend an x86 board because as great as the RPI and similar can be, ARM just doesn’t have the same support for a lot of things you might want to self host. I personally like to spring for a used thinclient PC off of eBay, because they have about the same resources as a Raspberry Pi but on an x86 platform. With my thin clients I typically install Alpine but a really light Debian install could work as well, and then from there you can go about installing Docker etc for a little homelab. Even better, if you get lucky and get a couple of them you could mess around with clustering them and some light Kubernetes at home. I’ve got mine running PiHole and Unbound on Alpine to serve my whole house with DNS and it works great. I don’t think I’ve had hardly any downtime issues or anything of that sort.
TL;DR: try a couple cheap thin clients from eBay and you can run some light stuff on them for cheap.
ARM just doesn’t have the same support for a lot of things you might want to self host
Like what? Person explicitly mentioned opensource software.
used thinclient PC
Usualy thay are cheap used, so it might work too
ARM software support is just generally rough, yeah it’s good on RPi (and Mac) but on other boards it typically sucks, namely the cheaper boards OP would be buying. Here’s a couple software examples though, I’m a big docker user and just the other day I was trying to run I believe Mastodon and Lemmy on an ARM device but there was just no image for it. I’m sure I could build an image myself but for someone just getting into Homelabbing (like OP), x86 is the platform to use.
ARM software support is just generally rough, yeah it’s good on RPi (and Mac) but on other boards it typically sucks, namely the cheaper boards OP would be buying.
Let’s see… Not counting Rock64 which is popular and AARCH, I also have chinese noname Espada E-726 TV Box on Allwinner A10, that(box) nobody knew about. Built bootloader, built kernel, installed system on SD card, it works.
I’m a big docker user and just the other day I was trying to run I believe Mastodon and Lemmy on an ARM device but there was just no image for it.
(It’s a GIF)I’m sure I could build an image myself but for someone just getting into Homelabbing (like OP), x86 is the platform to use.
It is easier to not use Docker.
There is actually lots of OSS that does not support arm. As a popular example documentserver for nextcloud.
If it can be compiled from sources, it works
SIGILL
This means you did not compile for correct architecture. There also can happen with program that use hand-written assembly, but I reeeeally doubt nextcloud devs do it.
For simplicity just compile with -mcpu=native on target computer.
EDIT: wait a sec, who are you? I doubt you want documentserver too.
Nonaligned memory access can occur in C code. I’m not speaking about nextcloud, you mentioned "if you can compile it works (for any architecture) ", which is demonstrably false.
Nonaligned memory access can occur in C code.
Entire Cortex A-series should work fine with unaligned memory access to RAM when MMU is enabled(which is always on for linux). With few exceptions, but nextcloud is not a device driver.
(for any architecture) ",
I never said that.
I’m seconding this. The Pi-supply-dry is getting better, but for similar money to a Pi4 you can get an ex-corporate 1L mini PC (I like the HP G1 800’s in a nice case, with engineered cooling, real storage, and easy memory upgrades.
HP G1 800’s
Have you measure the power consumption? How is it?
According to the readout on my UPS, about 10W idle
I’ve recently been looking into ESP32 programming - they’re microcontrollers with onboard Bluetooth and WiFi, that are smaller yet more powerful than Arduinos. Randomnerdtutorials gets recommended a lot elsewhere; I believe I saw one tutorial for running a web server on an ESP32.
If you need a full OS and/or more resources, I’m not sure raspberry pi can be beaten (at least, that’s how the market was years ago when I was looking)
You alluded to this already but ESP32 et al is really awesome but they (and arduino) are microcontrollers, not mini pcs like a raspi which have very different purposes.
You CAN run a webserver on a microcontroller but you’re essentially writing a program to do so. On a raspi you’re installing a full OS and then installing apps (nginx, Apache, jellyfin etc).
Conversely raspi has GPIO which can be used to easily interface with electronics just like the ESP32 but now you’re stuck maintaining a whole os to make your LED blink.
Running a webserver is not the same as hosting a service. For the software examples requested by OP, an ESP32 is useless
Ah must’ve skimmed over that part, my bad. The home automation part jumped out to me
It’s Alright but for me microcontrollers like the one you told me are out of way since i need to run most and foremost docker for things like jellyfin /adgaurd home etc.
I use Hardkernel products for my kid’s PCs, as pihole, etc. Their products are sold under the Odroid brand. I have the Odroid C1 and C4 line of SBCs and they work as expected. The C1 used to be my mediaplayer, now it runs a game server and pihole. A little older, but it still has use.
I use their toaster NAS. The HC4 I think. Not the best multimedia server but it’s a serviceable file server.
I’ve been using an XU4 for a number of years. Not used it as a server but it works great as a client. I’m sure it would with excellent as a server. I’ve had Ubuntu, tried Android, and currently running Batocera for gaming.
I like that it has an SD slot like a Pi but also a storage module which plugs onto the board which is much faster. I can boot from one or the other by flicking a switch on the board.
Only draw back is that it doesn’t have onboard WiFi or Bluetooth and limited USB ports. I had to use a powered USB hub then find a PSU with a step down inverter to power it all, making it bigger than a small board. I’d still highly recommend it though.
I’m a big fan of dell wyse machines. Loads on ebay, ex business machines. X86 so decent support, decent dell power supply, on / off button / in cases and low power.
I have wyse 3040 for pihole cost 39.99
I have wyse 5070 with windows 10 for plex and running a Ubuntu 22 server in virtual box, cost 59.99
Thanks for the suggestion (I am looking forward to other comments as well) Well , I like x86 in general but not for self-hosting maybe? i have heard that they are bulky and take a lot of energy
You can expect a thin client to use about 10 watts idle (but more under load), which adds up to about 100 kWh per year. Some models use even less.
Even less. My thin client draws 5W in idle.
https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/wyse/3040/ https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/wyse/5070/
Both mine are there and tested for power use.
Running 24/7 for a good 6 months. Certainly not noticed any difference to power cost.
When people say x86 is not power efficient, it usually means it’s not very efficient for battery powered devices, or is kind of wasteful in situations like in data centers where they’re running thousands of machines. For home use, with a machine that’s gonna probably end up idling most of the time, my best guess is it would cost you a couple tens of dollars a year to run vs a slightly smaller amount.
Personally, just so I don’t have to deal with software compatibility on different architectures, I’ll gladly pay that small difference in power usage, but this will of course vary depending on what you’re looking to run on there.
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Not as cheap as the wyse, but probably way more powerful.
Framework sells a case to turn their mainboard into an SFF pc.
https://frame.work/products/cooler-master-mainboard-case-and-mainboard-kit
