Proxmox is the compute layer for the lab, running on a KAMRUI Hyper H1 mini PC with a Ryzen 7 6800H and 64 GB RAM. It runs the services that need more control than a single NAS app stack can provide: DNS filtering, Home Assistant, media workloads, backup services, Docker, Linux test systems, and isolated AI or work environments.
The useful part to share is the decision process: when a VM makes sense, when an LXC is enough, and how rollback plans change the way updates feel.
Workload Boundaries
- VMs are used when isolation matters, especially for Home Assistant, work-separated systems, desktop test environments, and AI agent experiments.
- LXC containers are used for lightweight infrastructure services where a full VM would be unnecessary.
- A media-focused LXC exists because hardware encoding and passthrough matter for Jellyfin and camera/object-detection workloads.
- A Docker VM hosts the main general-purpose application layer.
- A Proxmox Backup Server workload protects the lab’s VMs and LXCs, with backup storage pointed at the NAS.
The current shape includes separate homes for DNS filtering, media, Docker-hosted apps, Home Assistant, general Linux testing, AI-agent experiments, and isolated work-style systems.
Snapshots And Recovery
Proxmox Backup Server backs up the VMs and LXC containers to the NAS. VM snapshots are used before updates or risky changes where possible. Some LXC workloads do not support snapshots in the current setup, so PBS is the more important recovery layer.
The practical rule is simple: snapshots are for short-term rollback; backups are for real recovery.
Lessons
Proxmox has made the lab easier to reason about because it gives each workload a place to live. Reliable services can stay separate from experiments, and AI-agent systems can be isolated from the rest of the environment.