Quick overview of my setup: Synology NAS running a whole bunch of Docker containers and a couple of full blown VMs, and an N100 based mini PC running Ubuntu Server for those containers that benefit from hardware acceleration.
On the NAS I have a Linux Mint VM that I use for various desktoppy things, but performance via RDP or NoMachine and so on is just bad. I think it’s ultimately due to the lack of acceleration, so I’d like to try running it from the mini PC instead but I’m struggling to find hypervisor options.
VirtualBox can be done headless, apparently, but the package installed via Apt wants to install X/Wayland and the entire desktop experience. LXC looks like it might be a viable option with its web frontend but it appears to be conflicting with Docker atm and won’t run the setup.
Another option is to redo the machine with UnRaid or TrueNAS Scale but as they’re designed to be full fledged NAS OSes I don’t love that idea.
So what would you do? Does anyone have a similar setup with advice?
Thanks all!
Edit: Thanks for everyone’s comments. I still can’t get LXC to work, which is a shame because it has a nice web frontend, so I’ll give KVM a go as my next option. Failing that I might well backup my Docker volumes, blat the whole thing and see what Proxmox can do.
Edit 2: Webtop looks to be exactly what I was looking for. Thanks again for everyone’s help and suggestions.
Proxmox is sort of the gold standard for homelab server operating systems. Runs containers and VMs.
If you’re not into Proxmox, look into Fedora Server with Cockpit. Web UI for server management. Fedora CoreOS is an immutable variant of Server that would make more sense for a hypervisor, IMO.
I’ve been stung too many times by truenas scale and truecharts breaking things so I just redid my entire server set up switching from truenas scale to fedora server 40 with podman and cockpit and it’s a bit tricky with selinux but it’s been WAY better.
I’m running a few arrs and jellyfin, as well as a vm for home assistant.
