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Homelab Journal

Homelab Journal #12: Proxmox entered the chat, quietly

08 Apr 2026

Week twelve of the SmallGrid homelab: testing Proxmox carefully without rebuilding the whole setup just because virtualisation sounded shiny.

Cartoon homelab desk with Jellyfin working successfully
#journal#homelab#proxmox#testing

This week’s goal

Understand whether Proxmox would help, without immediately rebuilding everything.

This is a personal growth area. Historically, I have treated “interesting option” as a formal migration plan.

What I actually did

I read through the practical trade-offs:

  • plain Linux is simpler
  • Proxmox is more flexible
  • VMs and containers are useful
  • snapshots are tempting
  • backups still matter either way

I did not move the live setup. I tested ideas separately and wrote down where Proxmox would actually help.

The main use case is clear: if I want multiple services, test environments, and cleaner rollback points, Proxmox earns its place. If I only want Jellyfin, plain Ubuntu is still perfectly sensible.

What broke, or nearly did

My brain tried to turn a comparison into a rebuild.

I did not let it. I am choosing to call this discipline, not fear.

What I’m keeping

  • Proxmox as a likely future option
  • No live migration yet
  • Notes on what would move into a VM
  • Backups before any platform change

SmallGrid takeaway

Virtualisation is useful when it solves a real problem. It is not automatically the next step just because the dashboard looks more serious.

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