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[Beginner] Proxmox & storage configuration

Hi,

I’ve been playing with a Dell mini PC (OptiPlex 7070) that I set up with Proxmox and a single Debian virtual machine that hosts a bunch of containers (mostly an *arr stack).

All the data resides on the single SSD that came with the machine, but I’m now satisfied with the whole ordeal and would like to migrate my storage from my PC to this solution.

What’s the best approach software side? I have a bunch of HD in of varying size and age (therefore expected reliability) and I’d initially dedicate such storage to data I can 100% afford to lose (basically media).

I read I should avoid USB (even though my mini PC exposes a USB-C) for reliability, but on the other hand I’m not sure what other options I have that doesn’t force me to buy a NAS or properly sized HD to install inside the machine…

Also, what’s a good filesystem for my usecase?

Thank for any tips.

Decronym Bot , (edited )

Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:

Fewer Letters More Letters
LXC Linux Containers
NAS Network-Attached Storage
NFS Network File System, a Unix-based file-sharing protocol known for performance and efficiency
Plex Brand of media server package
SATA Serial AT Attachment interface for mass storage
SMB Server Message Block protocol for file and printer sharing; Windows-native

6 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 12 acronyms.

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Lifebandit666 ,

I have also got a dell optiplex and Proxmox and a Debian machine with mostly Arr in containers.

I also have 3 old HDDs that I’m using for it, of various sizes (2x1tb and 3/4tb)

I have used a powered usb3 to sata connector to hook them up to the Dell. As in I have 3 usb to sata connectors, and each one also has a plug socket. I’ve got those 3 plus my Dell in a 4 gang extension lead so it’s only using 1 plug socket in my kitchen. They were about £15 each on Amazon.

I have had a gotcha from using usb that destroyed my setup.

I now have a working solution that will stop this happening again:

So I have 3 usb-sata HDDs hooked in via the usb ports. I set up Open Media Vault as a VM. Then I passed through the USB drives to the OMV VM.

Those drives are then shared via SMB (I’ve just added NFS) to everything that needs it via the OMV VM.

I can then access the HDDs via this SMB share in Proxmox for backups if that’s what you wanna do.

Now the reason I’ve done it this way is because originally I had the drives in Proxmox. I gave them names and then put those names in the Fstab of Proxmox. One of the drives “forgot” it’s name and Proxmox wouldn’t then boot because one of its drives wasn’t accessible.

You could get around this by adding an option to the end of your fstab, I think the option is “nofail” but I’m not 100% so just check up on it.

I’ve used this option in my Debian VM Fstab to mount the NAS drives so my Arr stack can see them, and even got my Squeezebox server using them too. I’m using CIFS so I can see the drives on my Windows PC so I can manage the storage on my desktop.

So there you go, usb HDDs with passed through usb sockets to OMV VM is how I do it. If one of the drives fails OMV still runs and I just find I have no media in Plex and have to figure out why my drive isn’t working anymore.

dwindling7373 OP ,

There a dozens of us!

So I guess I can build a new VM and this won’t impact too heavily on my computational power (mostly Jellyfinn streaming 1080p stuff), correct?

Is there any way around the impending… running out of USB? Would a usb-C dongle be a nono?

Either way, thanks for the great answer.

Lifebandit666 , (edited )

Yeah the new VM should just draw from your remaining RAM. My Debian VM is only using a few GB (6? 8?) but my Dell (I have a 7050 so it can’t be so different from yours) still has 10gb to play with.

As for the running out of USBs I guess you could run a usb hub to one of the usb ports and just pass through the one, although I don’t know if that would break something.

I don’t think they do a powered usb c to sata but I could be wrong. I’ve used 3/4 of the ports on the back for HDDs, and the remaining one for my ZigBee stick for Home Assistant VM and have one spare (on the front) plus the usb C. I have passed that usb C through to a VM for a usb c to 3.5mm (to send music to speakers) in the past though.

You could try a usb to sata (powered) and a usb c to usb a to plug in to the usb C socket I guess, try that? I have a few usbc-a adapters knocking around the house so if you’re the same you could try it for nothing

dwindling7373 OP ,

I was hoping for some Proxmox magic dynamic allocation of resources, CPU cores and RAM between the two VMs. I have 16Gb RAM anyway so I should have plenty…

I guess I’ll play around starting from those much needed USB to SATA powered cables.

gaylord_fartmaster ,

If you want Proxmox to dynamically allocate resources you’ll need to use LXCs, not VMs. I don’t use VMs at all anymore for this exact reason.

4am ,

I’m not familiar with using USB drives, but on any bare-metal system don’t use /dev/sdX but instead use /dev/disk/by-id/<big long disk identifier> in your fstab/cryptab etc. Even if you switch ports/bays, or your devices come up in a weird order after a reboot, config always points to the same physical disk. Way less stuff breaks.

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