#homelab · 8sync News

My 3D printer pays for itself every time I skip buying a PC accessory

A home lab enthusiast shares how 3D printing has replaced buying small PC accessories. By printing custom cable organizers, headphone stands, GPU anti-sag risers, Raspberry Pi cases, and ESP32 enclosures, they get perfectly sized parts for under $5 that outperform cheap ready-made alternatives. The post covers practical use cases including PETG filament for heat-resistant functional parts and plans for future projects like DIY headphones and an open-air E-ATX server case.

Terramaster F4-425 Pro: An Hardware Upgrade for an Already Solid NAS

Terramaster has refreshed its F4-425 NAS lineup with the Pro model, upgrading the CPU from an Intel N150 (4-core) to an Intel Core 3 N350 (8-core, 7W TDP) and doubling the integrated GPU execution units to 32. The unit reviewed is the top configuration with 16GB DDR5, priced at $799.99. A notable discovery: TOS installs on user-inserted disks rather than onboard storage, making drive migration between devices seamless. TOS 7 brings a cleaner UI and better storage management, but the 'AI-native' marketing claim is questioned — the OpenClaw AI feature is merely an orchestration layer requiring external LLM configuration, not on-device inference. Several software rough edges are noted: global search limited to home directory, Jellyfin subdirectory browsing issues, no keyboard navigation in Photos, and apps needing manual re-enabling after each reboot. The underlying Linux environment is Ubuntu 22.04, which reaches EOL in April 2027 — a concern for a newly launched device. Hardware performance is solid, with under 20% CPU/RAM load during photo indexing and under 10% during 4K streaming.

I opted for native ZFS in Proxmox over a TrueNAS VM, and it's the best decision I made

Running native ZFS directly on Proxmox instead of inside a TrueNAS VM avoids IOMMU/VFIO headaches with HBA passthrough on consumer hardware. With native ZFS, containers like Immich can access storage via direct bind mounts without NFS/SMB round trips or boot-order dependencies. TrueNAS still wins on GUI convenience and one-click app catalogs, but for this specific hardware setup (LSI 9207-8i on a Z170-E board with SAS drives), native ZFS was the simpler and more reliable choice.

I stopped logging into my homelab dashboard after connecting these 4 MCP servers to Claude Code

A homelab enthusiast shares how connecting four MCP servers to Claude Code transformed their infrastructure management workflow. The four servers covered are: AdGuard Home MCP for DNS management, SSH MCP for remote server access, Portainer MCP for Docker container management, and ntfy MCP for push notifications. By combining these with Claude Code's /loop command, Claude can periodically check server health and send phone alerts when issues arise — replacing manual dashboard logins with conversational queries. The post includes setup commands for each MCP server and notes privacy considerations around SSH access and data processed by Anthropic's servers.

Don't bother with a bulky desktop, as this incredible mini PC with a Ryzen 4 5300U and 16GB is on sale right now

The Bosgame E5 mini PC is on sale for Prime Day at 24% off its usual ~$400 price. It features an AMD Ryzen 3 5300U APU, 16GB DDR4 RAM, 1TB NVMe SSD, dual 2.5 GbE NICs, Wi-Fi 5, and support for three 4K displays. It's positioned as a quiet, low-power home lab server capable of running Docker containers, Proxmox with VMs, or self-hosted services, while also doubling as a general-purpose desktop replacement.

Skip the cloud: this compact Ryzen AI 9 mini PC handles 8B local LLMs and it's at a special Prime Day price

The GEEKOM A9 Max mini PC is on sale for $1,189.15 during Prime Day. It features an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor, 32GB DDR5 RAM, 1TB SSD, and Windows 11 Pro in a compact form factor. The 32GB RAM makes it capable of running 7B–8B local LLMs via tools like Ollama or LM Studio without relying on cloud services. It supports up to 128GB RAM and dual PCIe Gen4 SSDs up to 8TB, offering room to grow. Connectivity includes Wi-Fi 7, USB 4, dual 2.5 GbE, and HDMI 2.1. It's positioned as a compact developer workstation or home lab machine for those wanting to experiment with local AI.

Proxmox on microSD cards is technically possible, but terrible transfer speeds aren't the only problem

Running Proxmox on microSD cards is technically feasible but deeply impractical. Installation took over 40 minutes, LXC containers were sluggish, and VMs with desktop environments were nearly unusable — a NixOS install took over 90 minutes. Beyond the terrible transfer speeds (around 30MB/s sustained write), the real dealbreaker is microSD card write endurance. Even with mitigations like disabling pve-ha services and using Log2Ram to reduce write frequency, microSD cards are far too fragile for a home server workload. The experiment serves as a cautionary tale against using microSD cards for Proxmox nodes.

This $125 discounted Ubiquiti access point is what your home network has been missing

A look at why dedicated Wi-Fi access points like the Ubiquiti UniFi AP AC PRO are a better choice than ISP-provided routers for home networks. The post explains the benefits of PoE-powered APs — flexible placement, VLAN support, and seamless roaming — and highlights a Prime Day deal bringing the UniFi AP AC PRO down to $125. It also touches on use cases like smart home IoT devices, NAS, home labs, and Home Assistant automations.

Prime Day slashes this x86 NAS down to $240 — a steal for backing up TBs of media without cloud subscriptions

The TerraMaster F2-425 is a 2-bay x86 NAS currently discounted to $240 during Prime Day. Powered by an Intel N95 CPU with Quick Sync support, it enables hardware-accelerated transcoding for Jellyfin, Plex, and Emby. It supports up to 60TB of storage, 2.5GbE networking, and works well with Btrfs for RAID 1 or JBOD setups. The author used it as a remote backup rig connected via Tailscale with Rsync, making it a practical option for 3-2-1 backup pipelines and self-hosting containers without relying on cloud subscriptions.