I’ve run HA on an RPi (first a 3B+ then 4) for 3+ years. I have experienced no issues with the SD card because I limit the number of recorded entities, use swap, etc despite running ~80 integrations and ~12 add-ons. But, I also believe I’m operating on borrowed time. After voicing my concerns about Yellow + CM5, and at the recommendation of @Edwin_D and @francisp, I gave the idea of using a NUC as my host another consideration. After some research, I’ve decided to migrate to a NUC + NVMe SSD + HA Container configuration.
I’ve also reconsidered my performance requirements to bias more toward growth into running a local voice assistant and possibly Node Red, an alternative database manager, and Grafana. I don’t intend to run anything like Frigate since I’m pretty happy with UniFi Protect’s native capabilities.
Hardware Recommendations
Overall, I’d just like to hear what has worked for you, what you would lean toward here in 2025 if you were building a system from scratch, and maybe what you’ve learned to avoid:
Processor - I know the N100 is kind of the standard NUC processor for HA, but is the N97 or any other worth considering? Is the N305 overkill?
Mini PC - Brand and/or specific model recommendations?
NVMe SSD - I know the Yellow has some limitations on the NVMe SSD’s that work. Does the same apply to a NUC installation…are there drives I should avoid? I’m leaning toward Samsung. Should I should try to maximize read/write speed or will the cheapest drive at my desired capacity work just fine? Does anyone have any experience with the Heatsink drives?
I’m running HAOS on an HP Elitedesk 800 G4 35W Mini with a Kingston NV3 1TB NVME SSD. It’s running an i7-8700T with 32GB of RAM. Total overkill for just HAOS, but it allows be to run all the Add-ons I want and not have to worry about slowing things down. Similar systems can be purchased on eBay for $100-$150.
I have this one, 16/256, also because its low energy footprint and decent price. didn’t regret it in any way: https://www.amazon.nl/gp/product/B0CQYT2QHY/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A226ZXJE5SK9T7&th=1
I run about 15 addons and over 200 integrations (I’m not going for lean and mean setup ).For voice/LLM I’d use a separate device, ut currently I don’t run an LLM and use Nabu Casa.
Look for used ones - i’d say no matter which NUC you get is good enough. I have old “skull canyon” model with i7, i’ve got it cheap. Perhaps a difference to look for is consumption - mine is pretty hungry (when loaded, but that never happens anyway…)
Regarding installation: i’d reccomend you to install proxmox and then HA inside. This way you’ll be able to run some other things you might need, too - like adguard, proxy…
I upgraded from a Raspi4 to an used business PC from eBay - there are plenty of equivalent PCs from Dell, HP, Lenovo, etc. which business sell cheap when they upgrade after 5 years.
HA itself is pretty lightweight - it runs on a Raspberry Pi after all - so any will do. It is processing vision (which is constant load) and voice (only when speaking, and especially if trying local AI) that will be the heavyweight apps you need to factor in.
FYI, I bought a Dell OptiPlex 7050 micro business PC with 7th gen i5-7500T CPU, a 500GB 2.5" HDD for about Aus$130, and I upgraded one stick of RAM giving 20GB and added a 240GB M.2 NVMe SSD. Still plenty of upgrade potential in CPU, RAM and disk. It is in a micro SFF box with low power usage and basic graphics from the “T” suffix CPU - but that’s OK for a server like Home Assistant.
Thinking that it is overkill for Home Assistant, I installed Proxmox … and then couldn’t think of any other Virtual Machines I want I followed a procedure in Community Guides section of this forum, and it was pretty easy.
I’m not a heavy user - only 25 devices and 28 integrations including Rhasspy voice assistant. Important thing is that Home Assistant generally uses only a few % of the 4 CPUs.
It’s not only VM’s that can run on proxmox (check all scripts available)…
But, if nothing else, you can monitor HAOS a bit better. One of options is that you can reboot whole haos (not only ha core restart) if something goes wrong. It did happen to me before: HA was “kinda” running, but all messed up, ha restart wasn’t available, etc… so if running direct HAOS pull the plug would be only option without proxmox. The problem was that i wasn’t home… so if i wouldn’t have proxmox…
I’m experimenting with this device (link below) running UnRaid. It’s a bit spendy, however very nicely engineered and so far good support. I started out trying some of the lower cost M.2 NVMe supporting NAS devices, but as Jeff Geerling found out (one of several videos he did on a device both he and tried, linked below) cooling of NVMe sticks is not easy in a small form factor. This box seems well engineered and the NVMe’s are running at reasonable temperature. Power usage is on order of 40 watts without the iron drives described below spinning.
I trying to shut down a too beefy Proxmox machine and a couple Synology NAS that are burning far too much electricity and aging.
Proxmox was good, however way over kill. And the Synology boxes are now showing that 1 GB ethernet is getting to its end game.
You are not asking about software, however I will share that while UnRaid is not free, I am very impressed with it’s function for NAS, Docker, and VM’s. With both it’s XFS file system and now ZFS, I have a 6TB ZFS on the NVMe’s and 20 TB on XFS with the old iron drives from one of Synology’s on USB 3.2 (yes this is very slow).
Note that this motherboard, and I think many of these small units with 4 NVMe slots split the PCI resources down to a single channel. So do not over buy on the NVMe’s as it is a waste of coin. The NVMe’s are running at 100 degrees F consistently, the iron drives are old NAS drives that run much hotter in 130 to 150 range. I am hoping to figure out how to power them down when not in use, as UnRaid seems to support this.
StoneStorm 4-Bay NAS Pocket PC Dual 2.5GbE i226-v LAN Ports, Core i3 N305 with DDR5 MAX 48GB, 4 M.2 NVMe 2280, Dual 4K Display, 2 USB3.2 10Gbps for Micro Firewall Router/NAS Mini Computer
4 x Western Digital 2TB WD Green SN350 NVMe Internal SSD Solid State Drive
That’s not even the main thing: on latest plus models they only support synology HDD’s, others are “kind of” half-supported, but with constant nagging, as i’ve read.
So, if this will be the way for syno i’m gonna also say “goodbye” to it…
I wish that proxmox would support some kind of good nas (raid) function…
Yes, i’ve got syno’s newsletter where they explains that as “a security reason”. And according to some feedback read it’s a shot in the leg…
Syno’s hdd’s are (was) way more expensive than others. They say prices will drop, but i doubt that they will come near commercial hdd’s. There are sales etc…where standard hdd’s can be bought way cheaper, for example. Even if it was true that they are more reliable (which they ain’t, they are only rebranded) that’s why raid is there for - if one hdd dies you can easily replace it… i use old used hdd’s. So far not one has died on me.
Synology says:
each component in a Synology storage solution is carefully engineered and tested to maintain data security and reliability.
yeah, like other manufacturers sell crap, WD and Seagate according to syno doesn’t test their drives for reliability… what a bunch of cr*p…
I agree. Basically the users have to pay for the Synology Sticker on the HDDs which nobody really cares about anyway latest once the HDD(s) is/are hidden in the tray.
I believe this new “security policy” wont hold for too long. We are not the only one praising the fact that synology isn’t the only one
Pick a name-brand SSD of your desired size and physical dimensions, thing to note are that there are (older) M.2-SATA and (newer) M.2-NVMe SSDs that look visually the same (but boards may take one XOR the other). For home-assistant’s needs there really isn’t much more to consider, ‘any’ fitting SSD will work - and chances that the SSD firmware will act up (hence why name-brand) and cause premature death are higher than writing it to death.
Thanks. I know that when going with containers directly (e.g., no HAOS) that I would be the supervisor. So, other than the advantages of the Supervisor itself if going with Proxmox+HAOS, why go that route over over a Docker+Portainer+HA Container approach?
Edit - NM, I kept scrolling and see you already provided an answer. I think I’m OK with what you view as negatives with a strictly direct container approach.
One of options i see for proxmox beside HA is adguard. Personally i run it on my asus router, but if not possible proxmox is the way to go. Browsing is muuuuch easier with adguard running (eliminates tons of annoying commercials and pictures).
Then reverse proxy, influxdb… Proxmox scripts
Thanks for all of the replies. My bad for not including some of the design considerations I took for granted:
New
High power enough for my intended use cases plus maybe a little growth/experimenting while minimizing unnecessary power and heat
With that in mind, some of your suggestions are just overkill for me - and even by your own admissions, some of you as well
Anyways, here’s what I’m going with. All in $232 (+$30 for the M.2 enclosure).
I’ll report back for others who may be doing research for similar goals after I get around to configuring it, fully transition my current production setup, and use it for a couple months.
It’s good you got the Samsung M.2. Very often these offbrand NUCs will come with a very, very offbrand M.2 that will eventually fail. Make sure you have off hardware backups in any case!
NUC + NVMe SSD + HA Container)
).For voice/LLM I’d use a separate device, ut currently I don’t run an LLM and use Nabu Casa.
I followed a procedure in Community Guides section of this forum, and it was pretty easy.
