Home Server Backup Restore Drill: Prove Your Docker and VM Backups Actually Work Last updated: October 2026 Tested on: Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, Docker Engine , Docker Compose v2, Proxmox VE ,  A backup is not real because a job says “success”. A backup is real when you can restore it, boot it, log in, see your data, and explain the steps without searching through old browser tabs at midnight. This is the restore drill I would run on a home server that has both Docker services and virtual machines. It is not glamorous. It does not look impressive on a dashboard. It does something more useful: it proves whether your homelab backups actually work. If you are running Docker Compose stacks, Proxmox VMs, databases, reverse proxies, monitoring tools, file shares, DNS services or anything else you would miss if the server died, this drill is worth doing. Backups are only half the system. Restore is the part that tells the truth. Quick answer: how do you prove a home serv...

Last updated: June 12, 2026 SSH is usually the front door of a Linux home server. It is the thing you use when the web dashboard is broken, when Docker is misbehaving, when a service refuses to start, or when you need to fix something from another room with a laptop balanced on your knees. That also means SSH deserves more attention than most people give it. A home server does not need enterprise paranoia. It does not need a ten-page access policy, a hardware security module, and a dashboard full of red lights. But it does need a sensible SSH setup: key-based login, no direct root login, no password login when practical, firewall rules that limit who can connect, and a recovery plan so you do not lock yourself out of your own machine. This guide is the SSH hardening article I would follow for a small Linux home server, cheap homelab box, old workstation, mini PC, laptop server, or self-hosting machine running Docker services at home. If you are building the whole security s...

Sometimes the best home server is not a tiny low-power box. Last updated: May 25, 2026 Sometimes it is a massive workstation that used to live in a professional environment, has more expansion than most modern desktops, and can now be found for reasonable money on the used market. That is how I ended up using an HP Z840 Workstation as my new main workstation and homelab machine. This is not a small server. It is not a Raspberry Pi. It is not a silent mini PC. It is a proper dual-socket workstation platform with ECC DDR4 memory, lots of PCIe expansion, multiple storage options, serious cooling, and enough capacity to run programming workloads, Linux experiments, VirtualBox VMs and home lab services without feeling cramped. My unit originally came with an Intel Xeon E5-2650 v3 . I replaced it with an Intel Xeon E5-2640 v4 that cost me around 3€ including shipping . That is the kind of ridiculous used enterprise hardware upgrade that makes homelab life interesting. The...