Back when I started my home lab, it consisted of a compact mini PC. It evolved over the years, taking the form of multiple used enterprise rack servers, finally ending up as a few small business desktop PCs with low-power CPUs. But it all started with a Minisforum U850 with an Intel Core i5-10210U processor, Windows 10 Pro, and 16GB of DDR4 RAM. The chip had integrated graphics powered by Intel UHD 630. In terms of specs at the time of release, this wasn't a terrible mini PC. It had some serious horsepower under the hood, especially when compared to a Raspberry Pi.

If you're looking to start your self-hosted journey with a home lab of your own, you've likely seen the recommendations to go with compact hardware and single-board computers (SBCs). The Raspberry Pi is probably one of the most popular SBCs around. Ever since the OG was released all the way back in 2012, the SBC has advanced into one powerful compact system with a single board. The Raspberry Pi 5 has an impressive quad-core Broadcom BCM2712 CPU with Gigabit networking and support for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It's quite the device and one that can run some self-hosted apps.

I had both the mini PC and the original Raspberry Pi, so why did I go down the x86 route?

Raspberry Pi may not always be the best choice

King for experimentation, not virtualization

The Raspberry Pi range of hardware is absolutely brilliant for tinkering. It may even seem like the obvious go-to device for running a beginner home lab, being a cheap, relatively easy, energy-efficient, and widely supported SBC. But that could mislead you into using something that's not really the best-suited device for the job. This is why I didn't go with the Pi for the home lab; instead, I used an available mini PC, though any other x86 device would have sufficed. It's not really about which is better for the job, but more about which device was better for my home lab.

Even though this would be my first foray into building out a home lab, it wasn't my first time self-hosting. My Synology NAS handled everything prior, and I had dabbled in running various scripts and the like from a PC. It was a simple transition from using a NAS for everything to a dedicated platform for virtualization. I wasn't planning to run just one service. I wanted a small environment where I could experiment with self-hosting packages like Plex or Nextcloud, master Linux administration, and get into monitoring, DNS filtering, container deployment, and more.

The Pi would have been great for a project or two at max, but I know it would have struggled to do much more than what would have been possible with the single-core BCM2835 chip​​​​​​ or even the second-gen model with the quad-core BCM2836. That led me down the mini PC route, and I couldn't have been happier with a home lab starter device. I wanted to see how servers at home would work, manage self-hosted services, recover from self-induced failures, and take advantage of the extra computing power from the Minisforum U850 and upgradable RAM, storage, and virtualization support.

The mini PC felt like a server

x86 and Proxmox support

Older Raspberry Pi models had nowhere near enough RAM for running Proxmox, but Windows-powered mini PCs did, including my Minisforum U850. One of the biggest draws of the PC is using x86 processors and feeling more like a compact home server. Normal Linux distros could be installed, including Proxmox, without relying on special or community-maintained images. This made the entire process, from getting started to hosting an entire empire from home, feel much more familiar to running Linux or other systems at the desktop level. There wasn't any concern regarding ARM compatibility.

Although it doesn't appear too important when choosing the foundation of a home lab where only a few services will run, picking between ARM and x86 can mean the difference between spending time diagnosing issues relating to any quirks and incompatibilities relating to the system architecture and cracking on with building a compelling home lab. I wanted the latter, which made x86 the better choice. That Intel chip may be a laptop CPU and an old one at that, but it was perfect at the time for creating and running a hypervisor such as Proxmox, which quickly became my favorite platform for running ... well, everything!

And because it's a mini PC, I wasn't relying on a single powerful system running hundreds of virtual instances. I could throw together more mini PCs to spread the load, creating a home-based Proxmox datacenter cluster. I could run experiments, try new things, and do other weird tasks in the home lab without fearing I'd suddenly lose everything. Proxmox makes it easy to not only create a versatile home lab but also to have fun tearing it apart and seeing how far hardware and software can be pushed with the safety of snapshots, backups, and an easy restoration process.

A mini PC is more capable

Raspberry Pi SBCs are fantastic and can achieve quite a lot, but a mini PC simply has more processing power, more (and faster) RAM, better storage options (out of the box), and more I/O ports. Sure, you can create some awesome builds with a Raspberry Pi, but if all you want to do is launch a Proxmox node and start messing with self-hosted scripts, a mini PC or some other x86 system is the way to go. Now, not every home lab requires high-performing systems. I learned this the hard way with the beastly AMD Ryzen Threadripper 9950XW with its 64 cores.

Those 128 threads were incredible to have at hand, but the 100W idle power draw is simply ridiculous for the home lab. And that's just the processor. Add the motherboard, GPU for LLM inference or other tasks, and I saw idle readings of around 200W from the wall and as much as 500W with everything fully loaded. The annual utility bill would be eye-staggering, which is where an army of mini PCs can really make a difference. Pulling just 50W or so each at full load can bring down the total home lab draw considerably. Idle consumption is even better.

The earlier Raspberry Pi models had limited Ethernet speeds. 100Mbps was about as good as you'd get. Nowadays, it's not uncommon to find SBCs with 1Gbps ports if not faster, but it wasn't guaranteed a decade ago without some sort of dongle. The U850 has the Intel AX200 wireless module, rocking Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.1. For ports, we're looking at not only a 1Gbps Ethernet connection, but also a 2.5Gbps link for good measure. Then there are the two internal SATA ports, HDMI, DisplayPort, and six USB ports. Most SBCs simply can't match this, allowing me to use the mini PC as a true home hub.

Raspberry Pi is a great secondary choice

So, even though I don't rely on the Raspberry Pi for running Jellyfin, Frigate, and other software, that doesn't mean I don't see the SBC doing anything within the home lab. That couldn't be further from the truth, as the device is still useful enough to be used around the home. Whether it's creating a low-power sensor, a voice assistant for Home Assistant, or for some other project where Proxmox would be overkill or isn't warranted, an SBC like the Raspberry Pi would be a great option. Need a way to filter through DNS requests to reduce tracking and targeted advertising? Raspberry Pi with Pi-hole is perfect.