About WellsFLIX
From lockdown experiments to enterprise infrastructure
The Beginning
Like many tech enthusiasts in 2020, I found myself with extra time during the Covid stay-at-home period. What started as a simple curiosity about server hardware turned into a deep dive into enterprise infrastructure that continues to this day.
It all began with a few really old Dell servers I picked up from local classifieds. Nothing fancy - just aging hardware that businesses were getting rid of. But there's something magical about having your own physical servers humming away in your home, completely under your control.
The Evolution
What started as a weekend project slowly evolved into something much larger. Those first servers taught me the fundamentals - RAID configurations, network topology, virtualization basics. Each upgrade brought new challenges and learning opportunities.
The Beginning
First Dell servers from classifieds, basic Plex setup
Major Upgrade
Migration to Dell R730 XD, TrueNAS Scale, 132TB storage
Enterprise-Grade
Advanced monitoring, incident response, documentation practices
The transition from hobby tinkering to running production-quality services for friends and family taught me valuable lessons about reliability, documentation, and proper change management - often the hard way.
Philosophy
My approach to homelab infrastructure is rooted in treating it like enterprise systems. Every outage is a learning opportunity. Every upgrade gets documented. Every incident gets a proper post-mortem.
Document Everything
If it's not documented, it didn't happen. Share knowledge through detailed write-ups.
Learn by Breaking
The best lessons come from recovering from failures. Embrace the chaos.
Production Mindset
Treat your homelab like it matters. Users depend on it working.
Keep Improving
There's always a better way. Question everything, optimize continuously.
Current Setup
Today, WellsFLIX runs on a comprehensive homelab infrastructure centered around enterprise Dell PowerEdge servers, providing both media services and virtualization capabilities for continuous learning and experimentation.
Media Server
Dell R730 XD with TrueNAS Scale - Primary Plex server with 132TB storage serving the community
Virtualization Cluster
2x Dell R420 + 1x Dell R430 running XCP-NG with Xen Orchestra for VM management and testing
Shared Storage
Dell R320 with TrueNAS Scale providing SSD iSCSI storage for the XCP-NG cluster
Learning Lab
Testing ground for new technologies, configurations, and enterprise practices
This distributed architecture allows for experimenting with enterprise virtualization, storage clustering, and high-availability configurations while maintaining production services for users.
The setup has evolved from a single server to a multi-node infrastructure that mirrors enterprise environments, providing hands-on experience with technologies like hyperconverged infrastructure, shared storage, and cluster management.
Get in Touch
Have questions about a post? Found an error? Want to share your own homelab story? Feel free to reach out.