mattkaminski.tech

Promox Virtualization Server

Hello and Welcome.

This is my setup for my proxmox v1.0 server.

The main driving force for this, is to learn more virtualization, this time on a server.

Why a proxmox server vs a just a normal virtual machine on my current machine.

  • I wanted to get my hands on a virtualization server so that I can spin up multiple virtual machines at the same time without taking up storage or resources on my personal computer.

I had an old gaming computer laying around which was great for setting up the server but not the greatest for the electricity bill.

What is needed for a setup like this ?

  • USB
  • Computer

Here are the following specs

  • CPU: AMD FX8320
  • RAM: 16gb Ddr3
  • Storage: 256 GB SSD
  • GPU GTX 960

Creating a bootable media

We need a way to get proxmox on the computer.

We will do this by settings up a bootable media

The very first thing I did was we went to the proxmox website and downloaded an ISO

You can get it by clicking this link here

  • https://www.proxmox.com/en/downloads

Once downloaded we would need a way to make our USB a bootable USB.

I have done bootable usb for windows so im familiar with a program called Rufus

You can get Rufus from here.

  • https://rufus.ie/en/

When we startup Rufus we want to make sure we have our USB selected

Then lets select our ISO for Proxmox

Then we click start and let Rufus do all the work for us.

Starting up Promox

We then take out our media and plug it into the machine. Power the machine on and enter boot menu.

We then go through the steps on the screen till we get to the network setup part.

Network Setup for Proxmox

I personally needed to do some work here.

My Wi-Fi isn’t the greatest and I wanted a solid constant connection to my proxmox server. I will accomplish this by using ethernet.

This is where an issue came up

I only have one ethernet port in the area im currently working in. We solved this issue by getting an unmanaged switch.

I picked up a TP-LINK 5 Port unmanaged switch

![[Pasted image 20250425224712.png]]

This will allow me to take my one ethernet cable and split it into four other devices at the home.

So we got an internet connection to the machine.

Now we need to set a Static IP for our Promox server

What is a static IP?

  • Static IP is an IP that will never changes this is key for our server.

The DHCP Server is in charge of assigning IP on top of the gateway and subnet mask.

DHCP stands for Dynamic Host Control Protocol it runs on port 67 and 68.

How can we setup up a static IP ?

  • We would need to get into the router portal to set this IP

We can do this by getting the default gateway.

We get this simple by opening CMD and running the following command

  • Ipconfig

![[Pasted image 20250425230614.png]]

When then copy and paste that default gateway into the browser.

Im using a TP -LINK Deco Mesh Router and i need to us the app for this type of settings.

In the Deco APP

  • We go into more > Advanced > Address Reservation
    This is where we can set a static IP for our machine.

But we need the MAC address

  • MAC is Media Access Control and it gives your device a unique ID when connecting to a network

Luckily on the proxmox network setup we get our MAC address

![[Pasted image 20250425230747.png]]

This NOT my actual information in this picture

On the DECO app

  • Added the MAC address
  • Created a static IP

For the hostname on the proxmox setup you can create what ever you want.

The IP Address is going to be the static IP we created.

Netmask is going to be your subnet mask that we got from the cmd running ipconfig

Gateway is going to be your default gateway also from running ipconfig

DNS is going to be the DNS Server we are using at the home.

What DNS?

  • DNS is domain name system this assign names to IP address. We can remember names much easier then a bunch of numbers.

My Deco app provided me this

Continuing through the steps to finish setting up Proxmox.

Access your proxmox server

Once the setup is completed we want to use a web browser and type in our static Ip address that we assigned followed by port 8006 to access the homepage of promox.

There you have it you have setup a Promox Server

Things learned in LAB

  • Bootable media
  • Networking ( Static IP, DHCP. Default Gateway, Subnet Mask, DNS )
  • Resource allocation
  • Storage configuration

Issue at hand

  • The gaming pc is a full size case taking up a bunch of room
  • The eclectically bill is going to be sky high if I leaving it running 24/7