Can the vps provider not read everything on your server, unless it’s explicitly encrypted?
I’m asking because I’m interested in self-hosting mainly as a way to get privacy respecting services where good hosted ones don’t exist. I’m not sure I really want to deal with running my own hardware
A laptop is a great place to start.
I like using desktop components as I’ve been able to incrementally upgrade the ram, CPU, and drives as the years go by. A lot of people also really like using single board computers.
The only thing I’d recommend against are pre-built NASes. Theyre proprietary AF and so overpriced for what you get if you don’t need the handholding of the consumer NAS software.
One thing I recommend doing, is keeping step by step notes on everything you set up, and keep a list of files and folders you’d need to keep to easily run whatever you’re running on a new system.
That way, moving to a new system, changing your config, or reinstalling the OS is so much easier. A couple years down the line you’ll be thanking yourself for writing down how the hell you configured that one thing years back.
Almost every problem I’ve had was due to me not accounting for some quirk of my config that I’d forgotten about.
And that would apply with a VPS, too, if you end up going that route.
The moment people realize a NAS is just a small factor desktop with a lot of space with good Ethernet speed, their eyes widen up the same way people realized the cloud is just someone else’s computer.
They are genuinely useful devices, in that they simplify the process of running what is essentially a home server, down to something the average person can pull off by just buying a box and slotting some drives into it, then use a simple UI to configure whatever basic services they like.
For just the hardware, they’re absolutely robbery. You’re paying for the software to hold your hand. If you don’t need that, they’re pretty much pointless.
Might just learn nix if I get to that.
But yeah, I have no interest in prebuilt devices