From avoiding YouTube Music ads to building a complete personal cloud infrastructure
This project began with a simple frustration: I wanted to listen to music without YouTube Music's ads and background play restrictions. What started as a quest for ad-free music evolved into a full-blown homelab hosting multiple services that replace commercial subscriptions with self-hosted alternatives.
- Music Freedom (Navidrome) → Replace YouTube Music
- Media Consumption (Jellyfin) → Replace Netflix/Prime Video
- File Sync (Nextcloud) → Replace Google Drive/Dropbox
- Automation (Arr Stack) → Automate media acquisition
- Management (Portainer/Cockpit) → Professional operations
- 🎵 Navidrome - Personal Spotify alternative (Port 4533)
- 🎥 Jellyfin - Personal Netflix replacement (Port 8096)
- 📥 MeTube - YouTube audio downloader (Port 5001)
- 📺 Sonarr - TV show automation & management
- 🎬 Radarr - Movie automation & management
- 🔍 Prowlarr - Unified indexer manager
- 🌊 qBittorrent - Torrent client with web UI
- 🛠️ Portainer - Docker container management (Port 9443)
- 📊 Cockpit - Server system management (Port 9090)
- 🔒 Tailscale - Secure VPN for remote access
- ☁️ Nextcloud - File sync, contacts, calendar (Port 8080)
A modular, containerized architecture running on repurposed hardware, designed for reliability and easy expansion.
Hardware Specifications:
- Processor: Intel i3 4th Generation
- Memory: 4GB RAM
- Storage: 1TB HDD
- OS: Debian 12 Server
- Network: Wired Ethernet + Tailscale VPN
Core Technology Stack:
- Containerization: Docker + Docker Compose
- Orchestration: Portainer for container management and Cockpit for server overview and access
- Networking: Tailscale for secure remote access
- Reverse Proxy: Nginx Proxy Manager for service routing
graph TB
%% Inputs
User[👤 User]
Internet[🌐 Internet]
%% Network Access
Tailscale[🔒 Tailscale VPN]
%% Core Services
Media[🎵 Media Services<br/>Navidrome + Jellyfin]
Automation[🤖 Automation<br/>Arr Stack + MeTube]
Cloud[☁️ Cloud<br/>Nextcloud]
Management[🛠️ Management<br/>Portainer + Cockpit]
%% Correct Connections
User --> Tailscale
Internet --> Tailscale
Tailscale --> Media
Tailscale --> Automation
Tailscale --> Cloud
Tailscale --> Management
Internet <--> Automation
Automation --> Media
For detailed architecture diagrams, network flows, and service dependencies, see the architecture documentation.
- Container-First Approach: Each service runs in isolated Docker containers
- Unified Storage: Centralized volume management for easy backups
- Secure-by-Default: VPN-only remote access, service authentication
- Automation-Focused: Media acquisition fully automated via Arr stack
- Problem: YouTube Music ads, no background play
- Solution: Navidrome + MeTube automation
- Result: Complete ad-free music ecosystem
- Realization: "I can do this for movies and TV too"
- Solution: Jellyfin + Arr stack + qBittorrent
- Result: Entire media consumption self-hosted
- Need: Proper management and remote access
- Solution: Portainer, Cockpit, Tailscale
- Result: Enterprise-grade homelab operations
- ✅ Complete ad-free music solution
- ✅ Automated media acquisition pipeline
- ✅ Commercial service replacement (Spotify, Netflix, Google Drive)
- ✅ Professional infrastructure management
- ✅ Secure remote access from anywhere
- ✅ All data under personal control
- Network wide Ad Blocker(Pi hole)
- Home automation (Tweaking with Alexa)
- Monitoring (Grafana, Prometheus)
- Development environments
- Kubernetes
This project demonstrates how solving one specific pain point can lead to mastering:
- Linux system administration
- Docker containerization
- Network security and VPNs
- Service integration and automation
- Infrastructure-as-code principles
- Every bug can be fixed!
From avoiding ads to architecting solutions - this homelab represents my journey into taking control of my digital life.