Instead of purchasing an off-the-shelf commercial NAS, I independently engineered and configured a custom network-attached storage solution from scratch using a repurposed PC running TrueNAS. Driven by the critical need to implement a reliable 3-2-1 backup strategy for my personal data, I built the system from the ground up utilizing a high-performance ZFS storage pool in a RAID5 configuration. To ensure robust data integrity and secure local access, I deployed user-authenticated SMB shares paired with automated snapshots and scheduled backups, successfully transforming legacy hardware into a resilient, self-hosted data vault.
What began as a dedicated backup repository has since evolved into a robust homelab environment, serving as a hands-on sandbox for networking and backend experimentation. I expanded the server’s ecosystem by deploying Immich to act as a private, localized cloud for media storage, alongside Dockge to cleanly manage and orchestrate my other containerized applications. This project highlights my ability to independently architect on-premise infrastructure, provision secure storage arrays, and maintain containerized services—all while maintaining absolute control over my data pipeline.