VCF 9 Is Around the Corner – Time to Upgrade the Homelab
With VCF 9 right around the corner, it’s the perfect moment to give the homelab a long overdue upgrade.
New Hardware: 8-Port 2.5Gbit Switch
To kick things off, I picked up an 8-port 2.5 Gbit switch from AliExpress for just €54. Surprisingly, it performs well for its price and fits nicely into the homelab setup - the webui is a little "oldschool" but those its job. It’s a great value option for those looking to upgrade their networking without spending a fortune.
Goodbye Nested Hosts and hello Traditional NFS
Thanks to the reduced requirements and improved flexibility of VCF 9, I’ve decided to deploy VCF 9 without nested ESXi hosts.
I’m currently missing a third NUC or a dedicated storage host, so I opted for a improvised storage solution for providing NFS storage to my lab.
Proxmox + USB NIC + Ubuntu VM = DIY NFS
I had a 2.5 Gbit USB 3.0 adapter lying around, which I connected to my always-on Proxmox node. On this node, an Ubuntu VM runs with a single NVMe drive acting as the shared storage.
At first, I wasn’t sure if this setup would even work—but hey, why not give it a try?
Additionally, I migrated my pfSense firewall to this Proxmox node as well, isolating firewall responsibilities from my lab hosts.
And this is what the current state looks like:
ESXi with NVMe Tiering
For the ESXi nodes, I went with NVMe tiering, which is now a fully supported feature in ESXi 9. Setup was straightforward, and everything installed smoothly.
VCF 9 Installation Experience
The new VCF 9 installation UI is a major improvement. It’s much easier and more flexible, especially for “special” configurations that previously required manually tweaking JSON files (looking at you, VCF 5.2).
Deployment went better than expected:
Edge node deployment worked on my limited setup
Storage latency is not ideal but works
The Windows jump host feels a bit laggy
…but for testing and getting hands-on experience with VCF 9, it’s surprisingly good.
Looking Ahead
There’s definitely room for future improvements, particularly in the storage department, but I have to say—VCF 9 is a big leap forward for the VCF platform overall.
Final Thoughts
That’s the current state of my lab. I mainly wanted to showcase what’s possible with limited hardware and encourage others to tinker, test, and see what you can achieve with some creativity and the right tools.
Until next time—keep homelabbing!
Last but not least, a real-world picture of what an improvised homelab looks like: "the more you look, the worse it gets".
