--- title: Setting Up my PROXMOX Backup Server! | daily.dev description: A homelab setup walkthrough covering the installation of Proxmox Backup Server on an HP Microserver Gen8 with 4x10TB refurbished SAS drives. Key steps include... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/setting-up-my-proxmox-backup-server--hlnjlqdyy twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Setting Up my PROXMOX Backup Server! | daily.dev og:description: A homelab setup walkthrough covering the installation of Proxmox Backup Server on an HP Microserver Gen8 with 4x10TB refurbished SAS drives. Key steps include... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/setting-up-my-proxmox-backup-server--hlnjlqdyy og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/HLNJlqdyy.png og:image:alt: Setting Up my PROXMOX Backup Server! og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Setting Up my PROXMOX Backup Server! **[apalrd's adventures](https://daily.dev/sources/apalrd)** · 3 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A homelab setup walkthrough covering the installation of Proxmox Backup Server on an HP Microserver Gen8 with 4x10TB refurbished SAS drives. Key steps include reformatting SAS drives using sg_format to clear hardware RAID protection metadata (fixing blk_update_request protection errors), and configuring a RAIDZ1 ZFS pool with a ZFS Special Device for metadata acceleration — important given PBS stores up to 65k files per directory. Future plans include auto-start/shutdown scheduling, LACP bonding, CephFS backup integration, and LTO5 tape backup. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### How do I fix blk_update_request protection error on refurbished SAS drives in Linux? Refurbished SAS drives previously used with a hardware RAID controller often have additional data integrity/protection features enabled that conflict with software RAID or ZFS. The fix is to reformat the drive at the SCSI level using the command sg_format --format /dev/sdX, which resets the drive to manufacturer defaults without hardware protection. This process takes roughly a full day per drive but can be run in parallel. _Homelab builders troubleshooting SAS drive errors share fixes like this on daily.dev._ ### What is a ZFS Special Device and when should I use one with Proxmox Backup Server? A ZFS Special Device stores filesystem metadata on a separate, typically faster drive, speeding up directory listings and large metadata operations. In Proxmox Backup Server this matters because its chunk-based deduplication can store up to 65,000 files per directory, named by hash. Adding one after pool creation looks like: zpool add -o ashift=12 special mirror /dev/sde /dev/sdf -f. _PBS storage architecture decisions like this get discussed regularly among homelab engineers on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Proxmox Backup Server is the boring home lab upgrade that made me less afraid to break things](https://daily.dev/posts/proxmox-backup-server-is-the-boring-home-lab-upgrade-that-made-me-less-afraid-to-break-things-hxyzppueq) · XDA Developers · 4 upvotes · 2 comments - [My Proxmox backups stopped being a storage nightmare with this workaround](https://daily.dev/posts/my-proxmox-backups-stopped-being-a-storage-nightmare-with-this-workaround-cxw3bmesc) · XDA Developers · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [More random home lab things I've recently learned](https://daily.dev/posts/more-random-home-lab-things-i-ve-recently-learned-e7ucih6lp) · Hacker News · 10 upvotes · 0 comments - [I moved an essential Proxmox tool to TrueNAS, and it solved my biggest storage problem](https://daily.dev/posts/i-moved-an-essential-proxmox-tool-to-truenas-and-it-solved-my-biggest-storage-problem-qbxtjfpdq) · XDA Developers · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#linux](https://daily.dev/tags/linux), [#storage](https://daily.dev/tags/storage), [#self-hosting](https://daily.dev/tags/self-hosting), [#proxmox](https://daily.dev/tags/proxmox) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/setting-up-my-proxmox-backup-server--hlnjlqdyy) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Setting Up my PROXMOX Backup Server!","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/setting-up-my-proxmox-backup-server--hlnjlqdyy","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/setting-up-my-proxmox-backup-server--hlnjlqdyy"},"datePublished":"2026-08-11T08:56:47.021Z","dateModified":"2026-08-11T09:32:55.359Z","description":"A homelab setup walkthrough covering the installation of Proxmox Backup Server on an HP Microserver Gen8 with 4x10TB refurbished SAS drives. 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