Proxmox was the answer for me. OpenMediaVault in a VM for NAS, LXC containers for things that need GPU access (Plex and frigate). Hell, I even virtualized my router. One thing I probably should have done was a single docker host and learn podman or something similar. I ended up with 8 or 9 VMs that run 8 or 9 dockers. It works great, but it’s more to manage.

You’ll want 2 network cards/interfaces- one for the VMs and another for the host. Power usage is not great using old gaming parts. Discrete graphics seem to add 40 watts no matter what. A 5600G or Intel with quicksync will get the job done and save you a few bucks a month. I recently moved to a 7700x and transcode performance is great. Expect 100-150 watts 24/7 which costs me $10-15 month. But I can compile ESPHome binaries in a few seconds 🤣