Opnsense

My home network used to be whatever my ISP router decided it should be. No VLANs, no proper firewall rules, no visibility into what was actually happening. When I started running Proxmox on the HP DL380 G6, one of the first things I wanted to fix was the network layer — and OPNsense running as a VM turned out to be exactly the right move. This post covers why I went down this route, what you need to make it work, and a step-by-step walkthrough of the setup. ...

Running OPNsense as a VM inside Proxmox is one of the best decisions I made when building my homelab. You get a full-featured firewall with the added benefits of snapshots, easy backups, and no dedicated hardware required. The setup is a bit more involved than installing on bare metal — mostly because of how network interfaces need to be configured in Proxmox. But once you understand the network topology, it clicks quickly. ...

Most people’s home network looks like this: an ISP-provided router sitting in the corner, doing everything — routing, DHCP, DNS, NAT, and whatever passes for a firewall in consumer networking gear. It works. Until it doesn’t. If you’re running a homelab, self-hosting services, or just care about what’s happening on your network, a proper firewall is one of the most valuable things you can add to your setup. And with tools like OPNsense, it’s more accessible than ever. ...

If you’ve spent any time in IT circles online, you’ve probably heard the word “homelab” thrown around. But what actually is a homelab, and why do so many IT professionals swear by them? This post breaks down - and makes the case for why you should consider building one yourself. What is a homelab? A homelab is a personal computing environment you run at home for learning, experimenting, and building skills. It can be as simple as an old PC running a couple of virtual machines, or as complex as a rack full of enterprise-grade servers with a fully segmented network. ...

Every blog has on origin story. This one starts with a second-hand server, a lot of curiosity, and a growing frustration with how hard it is to find honest, practical IT knowledge, without starting a conversion with some AI bot. A bit of background I’ve been working in IT support for the better part of a decade. In that time I’ve helped businesses of all sizes keep their infrastructure running - diagnosing Active Directory issues at 8am, chasing down Exchange mail from problems after lunch, and explaining to someone why their VPN stopped working right before an important call. ...

Welcome to BeyondLab — a place where I document everything I build, break, and learn. I work as an IT support engineer and have been running a homelab on an HP DL380 G6 with Proxmox, OPNsense, and a growing stack of self-hosted services. This blog is where that knowledge escapes the lab. Expect posts on: Proxmox and virtualisation OPNsense and networking Self-hosted services MSP and IT support tips from the field