Will this be overkill or otherwise not recommended for someone who is new and just starting to learn?
My goal is to have something I can grow into, but initially I’d like to host a few VMs, game servers, and a have place to store content. I’d also like to host a PLEX server in the future as well but might buy a separate piece of hardware for it specifically down the road. Thanks in advance for taking the time to help a newbie!
If you have something laying around, you should start there until you know you’ll need more power/functionality. I got into homelabing/self hosting with two of these r720s I got for free. They’re awesome. I’m running multiple VMs, lxc containers, a NAS, and my power consumption is about 175 watts per r720. But my power bill is $0.11/kWh.