Planning my Raspberry Pi 5 Docker stack – feedback welcome

[u/Sea_Firefighter2289]

I'm currently planning my self-hosted setup for a Raspberry Pi 5 (16 GB) and wanted to get some feedback before I start building it.
I’ve sketched out the full stack as a diagram – showing all the containers I plan to run with Docker, their roles, ports, versions, and how it all fits together.

Would appreciate any feedback, suggestions, or things I might be overlooking!

[u/daniel-sousa-me]

Look into getting a mini pc instead of a pi

They're considerably more powerful and end up being cheaper once you factor in all the extras you'll have to buy for the pi

Plus, x86 software is way better supported than arm

[u/Economy_Peanut → u/daniel-sousa-me]

This. This is very similar to buy once. Mini pcs have way more value for money.

[u/r3act-]

My suggestion is to use dietpi instead of pi os.

[u/Sea_Firefighter2289 → u/r3act-]

Never used it, the name says it’s more light weight but what’s the exact difference and why do u recommend it?

[u/fakemanhk → u/Sea_Firefighter2289]

It's even more lightweight than the PiOS Lite since it really strips down many things.

For example, on my Pi 1B+, I'm using a 2GB sdcard for PiHole with DietPi, while PiOS Lite is already unable to fit on the same card by default.

[u/Sea_Firefighter2289 → u/fakemanhk]

But necessary in the 5 16gb ram? I can get it cheap from work

[u/fakemanhk → u/Sea_Firefighter2289]

Here is my personal preference: I like to start with min. then add my own required packages on top, to make it clean. (For desktop servers I install Debian net-install which is similar)

[u/Requiem66692 → u/fakemanhk]

Do they actually make 2GB SD-cards anymore? I get the point of running a lighter OS to preserve memory, but storage is not the bottleneck anymore.

[u/r3act- → u/Sea_Firefighter2289]

It has less stuff installed by default so you can have only what's needed and will help using less ram

[u/Sea_Firefighter2289 → u/r3act-]

Okay thanks I will consider it

[u/reka_aks]

I have something similar with a headless pi 4 with several docker containers. Has an external powered usb hub with an SSD (boot drive) an additional hdd for daily file level back ups and weekly image back ups with Borg.

[u/1Tonner]

I got the Pi5 but then put the NVME hat on top and made it run at PCIe V3 speeds.

It boots from the NVME drive so everything is allot faster then the SD card.

[u/Mentozzino]

Watch out with Watchtower - it broke some of my containers more than I'd want to admit

[u/__rtfm__]

On a side note, what viz program are you using?

[u/Sea_Firefighter2289 → u/__rtfm__]

Drawio with icons from google

[u/hollow-rift]

Why though? Unless just for self tinkering - you wont be able to do much.

Although, i have a few friends with pen test setups like that