Proxmox on OpenMetal Dedicated Servers: Real Infrastructure for Real Workloads
Run Proxmox the way it was meant to be run, on enterprise dedicated servers that don’t compromise on performance, predictability, or control. No nested virtualization, no noisy neighbors, just full access to the hardware powering your virtualization stack.
Why OpenMetal Dedicated Servers?
- Enterprise dedicated servers delivered on demand, tailored to your stack
- High-speed networking and IPMI access so you can install, configure, and automate with confidence
- Multiple VLAN support for proper Proxmox cluster design
- Transparent pricing and flexible billing, including long-term rate locks
- Tier III data centers with enterprise-grade connectivity and redundancy
Dedicated servers mean no shared hypervisor layer, predictable performance, and full control over your OS, networking, and storage stack — ideal for Proxmox clusters, ZFS pools, HA routing, and production workloads.
Watch: Proxmox on Enterprise Dedicated Servers
Wendell Wilson from Level1Techs walks through building a real Proxmox cluster on OpenMetal enterprise dedicated servers. This is a full production-style setup with VLANs, bonded networking, ZFS storage, HA routing, Datacenter Manager integration, and backup workflows you can replicate in your own environment.
The cluster in the video runs on OpenMetal enterprise dedicated servers designed for virtualization platforms like Proxmox:
- Bonded high-speed networking for storage, VM, and control traffic
- Out-of-band IPMI access for installation and recovery
- Multiple VLAN support for traffic isolation and performance
- Dedicated CPUs, RAM, and storage for consistent, predictable performance
- Transparent networking and egress pricing for production workloads
This reference architecture shows how Proxmox can be deployed in a production-ready configuration on OpenMetal enterprise dedicated servers, using the same design demonstrated by Wendell Wilson from Level1Techs.
At the core is a three-node Proxmox cluster built on OpenMetal Large v4 dedicated servers. These nodes form the quorum required for high availability and are connected through multiple VLANs that separate cluster control (corosync), storage traffic, VM traffic, and management access. Each node uses local ZFS storage pools, enabling fast, efficient replication and migration of virtual machines between hosts without the complexity of external shared storage.
In front of the cluster sits a pair of HA pfSense virtual machines that handle ingress and egress routing. This design ensures that Proxmox management interfaces and VMs are not directly exposed to the public internet. Instead, all traffic flows through a secure edge layer, significantly reducing the attack surface while providing flexibility for NAT, VPN access, and firewall policies.
A fourth Large v4 server is used as a dedicated storage and replication node. This server allows for testing and demonstrating ZFS replication behavior, storage design, and workload isolation without consuming resources from the quorum cluster. This is a practical pattern for real deployments where storage experimentation, staging workloads, or replication targets should not impact core cluster stability.
Below the cluster, two important components extend the architecture beyond a single site:
- Proxmox Backup Server runs offsite and receives differential backups over a secure VPN connection. Because ZFS tracks changes at the block level, backups are bandwidth-efficient and fast, making offsite protection practical even for large datasets.
- Proxmox Datacenter Manager provides a control plane that can link this cluster with additional Proxmox clusters in other locations, including on-premises environments. This enables VM migration, replication, and centralized management across sites without stretching the cluster itself.
This architecture demonstrates how Proxmox, when paired with dedicated server infrastructure that supports VLAN segmentation, IPMI access, and high-performance networking, can be operated as a true enterprise virtualization platform. It combines high availability, security, storage efficiency, and multi-site manageability in a design that is both practical to deploy and easy to scale.
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