Are there any technical/performance reasons why I couldn’t create an instance for myself and host a Plex server off of the same machine at home?
I’m fairly new to self-hosting in general, so any insight would be appreciated!
EDIT: I completely forgot to mention that this would be for a Mastodon instance, not for Lemmy.
Sounds like it’d work great. You might want to use something like DigitalOcean instead of your home machine, for a couple different reasons. DigitalOcean is cheap for this type of application (like on the order of, IDK, $5-10 a month or something).
Also, fair warning, the current generation of Fediverse software is a pain in the ass to install, even before you get into issues of upgrading it, staying on top of security of the server, etc etc. But sure, it’s doable if you’re savvy and willing to invest some small time into it.
The cheapest digitalocean VPS doesn’t have enough ram to host lemmy these days, especially after v0.19 update significantly increase database ram consumption. You’ll have to use a vps with at least 4 GB of ram which will cost $24/mo. If you only want to spend $5/mo for that kind of VPS, you’ll have to dig into lowendtalk.com to find some VPS deals from a somewhat reputable providers.
From what I’ve read participating in the Federation does require some competent level of commitment. I might end up joining once the process matures a bit more and the barrier for entry is a little lower for complete novices like myself.
Thanks for the service recommendation!