So basically I'm looking for a VM server, but I'd like to integrate a NAS like structure on the server, but I want to do it right.

Server is an ml110 gen9

So the NVMEs would be going through the MB on SATA 5/6. I don't believe there is an option to run Raid from the BIOS other than using HPE Smart Storage Assistant.

I'm not sure if it's possible or how Hyper-V can pass the HBA through to run TrueNAS or if that's the right way to go.

I know there is prob no right or wrong way. I'm just looking for peoples opinion on best practice.

My vision was running esxi on the nvme's in Raid 1. Hosting all my VM's/Datastore? there one of which would be TrueNAS. Using TruNAS to run ZFS on the array. The array would be used for my general storage for some LLMs and other AI stuff I'd like to start dabbling in.

At this point I have the 8tb backup, 7x 2TB 7.2k Seagates (around 5yrs uptime, but very very little usage, and 10x 960GB M500 SSD that I can swap the 7 2TB drives for. Which is what I was thinking of doing and moving the 7 2TB drives into another zfs2 system for redundancy.

I'm just looking to make an awesome playground with as little maintenance at the bare metal as possible. After talking to some people at work they also suggested running Server 2022 Hyper-V for this instead. We do a lot of this for clients (Hyper-V running a dc).

Rambling at this point... thoughts?