Self-Hosting an AI Agent Server on Mac mini
krisurbas · reddit · 2026-07-13
Over the past three months, the author built a self-hosted AI agent system on a Mac mini M4 (24GB) rather than relying solely on Claude Code.
Architecture
- Hermes handles orchestration, divided into three distinct roles: Market Analyst, Career Advisor, and Coding Worker.
- OpenCode executes the actual code modifications, currently running on an open-source model (MiniMax M3).
- herdr is also utilized to manage multiple parallel agent sessions.
- Total API costs amount to approximately €30/month.
Effective Practices
- Dividing responsibilities among specialized profiles instead of relying on a single general-purpose agent.
- Adopting a spec-handoff approach: the agent first drafts a Markdown specification, which OpenCode then uses to implement changes.
- Implementing Git guardrails anywhere an agent interacts with code, and using a second OpenCode session to review self-modified results.
Pitfalls
- Directly driving the agent with Kanban tickets resulted in poor output quality.
- Continuous self-improvement loops remain difficult to execute reliably.
The author concludes by soliciting suggestions on how to expand or improve the system.
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