# Remote access to your Raspberry Pi

That’s it—I’ve finally decided to start my homelab: a place to experiment, break things, learn, and start all over again.

I had a Raspberry Pi 4B sitting in a box, so I figured, *why not jump in?*

### Discovering What’s on the Pi

I plugged it into my monitor to see what was on it. Turns out I had installed **Ubuntu MATE desktop** a few years ago. It worked… sort of. I connected to Wi-Fi and started downloading a few things, but every time I opened Firefox, the system froze. After several restarts and failed attempts, I decided Ubuntu MATE wasn’t the right fit—especially with only **2 GB of RAM**.

### Choosing the Right OS

To save resources, I went with **Raspberry Pi OS Lite** instead of the full desktop version. It boots incredibly fast and gives me a clean terminal-only environment—perfect for setting up a lightweight home server for experimentation.

### Setting Up Remote Access (SSH)

Of course, I didn’t want to plug the Pi into a monitor every time I wanted to use it. Remote access via SSH is the way to go, and luckily, it’s very straightforward:

1. On your Raspberry Pi, open the terminal and run:
    
    ```bash
    sudo raspi-config
    ```
    
2. Go to **Interfacing Options** → **SSH** → **Enable** → **OK** → **Finish**.
    
3. Find your Pi’s IP address:
    
    ```bash
    hostname -I
    ```
    
4. From another computer, connect using:
    
    ```bash
    ssh <username>@<ip-address>
    ```
    
5. The first time you connect, you’ll get a security warning—type `yes` to proceed. Enter your password when prompted.
    

You should now see the Raspberry Pi prompt:

```bash
<username>@<hostname> ~ $
```

And that’s it—you’re now connected remotely and ready to start experimenting with your homelab!