Mark's Home Assistant Setup: The Good, The Bad, The Exploded Server

0:04 [SPEAKER_00]: Hello and welcome to the High Misses in Podcast. [SPEAKER_00]: My name is Phil. [SPEAKER_00]: Join me on the YouTube. [SPEAKER_00]: I've got work on. [SPEAKER_00]: Hey, go ahead mate. [SPEAKER_00]: Hey, good, how are you? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, good. [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_00]: And today we're joined by Mark.

0:15 [SPEAKER_00]: Hi, Mark. [SPEAKER_00]: Hey! [SPEAKER_00]: This podcast is sponsored by Hermes' and Cloud by Nebuchadnezzar. [SPEAKER_00]: For some more monthly fee, you unlock powerful features, like secure, effortless access to your system from anywhere, your choice of voice assistants, off-site backups, and more.

0:31 [SPEAKER_00]: It's all configurable in the UI, and there's no gamma needed. [SPEAKER_00]: It also supports the development of home assistant, ESP home and other open home foundation projects. [SPEAKER_00]: Click the link in the description to learn more. [SPEAKER_00]: This episode is also sponsored by our friends at Apollo Automation.

0:50 [SPEAKER_00]: Makers of open-source smart home sensors built for the home assistant ecosystem. [SPEAKER_00]: There's an official Open Home Foundation partner, commercial partner, and their devices are built with local control, privacy, and reliability in mind. [SPEAKER_00]: Almost everything they offer is works with home assistant and may be home certified, giving you full control and flexibility right out of the box.

1:15 [SPEAKER_00]: And the best part, they build in the open, working directly with the community to create sensors that people actually need. [SPEAKER_00]: If you're deep into home assistant or just getting started, definitely check them out at poloautomation.com. [SPEAKER_00]: Mark, thank you so much for joining us today.

1:31 [SPEAKER_00]: Where are you joining us from? [SPEAKER_03]: I'm in Northwest Georgia in the US, North of Atlanta, just south of Chattanooga, Tennessee. [SPEAKER_00]: very nice. [SPEAKER_00]: So tell us a bit about your journey with home automation. [SPEAKER_00]: Like if you always being into home automation or what sort of led you down that Rumpdoor.

1:53 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, you know, I actually, I never experimented, but I researched X10 for a long time and never went forward with it. [SPEAKER_03]: And then in 2016, a coworker, mine, was showing off, he had gotten smart things, hub. [SPEAKER_03]: And I wouldn't have had him, as how I started was with smart things.

2:23 [SPEAKER_03]: they just been purchased by Samson at the time and I started with one of their starter kits. [SPEAKER_03]: I had had a couple of contact sensors, a motion sensor, and I started with Owen and a smart plug is what it was all Zigby and I'm my first automation with that was in our bedroom. [SPEAKER_03]: We had this floor lamp.

2:52 [SPEAKER_03]: And it gets real dark in our bedroom when, you know, but, you know, we're not in there until we're going to bed, so at least we're, you know, having to go in for temporarily. [SPEAKER_03]: So we turn that lamp on and it just annoyed me that it was on for five hours and no one was in, you know, mate for maybe two minutes of somebody being in the room.

3:13 [SPEAKER_03]: So my first automation with the, with the smart things was to turn that light on when someone entered the room. [SPEAKER_03]: And that was not good, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

3:47 [SPEAKER_03]: It generated some frustration from the misses at times. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's funny in those, like, because you said you got the smart things like pack or whatever, right? [SPEAKER_01]: So those those like original sensors that they had, those things lasted like the batteries on those things lasted like two years.

4:06 [SPEAKER_01]: Like it's crazy. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's also like a $12 battery for the single battery, but you know, [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, no, I mean, and I expanded it. [SPEAKER_03]: I got some, I actually had some Z-Wave things that I got because that hub did Z-B-N-Z-Wave. [SPEAKER_03]: So I had a few, you know, a few things.

4:29 [SPEAKER_03]: I automated my Christmas lights with it. [SPEAKER_03]: I think that was probably my most successful. [SPEAKER_03]: thing with it was turning my Christmas lights on in the morning and turning up in the outside ones when it got dark and stuff and so I didn't have to fool with that or with the old timey, you know, timers that, you know, failed and stuff.

4:50 [SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, true about the old school time is that I have a little pins in them like you have to stop the car. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I don't tell around. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, when in my garage, I'm sure I could find one or two of those. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah. [SPEAKER_03]: I thought when I got one that had a light sensor on it, I thought I had moved up in the world.

5:11 [SPEAKER_00]: That's true, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like two sensors in the world. [SPEAKER_00]: And those were like, we're an expensive two, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Like, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Back in those days, like $30, now for $30, you could get like a nice couple of window sensors or something, right?

5:25 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_03]: In 2019, I had a, I had a, I had a, I have a detached garage and I have most of my lawn equipment's out there and I had a riding lawn motor stolen. [SPEAKER_03]: And so right, right after the, yeah, when one came in the middle of the day, we were gone. [SPEAKER_03]: Let's just took off with it.

5:47 [SPEAKER_03]: So that was when I bought my first set of cameras. [SPEAKER_03]: and again at the time of my same friend at work he had got he had some arlo cameras so okay I'll get some arlo cameras I was you know he he liked him and stuff and I bought those cameras and you know back then they gave you a month's worth of cloud storage for free and no subscription and [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.

6:15 [SPEAKER_03]: And I actually have one of those cameras still running. [SPEAKER_03]: We'll talk about my cameras in more detail a little bit. [SPEAKER_03]: But, and so that was pretty good. [SPEAKER_03]: But then, that's when I started really seeing, you know, the cloud. [SPEAKER_03]: I had, I had with the smart things.

6:31 [SPEAKER_03]: I had there, they had that, um, [SPEAKER_03]: somebody wrote a web thing that you could in groovy where you could do some more advanced automations than what the hub provided in their app. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I was using that and had the camera those cameras and that was when I really started seeing that this [SPEAKER_03]: I'm an IT person.

6:53 [SPEAKER_03]: I'm a cloud. [SPEAKER_03]: I'm actually a cloud architect. [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, but this home automation stuff, the cloud is, it needs to supplement not be your primary and so that was when I really started looking at it. [SPEAKER_03]: And then, when COVID hit, before COVID, I was working from home two days a week and driving into my office three days a week.

7:17 [SPEAKER_03]: We went full time remote, and we stayed full time remote even today. [SPEAKER_03]: And so, when it hit, I was at home, and more time to tanker and I started looking, and that was when I was like, I saw this saw the home assistant project. [SPEAKER_03]: And I was like, I think any work with smart things, so it's like, well, you know, and it works and I can do Zigg be with it.

7:44 [SPEAKER_03]: So I've got because I had a couple at the time I had like two or three free light bulbs. [SPEAKER_03]: They were just simple. [SPEAKER_03]: They were white. [SPEAKER_03]: They weren't color. [SPEAKER_03]: They were white. [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if they did. [SPEAKER_03]: I think they were just on off.

7:57 [SPEAKER_03]: They may have had. [SPEAKER_03]: you know, where you could change the intensity I can't remember now. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I had, you know, and I had several sensors and several smart things, smart plugs. [SPEAKER_03]: I'm most of my stuff with smart things, except for a few odds and ends that I picked up.

8:20 [SPEAKER_03]: And so I had had this year's [SPEAKER_03]: And I think I was probably Windows XP days, had Windows XP on it. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I had a tower and power supply. [SPEAKER_03]: And the motherboard that XP machine, the motherboard was just crap. [SPEAKER_03]: I was having constant trouble with it.

8:45 [SPEAKER_03]: So eventually I got a new PC separate and that can, but I still had the shell. [SPEAKER_03]: So I was like, OK, I'll build my own server. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I took the case, the power supply, they were good enough. [SPEAKER_03]: Because it's pretty big case. [SPEAKER_03]: And I bought another board and a processor and got a ended up getting a, [SPEAKER_03]: one of these dongles that did Zigbee-NZ wave and I installed a boom-2 on it and the best decision I made there was at the time I decided to go with the home assistant OS on a BI installed.

9:34 [SPEAKER_03]: KVM and ran it that way and that was really good. [SPEAKER_03]: It's going to be in when I had my mentioned earlier when we're talking, I had a ton of about my little mini catastrophe that having it on a VM came up. [SPEAKER_03]: I primarily did a VM where in my job way back in the day so I was I was reluctant to go to the doctor route and you know obviously the doctor [SPEAKER_03]: I figured the VM would be nice, and so I built it, I got my brought in, I got it connected to smart things, and I slowly started moving the Zigbee device as over.

10:19 [SPEAKER_03]: those criminals were really interesting to reset them. [SPEAKER_03]: You had to imagine you had to blink at them like now. [SPEAKER_03]: You had to flip the power on on like six times within, you know, within 10 seconds or something weird like that to get them back. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: That's no guarantee that it would work.

10:39 [SPEAKER_00]: Like sometimes I would just like. [SPEAKER_03]: There were several times I thought that when I was with one, I was using one, had a lamp, there's a lamp over here that I used to test with, and it's got a sweet, you know, just an old-style switch on it and I was just like, [SPEAKER_03]: Please put them with this ball going to the pairing and so eventually I got everything moved over and turned off the smart things and That was when I really started trying to amp up my automations.

11:09 [SPEAKER_03]: I looked at one of the things [SPEAKER_03]: that I did with my motion automations is, you know, of course I had these very basic motion sensors. [SPEAKER_03]: So they're not the millimeter wave where they really know if someone's in the room or not. [SPEAKER_03]: And so what I would [SPEAKER_03]: my basic idea with them is, you know, trigger it, put it on a timer, but then any, if it's since motion again, reset the timer, things like that, the other thing is it's like if I turn I wanted to have a mode where the bulb, where the light would stay on, where it wouldn't time out.

11:50 [SPEAKER_03]: So you wouldn't have to be constantly waving your arms and stuff. [SPEAKER_03]: So the other thing I'll put in [SPEAKER_03]: Basically, if there's, if there's, if there's already on when there's motion, so if it didn't get, if it got turned on manually, then the automation just doesn't affect it at that point.

12:07 [SPEAKER_03]: You have to turn it off manually. [SPEAKER_03]: And so to do that at the time in home assistant with the automation piece was pretty challenging. [SPEAKER_00]: and you remained on note read then, like I know there was a time where we'll do this podcast right, like everyone, every second guest we would have on was doing no great.

12:37 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I think they didn't know the grid until about actually early last year, because some of my, some of my no-grid automations look like a big spaghetti mess, so yeah, that's where [SPEAKER_03]: ChatGPT was quite helpful to get some of those more copies. [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I tell you, my biggest so now I've changed my cameras except I've got the one Arlo camera because the Arlo constantly, you know, they're trying to squeeze every dollar out with their subscription.

13:18 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I bought some, and I've got a special, my outside cameras. [SPEAKER_03]: I don't, this house was built in 2006, but it does. [SPEAKER_03]: It's not really conducive to running, you know, new cabling and stuff. [SPEAKER_03]: And so my cameras, the big thing was, is I had my outside cameras for battery operated.

13:42 [SPEAKER_03]: So I got the real links with the solar panels and their Wi-Fi. [SPEAKER_03]: And so, [SPEAKER_03]: And I did have an RLO doorbell for a while, and I changed it to real length. [SPEAKER_03]: No, it's got a wired power, because of the doorbell power. [SPEAKER_03]: It's still wireless for the network.

14:06 [SPEAKER_03]: And so I've got all those out there, and when I had, [SPEAKER_03]: One of the things I had done in the pro-after having home assistant for a year or two is all my outside floodlights. [SPEAKER_03]: I put them on shellys. [SPEAKER_03]: And [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I put the switches on shellies and I had Tasmoto running on those shellies and I've got a lot all all all the The crebles are long gone.

14:36 [SPEAKER_03]: I've got most most of the bulbs I have or you know RGB bulbs and they're Wi-Fi and [SPEAKER_03]: I had been using TestMoto, but then I've switched everything, I got everything switched over to ESP Home, except for one wall switch, I haven't changed it out yet. [SPEAKER_03]: I've got to take the plunge on it, and again, that's another place where chat GPT was a big help on getting some of these configurations, right?

15:12 [SPEAKER_03]: for ESP Home. [SPEAKER_03]: I've really enjoyed it though. [SPEAKER_00]: What was your like reason to go with ESP Home or Shelley down that road when you were already in like the Zigbee ecosystem, you wouldn't want to go a Zigbee relay there? [SPEAKER_00]: Like what we'll make you choose that road.

15:29 [SPEAKER_03]: I was, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I [SPEAKER_03]: But at the time I was still a little nervous about the Zigbee, partially a lot of the smart things stuff.

15:41 [SPEAKER_03]: A lot of that I still had a lot of those devices and they tended to be slower. [SPEAKER_03]: So I'm going to make sure Zigbee and Wi-Fi ones, I like the Wi-Fi, you know, especially for like a light bulb that's powered in a [SPEAKER_03]: and this wall switch I've sent you know I'm in the US so I I have a I actually have a degree in electrical engineering and so I don't mind messing with the [SPEAKER_03]: you know, with my electrical in my house.

16:12 [SPEAKER_03]: And so I've changed them out. [SPEAKER_03]: So that's kind of, kind of, it's just, you know, especially when you look at like walls, which is I've not seen very many in the Zigbee and Z-Wave. [SPEAKER_03]: There's, there's a few of them, but there's not nearly as much as they are [SPEAKER_01]: That's fair.

16:33 [SPEAKER_03]: And so anyway, my big, my big, my one biggest automation is, I've got, I've got three, no, yeah, I've got three real-en cameras plus the doorbell camera. [SPEAKER_03]: And I've got the, the one, our lobe, still outside. [SPEAKER_03]: And I've got my outside lights on these shellies. [SPEAKER_03]: And I've got, I've managed to avoid the my queue of garage doors Fiasco nice.

17:09 [SPEAKER_03]: I bought an Aladdin door, okay, garage door openers when I was replacing them. [SPEAKER_03]: And they have a cloud piece, but I've actually since replaced it, anthem sells a kit now to do garage doors. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I've got my garage doors on ESP hum, and I've got the real links and everything into home assistant.

17:34 [SPEAKER_03]: And so when I walk my dogs at night, I live out in the country. [SPEAKER_03]: So it's very dark. [SPEAKER_03]: I don't have, I hardly have any ambient light outside. [SPEAKER_03]: And so when the doorbell camera or any [SPEAKER_03]: You know, they got on board AI, right? [SPEAKER_03]: So if they detect human or if they detect a vehicle and it's not or if the garage door is open and it's not a turn on all my outside lights it lights up and so that's that's kind of the biggest one that they are in it and you know it's it's it's really complicated because it you know it's using the motion [SPEAKER_03]: of the cameras or the doors open and it's got a timer, anything that triggers it will reset that timer.

18:24 [SPEAKER_03]: And so I just switched it to using labels so it's easier to manage because it was such a kind of keep up with all the entities. [SPEAKER_03]: And so [SPEAKER_03]: That was kind of the last thing I had on Node Red that I moved over, and I moved it over last year, and then that led up to in the fall last year.

18:49 [SPEAKER_03]: woke up one morning, and it was still dark outside, had to walk the dogs, and I went and walk the dogs, and lights didn't come on. [SPEAKER_03]: And I hadn't had trouble with the automation. [SPEAKER_03]: And since I switched it over, I really had to home assistant completely. [SPEAKER_03]: I hadn't had any trouble.

19:13 [SPEAKER_03]: The Arlo cameras were a problem because the integration [SPEAKER_03]: It's a hacks integration, and Arlo is just, you know, they don't have an API, the person's scraping their web page. [SPEAKER_03]: And so it had, it could be flaky at times, but since I was on the real links, it's, it's been rock solid.

19:34 [SPEAKER_03]: And that's like that's where Amherstit can come on. [SPEAKER_03]: So I went back to bed and then when I came in, when I came into my office, I knew something was wrong. [SPEAKER_03]: So that many tower that I had been running on is in this office and when I came on, Robon, when Phil and I first started talking and I had some background noise or something.

19:55 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, that, yeah. [SPEAKER_03]: mini tower the fan on that power supply was really loud okay it was even i mean i was in here this and this is where i work every day and i was being here in that thing and i walked in the office and it was nearly silent in here [SPEAKER_03]: And I was like, that's not right.

20:15 [SPEAKER_03]: And I had power button on the thing and it would start to come on and it makes them noise and then it would just shut off. [SPEAKER_03]: It was better than a door nail. [SPEAKER_03]: And so it was down hard. [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, the thing wouldn't come up and so I was like, what the heck am I going to do?

20:34 [SPEAKER_03]: So I had some old laptop. [SPEAKER_03]: that was one of my kids back in the day, you know, it's like 10 years old. [SPEAKER_03]: And so after fighting with the tower and deciding that there was no hope for it, no quick hope for it anyway, I, [SPEAKER_03]: When I hit and I install I've been thinking about okay, I've been thinking about changing the tower out To proxmox and I've been planning on my hair.

21:04 [SPEAKER_03]: Okay. [SPEAKER_03]: How am I gonna Swap this out how long is it gonna take me to do it so so I was like, well No, now it's time for a proxmox so I Unloaded proxmox and I installed it on that laptop [SPEAKER_03]: And then, well, I had tried a couple things, like I had some old raspberry pies, and they were pi-30s, and so I started to do the restore on the pi-30, and it said, nope, can't do that, because I used the knob of class of cloud, but you have to be on a pi-4 or a greater for that piece to work, which I didn't know, because I had never run on a pi.

21:42 [SPEAKER_03]: So then I got the laptop going. [SPEAKER_03]: I started the restore, and I was like, [SPEAKER_03]: that hard drives probably good. [SPEAKER_03]: So I pulled the hard drive out and got it hooked up and I was able to copy over the VM and I was, it was still restoring from the cloud backup when I was powering up the VM on proxmox and.

22:03 [SPEAKER_03]: got me going, had to move my dongle for the Zig being that work. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I ran on that and for a couple days while I was ordered a mini PC and that's coming in and I moved it over. [SPEAKER_03]: And now I'm in here and it's quiet all the time. [SPEAKER_03]: Every now I run a VM, I run a Windows VM on that many PC that I used to play with.

22:29 [SPEAKER_03]: I would have tried to use the recording software on it, but I couldn't get the virtual background to work. [SPEAKER_03]: It wasn't going to work on that VM, and so anyway, so that's every now and then the fan on that many PC will kick up if something's going on that on that, uh, [SPEAKER_03]: video but for the most part it stays quiet in here.

22:51 [SPEAKER_00]: So did you consider using the laptop as the home assistant server moving forward? [SPEAKER_00]: I think one of the advantages of having it as a laptop is set back up battery in it, right? [SPEAKER_00]: There is obviously the downside that then you've got a laptop powered in all the time so there could be battery performance issues.

23:15 [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't, I didn't really consider it and the reason is is, uh, one, I actually see like that laptop, those old laptops, I'd put a moon to want them. [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I use them because because I'm cheap. [SPEAKER_03]: You know, they work for the most part, you know, they do the basic stuff that I need, you know, especially for managing things like proxmox and homosistent and that kind of thing.

23:41 [SPEAKER_03]: And so I didn't really want that, I'd have to put that laptop somewhere. [SPEAKER_03]: And I have a UPS that this thing is plugged into, but the many PCs plugged into now, I don't. [SPEAKER_03]: What I don't have is, I don't have the cable for this UPS anymore. [SPEAKER_03]: Otherwise, I would have it, so that it would shut down.

24:01 [SPEAKER_03]: So, you know, one of the things I have trouble with here is I do have power out, [SPEAKER_03]: at least once or twice a month, I'll have a pound, and it's usually just for a brief moment, but every now and then it'll be for hours. [SPEAKER_03]: But UPS lasts about 30 minutes, and then it's all I can do.

24:23 [SPEAKER_03]: So speaking of batteries, I do have an interesting, interesting conundrum on my garage door opener. [SPEAKER_03]: The ones I got, they came with built-in Wi-Fi using their cloud, which they have since, they now have an official home assistant integration. [SPEAKER_03]: They have probably been alive.

24:49 [SPEAKER_03]: And so that battery will, um, when the power goes out, the garage door, it can still open and close the garage door. [SPEAKER_03]: It's about half speed. [SPEAKER_03]: So it, it's much slower, but that's what it does. [SPEAKER_03]: The problem is is problem I've run into the, um, [SPEAKER_03]: That anthem kit, you know, it has the relay is on the button.

25:17 [SPEAKER_03]: It's wired into the button, so it's like you're pressing the button is what it does. [SPEAKER_03]: And what happens when the power goes out, the relay closes, and so it's like the button is permanently shut, and so now my battery backup on my garage stores don't work. [SPEAKER_03]: Right.

25:36 [SPEAKER_03]: So I've been like, well, do I go back to their cloud thing, which is still kind of, or do I find some kind of battery backup for these little ESP home things that are on top of my garage, they're sitting on my garage door openers. [SPEAKER_03]: So I don't have an easy way to get a battery in any way back up to them.

25:59 [SPEAKER_00]: So bubble powers them, like, [SPEAKER_03]: Well, they plug into the AC. [SPEAKER_03]: They have a little, okay, right. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, they have a little wall wart that plugs into the socket. [SPEAKER_03]: And so the problem is, is when the power goes out, the relay shuts and then it shorts out the button and then the garage door will work.

26:21 [SPEAKER_03]: So. [SPEAKER_00]: If a USB-POWET, like, is that a bucket one of those USB wall plugs that plugs in, it works that if actual. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, you plug it in, you plug it in, okay. [SPEAKER_03]: The, you know, it's it's you know, do you got a power thing and I can't remember it's been a lot.

26:37 [SPEAKER_03]: I think it's got a US it's either I'm pretty sure it's a mini USB plug that right. [SPEAKER_03]: It's the power into it's not a USB A so and I'm pretty sure it's not a USB C. [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm wondering if you could run like just a power bank, rather you charge your phone through, keep that on charge and then when that stops charging it then ticks over the battery and then [SPEAKER_03]: I have to think what I was really was thinking about was this fact could actually tap into the battery that's in the in the garage door opener.

27:16 [SPEAKER_03]: But it's kind of it's kind of the way it's built. [SPEAKER_03]: I'd have to take it all hard and I don't want to. [SPEAKER_03]: I don't want to do that. [SPEAKER_01]: Just storing it. [SPEAKER_01]: You will definitely blow your warranty if you do that. [SPEAKER_03]: But I don't want to create a fire hazard or just break it all together or something so.

27:38 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: That's fair. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think for me, I wouldn't trust myself to not cause the fire doing that, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Like at least like soldering on to a battery or like into the battery management. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Pete there, but yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: One of the things you talked about earlier is using labels and so on, right?

28:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Did you do that kind of as a global thing where everything is labeled and what kind of stuff do you label? [SPEAKER_01]: What are the labels, what do you eat? [SPEAKER_03]: So the labels, I've got the switch, I've got two sets of, I've got two, I've got Christmas inside, which is my switches, [SPEAKER_03]: My smart plugs that are for inside christmas lights, I've got christmas outside which are the smart plugs for that.

28:28 [SPEAKER_03]: I got the garage doors is a label and then outside motion is a label. [SPEAKER_03]: And then I got a test label. [SPEAKER_00]: So a few months away to a Christmas, are you leaving your Christmas lights up? [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, yeah, I don't get it, but what I do is I disable the automations when when when we're done and then I re-enable them when we set up for Christmas.

28:57 [SPEAKER_03]: And then the reason I did it this way was that way, I can easily swap the switches out, you know, as, as time goes by as to what they are, and like, like, I tell you where it helped with the motion piece, so I'm, I've got the, I've got the, for our low cameras or, yeah, for our low, three are low cameras.

29:22 [SPEAKER_03]: I got two cameras, it plus the doorbell camera. [SPEAKER_03]: And I'm only triggering on certain entities for it. [SPEAKER_03]: I'm only, because I'm using, I want to use the AI. [SPEAKER_03]: I don't want to, I've got cats and I've got animals outside. [SPEAKER_03]: So I don't want the lights coming on every time a cat walks out.

29:40 [SPEAKER_03]: Right, but then like I got the Arlo camera and all it's it doesn't have any onboard AI or anything. [SPEAKER_03]: So it made it easier the way the automation looked before I had like, you know, like 10 entities that I was trying to trigger off of and it's, you know, it's it's a really complicated workflow because Because it's got [SPEAKER_03]: because of all the different conditions.

30:12 [SPEAKER_03]: for how it triggers, cause let's, so let's, so it only, it only, like it's got, it's got a gate that it only triggers at night. [SPEAKER_03]: So it only turns the lights on when it's dark, essentially. [SPEAKER_03]: And then I use an external timer. [SPEAKER_03]: One of the problems I'd had before, like with no bread or anything was like, if I had to restart home assistant while the lights had been triggered on, [SPEAKER_03]: they would not then the automation would just go, right?

30:45 [SPEAKER_03]: It would just die. [SPEAKER_03]: So again, so I've got for this automation, I've got a timer, an external timer, so that if home assistant restarts, it'll continue that timer, and I've got a switch. [SPEAKER_03]: of, I don't call it a switch, but I got essentially a switch that, again, if the lights are turned on manually, then I don't cut them off automatically.

31:14 [SPEAKER_03]: So I've got a switch that says, oh, did the lights work the lights turn on via an automation or not? [SPEAKER_03]: So I've got these things here, and so the automation itself has got, you know, like five different paths of conditions that it's [SPEAKER_03]: And so it was it was quite a pain.

31:33 [SPEAKER_00]: So it's like I can imagine you can have me to go through all those automations and having to update them. [SPEAKER_00]: Now I'm guessing it's just one automation that you now have to check for. [SPEAKER_03]: So it's one automation but like I use the trigger IDs and I've got it's got four four different trigger IDs.

31:56 [SPEAKER_03]: for it. [SPEAKER_00]: So it's got, and then you can branch off based on that sugar ID. [SPEAKER_03]: It's got a trigger ID for when there's a motion. [SPEAKER_03]: So any motion, so it's got a trigger ID for that. [SPEAKER_03]: It's got a trigger ID for when the lights turn off. [SPEAKER_03]: When they turn, I think, if I'm trying to remember when that, when that one triggers, if the lights turn off, then I cancel the timer and I turn off the things saying an automation started, it turned on the lights.

32:25 [SPEAKER_03]: And then there's a trigger ID for when the timer finishes, [SPEAKER_03]: So when the timer goes off, which obviously cuts off the light, and then there's a trigger for when it's what I've got called as all clear basically when all the motions stop. [SPEAKER_03]: And that's what that's what starts the timer right so.

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33:56 [SPEAKER_00]: So for the best prices on all Zeus products head over to the smartesthouse.com [SPEAKER_01]: Now, Mark, on taking a little different approach here is, tell me about presence and stuff like that. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, what are you doing in there? [SPEAKER_01]: I know you talked earlier about your cameras and turning on the lights and tech and presence via the cameras outside for you to walk your dog.

34:21 [SPEAKER_01]: What about within the house, or even like coming to the property kind of thing, is there anything you're doing in front presence there, and then obviously room level, and I would [SPEAKER_03]: We're emptying this right now and we're in the Apple ecosystem and so I have the companion app on both our phones and and so I use that for the you know home and away presents and I have some automations triggered off that um [SPEAKER_03]: Uh, like, well, I have E could be thermostats and so when we're both away, I set the thermostats back and some things like that.

35:02 [SPEAKER_03]: Right. [SPEAKER_03]: So, and then when we come back, I turn them back to where we want them at what we're here. [SPEAKER_03]: Uh, I don't have, I don't really inside all I've got or just the basic motion sensors, so I don't really have any presence for room presence yet. [SPEAKER_03]: But it is something I've curious about, you know, I've got a couple different options right, um, and uh, so I haven't, haven't really gotten, gotten to that yet, um, [SPEAKER_03]: I'm unsure, I want to start trying to get that detail just yet.

35:40 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so is there a, like, do you have a, like, a thing of what's coming next? [SPEAKER_00]: Are there no go zones or are there plant, like, do you have an idea of what your, what you want your smartphone to look like? [SPEAKER_00]: Or do you think anything's on the table? [SPEAKER_00]: What's up?

35:55 [SPEAKER_03]: I do want to have more lights. [SPEAKER_03]: come on, you know, with motion, especially at night, you know, that kind of thing in different areas. [SPEAKER_03]: I have a water treatment system. [SPEAKER_03]: I've got the parts. [SPEAKER_03]: I'm going to make a, I've got a ESP 32 and one of these little [SPEAKER_03]: It's a laser sensor to detect distance and so I want to use that to get my salt level in my salt tank, but I haven't taken the time to put it together yet.

36:30 [SPEAKER_03]: So I've got some things like that. [SPEAKER_03]: I actually may repurpose that arlo camera once I get it out of where it's covering. [SPEAKER_03]: to I've got a I have propane and so I've got a propane tank and it's just got a you know a little dial gauge in it and so the thought is is that that orlo camber's got a it the back of it's got a magnet because it it it's designed to the their mounts have have balls on them that you can you know [SPEAKER_03]: the cover of the propane is all metal.

37:13 [SPEAKER_03]: So it should just be able to stick up there and point the camera at the little thing and have a eye read it to let me know the level of the tank. [SPEAKER_03]: So I've got some some little, some little things like that to help me with the, you know, space like that tank. [SPEAKER_03]: I fill it up like [SPEAKER_03]: have to have it really filled like once every two years.

37:33 [SPEAKER_03]: And I have had it run out one time because I didn't check it for a month or two, right? [SPEAKER_03]: And I missed that it was blown, you know, it takes two or three days for them to come out and bring it in. [SPEAKER_03]: So it's kind of one of those things, you you know, it's such an infrequent thing, but then when it happens, it's a it's a pain.

37:52 [SPEAKER_03]: So [SPEAKER_03]: So just some little things like that, where to make life life a little better, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that's fair. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, I mean, from a, you talked about using Zigbee quite a bit, and obviously using Wi-Fi as well. [SPEAKER_01]: Are you looking at Z-Wave or do you do it at Z-Wave or how about matter, and or matter [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, so I've been looking at matter and in fact there's a there's a there's another thing that I'm wanting is possibly door locks and there's a matter of door lock that I looked at that looks pretty interesting on the you know and the way it works is it works with an existing deadbolt so you take off the [SPEAKER_03]: the inside knob that you turn the deadbolt with and it just replaces.

38:51 [SPEAKER_03]: It just goes in there and it replaces it and so it's actually matter certified. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I'm definitely, you know, because definitely something like a door liar, I definitely do not want to have to be reliant on the cloud. [SPEAKER_03]: Get in my house now, right? [SPEAKER_03]: So [SPEAKER_03]: So there's that, I had one Z, I had the outside plug back when I was on smart things for my Christmas lights, was a Z-Wag plug, but I've got it, the one I have now is actually, it's actually a home kit plug.

39:30 [SPEAKER_03]: I have the, [SPEAKER_03]: home kit bridge stuff. [SPEAKER_03]: So I brought it into home assistant that way because really most of the most of the plugs that are certified for outdoor, you're pretty much stuck with the cloud except for one or two options. [SPEAKER_03]: So [SPEAKER_03]: So, you know, I'm not opposed to Z-Wave and I know that I've been looked at the zoostuff quite a bit because of the long range thing.

40:01 [SPEAKER_03]: So, because I've got some, I'm on three acres. [SPEAKER_03]: So I've got some places where the fifth, distance is my limitation right now. [SPEAKER_03]: And so, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's, the derivative LR is pretty awesome. [SPEAKER_01]: And even, again, the nice thing is, especially when you pair it with something like the home assistant, ZWA antenna, right?

40:25 [SPEAKER_01]: Is every at two, it's actually pretty cool because you can, again, this is portable. [SPEAKER_01]: Like my home assistant, it's in my basement. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm upstairs with this year, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Cause it's remote. [SPEAKER_01]: So now I can take a closer to where I need to be.

40:39 [SPEAKER_01]: and then obviously it uses IP to go back to back to home assistant, but then essentially acts as a Z-wave to IP kind of translator, right? [SPEAKER_01]: And then so you can put a lot closer to the source where you might need it, and then you've got the long-range from that point rather than from like in a corner in your basement or something like that.

41:04 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, oh and the other thing that I've been looking at, but I haven't, I haven't decided what path I want to go is the power monitoring stuff that's definitely adventurous to me, especially on home is a little older. [SPEAKER_03]: So, you know, every little bit went back to COVID. [SPEAKER_03]: I've got a whole bunch of, uh, [SPEAKER_03]: lights in the ceiling, the ceiling canister lights and I mean I got a bunch of them.

41:39 [SPEAKER_03]: And literally I went on, I did the Amazon, I had these Philips bulbs, regular bulbs just LED and I put them on order on the [SPEAKER_03]: What do they call it? [SPEAKER_03]: They're they're they're thing where they ship it to you every month or on a on a Scrap and save yeah It's described and save on those bulbs.

42:02 [SPEAKER_03]: I get six bulbs every month and just and then when they'd come in I'd go, okay, I got to replace these now and And yeah, I mean it took me like all year to go through all the bulbs and get it so that I've got to replace all those old incandescence out and [SPEAKER_00]: But that's actually a really good use of lots of spru grams on here, but like that that's a lot of spru grams, so that's actually a really good use case, because then they've come a regular cadence, you get the 10% discount if that means anything from their inflanted prices, and it gives you like a staggered approach to replacing those lights.

42:35 [SPEAKER_03]: Right, yeah, well, yeah, I mean, you know, [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, it was like 60 or so molds, right? [SPEAKER_03]: I don't want to buy them any molds at once. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot of capital upfront, right? [SPEAKER_01]: It's like it's that. [SPEAKER_01]: And doing the actual work.

42:48 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I mean, it would take me, you know, when I get six molds in, that would, [SPEAKER_03]: especially, you know, some of these are in high vaulted ceilings. [SPEAKER_03]: I had to order a special, you know, I have a long extension pole. [SPEAKER_03]: But that's what we're doing. [SPEAKER_03]: Then you have to have a little thing that you can put on there.

43:05 [SPEAKER_03]: And you can use it to screw in an unscrewer, a light bulb with things. [SPEAKER_03]: It's got a little suction cup and you stick it on and then you can turn it from the ground. [SPEAKER_03]: So you have to get on the ladder. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, those things are awesome. [SPEAKER_01]: It saved me one time where same thing in Kinesh and Bob, that was originally in my garage, which has like, just again, the garage is size wise and size the rest of my house, but there's no like, they haven't like drywalled that or anything, they were just, and yeah, and the bulb receptacle, whatever it's called, is, [SPEAKER_01]: Really high like to the point where I was I was standing on the top rug of the ladder Which please do not do yeah, that's not a thing.

43:52 [SPEAKER_01]: That's not me endorsing you do that [SPEAKER_01]: And I was just like my fingers are just touching the bottom of the bulb, right? [SPEAKER_01]: And like I couldn't grab it and my next or neighbor saw me struggling and he was like, Hey, I randomly picked this thing up at like, I don't know whom do you borrow, whatever.

44:12 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, and I've never had the chance to use it. [SPEAKER_01]: Let's see if it works. [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, life's avert. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: It's the most random tool that I didn't know existed. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I was looking at these balls that are up a way up there.

44:31 [SPEAKER_03]: And I was like, I don't have a ladder that can get there. [SPEAKER_03]: And I don't want to pay for a ladder. [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, it would go out and buying a ladder to reach that. [SPEAKER_03]: And so I was like, I looked it up. [SPEAKER_03]: And it's really neat. [SPEAKER_03]: It's just a little such and cup.

44:44 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's got a long cable. [SPEAKER_03]: So that when you screw in the ball, [SPEAKER_01]: it just pulls on it and it releases the suction on the cup so it was uh yeah yeah they're pretty awesome but so where what's the what's the twenty twenty six goal like by the end of the year where do you want to be with your with your old animation or are you at the point where you're like [SPEAKER_01]: It's good, I don't want to touch it.

45:10 [SPEAKER_01]: No, no, I don't want to touch it. [SPEAKER_03]: And it actually, you know, it's one of these things. [SPEAKER_03]: I kind of go and fit some starts. [SPEAKER_03]: So, because I did, you know, last year was a little painful, I switched, I got rid of no bread. [SPEAKER_03]: And so that was a lot of effort to get all that stuff out.

45:29 [SPEAKER_03]: And to have it worked, actually, in the end, work better, but to work as well, to start with. [SPEAKER_03]: And, um, [SPEAKER_03]: And, you know, I've kind of optimized a lot of my automations, so they're a little easier to manage now, and I would say probably, you know, [SPEAKER_03]: I've got some stupid things that I want to do like upstairs.

45:54 [SPEAKER_03]: I've got I've got a man cave. [SPEAKER_03]: I've got a couple TVs up there I've got Track lighting that are all smart. [SPEAKER_03]: I'd say let's see. [SPEAKER_03]: There's two track lights and they've got six smart bulbs each So they're all running EFB home or GB bulbs [SPEAKER_03]: And so what I want to do right now I just go up there and I've got, you know, I've got the smart switch that I can set a couple of different scenes with them on.

46:22 [SPEAKER_03]: But what I want to do is there's an ESPN integration. [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if you've seen this or not, and it'll trigger like when you can tell it, hey, I'm a, you know, Saints fan or whatever your team is and when they score, it'll trigger, it'll trigger it automatically. [SPEAKER_03]: it'll trigger an event in home assistant and so I want to do something like make the lights flash or something like that, you know?

46:45 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, there's both back in the day they used to have the, I don't know if you guys had them in the U.S. but I think it was like one of the bigger companies, like whatever Budweiser, one of those, they had the little, I might have been Wilson, but they might they they had the little bulbs that went off when your team scored and it's that.

47:02 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I think I've seen some things where like hockey fans that they have a they'll have like a They'll have like a goal in their main cave and they have lights in a and like a Steam on it so when the goals scored for their team, they'd it'll you know, it just blows smoke and lights are flashing Wow, it looks kind of cool.

47:26 [SPEAKER_03]: So yeah, yeah, just like they'll do like they would do at the game, right? [SPEAKER_03]: So, you know [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, totally. [SPEAKER_03]: So we're going to have to add, I think the power things probably be one of my bigger things is I want to get a power, the clamps on my main board so that I can start getting the whole house power and start getting an idea of what that's like.

47:54 [SPEAKER_03]: And then maybe put some plugs on the, you know, the bigger appliances and stuff so that I can get some power monitoring. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Here's that energy dashboard for all of it at need, like we can get out of it. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Nice. [SPEAKER_01]: All right.

48:12 [SPEAKER_01]: Any anything else you wanted to cover? [SPEAKER_03]: Uh, you know, I think that's where the main. [SPEAKER_03]: I think we covered most of it, uh, you know, uh, trying to think, yeah. [SPEAKER_03]: And I will say, I'm not a very good dashboard person. [SPEAKER_03]: So I did, you know, if a new the new that the new overview and I turned it on and I am loving it.

48:40 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and that it's improving every relationship right so it's cleaner than what and I had done a lot of work on setting floors and rooms and stuff, so it made it I had a few things to clean up when it when I when I turned it on but for the most part it came over and it it was like this is exactly what I want so.

49:04 [SPEAKER_00]: I have a second instance when I just run music assistant through and it needed to update to the latest home assistant. [SPEAKER_00]: So there's nothing installed on that instance of home assistant. [SPEAKER_00]: So I upgraded and yeah, it was so clean. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh wow, this looks really nice.

49:24 [SPEAKER_00]: It's not cluttered. [SPEAKER_00]: It was just, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I will say it was the first one I'd seen, I'm like, oh, like, as a new instance, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Like, when I've got online, since it's a bit more busy, but I think that they're moving it in the right direction. [SPEAKER_03]: And I haven't, I haven't, I haven't worked on it yet.

49:50 [SPEAKER_03]: So that's probably another item that I'll probably, the best thing about is, I don't have to buy anything for it. [SPEAKER_03]: I've kind of got the startings for it versus the power I've got to, I have to, you know, well, and as much as I'm comfortable doing most things in my house electrical opening up my electrical panel and putting clamps on it is not one of them.

50:13 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: For me, Alamo is the most critical custom component for me, my smile, like so much of my house is switched based on a state of Alamo, like being disarmed, armed away, armed night. [SPEAKER_00]: Everything is like looking at an Alamo state and then pairing it off that.

50:37 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I'll see and see that's the thing. [SPEAKER_03]: That's where I'm at is I've got [SPEAKER_03]: I've got my, I've got what I call home mode and which is it's three say, home away or night. [SPEAKER_03]: And so all my automations maintain that and like with our low cameras when I, when I did have full our lows, when the home mode would change, I'd change the state of the our low and stuff.

51:01 [SPEAKER_03]: So that's the thing. [SPEAKER_03]: I've got to, I've got to sort of remap everything into alarm mode. [SPEAKER_03]: And I haven't had enough time to look at how they manage the states to go, yeah, this is what I want to do in this, you know, so. [SPEAKER_03]: Because I do drive a lot of automations based on what move the home is in.

51:24 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think it's been a while since I've gone in an and configured a lot of my, but there were, I think there is certainly an like an armed custom mode that you can have. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah, they've got like four or five built-in states and then they've got some custom, you can do custom and stuff.

51:41 [SPEAKER_03]: So yeah, I've just got [SPEAKER_03]: Like I said, it's more matter of I've got to take an afternoon and go, just kind of map it out and say this is how I work and decide it and then try and execute the switching to it. [SPEAKER_01]: That's awesome. [SPEAKER_01]: Beat. [SPEAKER_01]: I guess if there's nothing else, I think that's a wrap.

52:07 [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much for joining us. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, thanks. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, no problem. [SPEAKER_00]: No. [SPEAKER_00]: So we shot a Patreon members, including our executive producers Benny and Jason. [SPEAKER_00]: You can help support the show and get early access to episodes all in and at free feed.

52:21 [SPEAKER_00]: To support the show, check out homemissistent.fm and click Patreon in the menu. [SPEAKER_00]: We also would love it if you can share this episode or give us a rating wherever you're listening to us today. [SPEAKER_00]: It helps feed those passive algorithms. [SPEAKER_00]: If you want to come on the show and share your journey with us like Mark dear today, you can submit mobile questions or just reach out for feedback at home assistant.fm or check the website at home assistant.fm and click the links in the menu.

52:49 [SPEAKER_00]: Mark, thank you so much for really appreciate it. [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for having me.