I am absolutely horrible at turning off lights. That’s how it began. The color changing aspect of Hue bulbs was cool, but adding motion sensors was when I saw the power of automation. I expanded Hue and added Amazon’s Alexa for voice control. Then I tried Samsung’s SmartThings to integrate Hue with other things, but that was flaky.
Next I tried Home Assistant on a Raspberry Pi. That was enough to introduce me to what it could do, but In the end, we just want things to work and I was still having issues with performance and reliability. It doesn’t help you to have your closet light automatically turn on if you have to stand in the dark for 5 seconds before it happens.
Starting Over
When we moved to Graham, I had to consider a larger place with more rooms and devices to control. I had experience resetting Hue and deleting Amazon devices one by one. I wanted to eliminate complexity in the setup and have as few services talking to Amazon as possible. I needed a multi-location WiFi setup to cover everything, and I wanted to eliminate 3rd party hubs as much as possible.
Today I run Home Assistant and associated services in Docker on a Synology rack-mount NAS. The Synology system handles my storage, surveillance cameras and the various databases and protocol support services I run to get everything connected to Home Assistant. With configurations and data on a shared folder available for Docker, I’ve had no issues between updates.
Connections
For cameras, I standardized on Amcrest as a brand, but I do use a few models. While the Synology NAS includes Surveillance Station, it doesn’t include enough licenses for enough the most basic system. I ended up purchasing enough licenses that I could have bought more expensive cameras to use with something free like Frigate. I have tried a few sidecar AI processing platforms and tinkered with Google’s thumb stick coprocessor for the network cameras, but nothing I am using yet. I mention the cameras because the NAS hosts everything. I do not actually use the integration to Home Assistant for anything other than putting a camera thumbnail on a dashboard.
Security is using Ring. That covers door and window sensors, glass break and fire. Ring isn’t natively supported by Home Assistant, so I am running a MQTT broker and a Ring-MQTT Bridge in Docker. This allows me to use the door sensors to trigger lights and other automations locally with excellent performance. I have a few inside doors with sensors specifically for lighting. One of the most valuable things about this connection is having access to the battery status of all the various sensors.
As I mentioned, there are quite a few integrations going…too many to detail, but here is an overview of the native and 3rd party integrations I use and why:
- Aerogarden – water and nutrient details for dashboard notifications
- Apple TV – control for automations
- BMW Connected Drive – lock and fuel details for dashboard
- Broadlink – shop air filter control
- Brother Printer – toner levels for dashboard
- Dyson – dashboard notification for leaving heater on in studio
- ecobee – HVAC control and dashboard for house
- Ecowitt – chicken coop temperature for dashboard
- Generac Generators – status and history for dashboard
- Home Assistant iOS – location for geofencing
- HomeKit Bridge – CarPlay support for garage doors
- Kwikset Smart Locks – dashboard status, lock automations
- LG WebOS SmartTV – dashboard control for wall mounted TV
- MQTT – connect ring sensors for status and automations (motion/door lights)
- Ring – Alarm, sensors and smart lights for automations
- Samsung Smart TV – dashboard control for wall mounted TV
- Sensibo – HVAC control and dashboard for shop
- Shelly – WiFi relays for garage door control
- SleepIQ – Sleep Number bed control
- Sony Bravia TV – automations for turning TV off
- Synology DSM – cameras on dashboards, free space and usage reporting
- TP-Link Smart Home – all light switches, smart bulbs, smart plugs and light strips
- Weatherflow Weather – weather station data for dashboards and automations
If that seems like a ton, it is, but only a few have been at all troublesome. Kwikset seems to play cat and mice with API access, so I wouldn’t recommend their locks if I was starting over. It’s from a Github repository and requires some maintenance here and there. I use Blink cameras for accessing some remote parts of the property. I wanted to use them for notifications too but the integration was unreliable and the camera notifications are late if they come at all.
I use Home Assistant as a front end to make the connection to Alexa as simple as possible. Keeping it set up this way allows me to filter the devices Alexa sees to just the minimum I need. With hundreds of entities, that keeps the confusion for similar names at bay.
Is Home Assistant for You?
I will admit that I don’t think someone without close to my tech competency would really struggle to keep it running, troubleshoot automations, much less configure it. That being said, once it’s done, it’s been pretty easy for me to maintain. It’s become so integral to our life that in the few instances it’s gone down (UPS failed, integration breaks) it’s immediately missed by us both. From the simplest things like turning on the downstairs lights when you’re trying to wrestle 200lbs of dogs, to making sure that all the outdoor lights come on when it’s time for a late night doggy bathroom run, it’s the little conveniences.
The last piece which is hard to put value on is the peace of mind. The landing dashboard lets us know if a door is unlocked or a window is open, If the garage doors are physically locked, if we left a heater on somewhere, etc. Having one place to check that works home or away (thank you Nabu Casa) is wonderful.
If you are willing to take on the challenge, you will find the community very friendly and the results very rewarding. The Raspberry Pi is a great way to explore it, but I cannot recommend the NAS/Docker approach enough. It’s been very reliable, responds instantly and is very easy to maintain. Raspberry Pi’s can struggle with SD cards with heavy usage, power supplies can be flaky and I have had quite a few of them fail.
