Hi everyone,

We are launching the Theia line of devices.

These do not require a cloud service to function and do not require it for any feature except elderly care monitoring with AI.

I have used other devices that have radar zones, and they would be finicky at best. Balloons from my kid’s friend’s birthday would activate them. My curtains would move with the AC and activate them. It was frustrating

In my living room I had a IR Blaster for the projector, projector screen, and audio system. A temp sensor, and a ESP32 for BT Beacon detection. Nothing worked right and had to constantly be tweaking all these devices.

This is why I developed the Theia line of devices. They cross reference thermal imaging with mmwave radar to ensure presence is actually there! We integrated BT beacon, IR Blaster, temp, sensor, C02 sensor, Luminosity sensor, a siren, and POE (on pro version only. Home version had RJ45).

Where are we now?

-           We have pre-production units which are our 4^th iteration of hardware

-           HotSpot detection is working

-           Tracking and zoning are working (using thermal only, working on integrating radar)

-           BT Beacon working (calibration for distance is being worked on)

-           IR Blaster backend completed (currently working on frontend)

-           Temp, humidity and C02 working (adding atmospheric pressure soon)

-           Mobile app (second iteration is being worked on to add functionality)

-           Micelio Cloud (working just started, about 3 months until beta)

-           Siren (working with hotspot detection only at this time, working on adding to alerts)

-           Alerts (C02 only using devices LED. Will add temp, humidity, presence and more!)

-           Home Assistant integration ( right now you need to input your MQTT broker info on the device, add Senziio from HACS and add the device. Currently temp, c02, presence and a couple other things are being transmitted. In the near future we will be adding more)

We have proven full functionality of the device and some Reddit users from the HA group have been testing devices. We have made improvements based on their recommendations. We also posted in r\homeassistant and received some great feedback.

If anyone has some feedback or possible use cases, please let us know. We are also taking pre reservations for 1 dollar. These reservations will allow us to further fund the project and speed up delivery. We may even be able to skip Kickstarter and go straight to production! The idea is to show demand for the product and receive enough funding (via investment). Your reservation does not require you to purchase the device. If you do decide to purchase the device we will give you a 35% discount! Price for home device with discount is 129 dollars for home edition and 156 dollars for the Pro edition (POE). At this point we can only provide 300 devices at this rate due to selling it at cost.

Feel free to ask any questions and provide feedback

https://earlybird.senziio.com/

More info and video of GUI

r/Senziio

We've had a porch horse for a while. We decorate it seasonally. We recently moved to Colorado, and bluficied the horse shortly thereafter.

ESPhome switches the LEDs on/off and controls the fog. There's a preheat stage that it also controls.

I use an aquara presence detector to detect when the person is approaching, which triggers preheat. My ring doorbell triggers the fog.

I had some time over the weekend to play with a 7.5" ePaper display powered by ESP32. Since I have solar panels, and I like to stare at the generation/consumption data, I decided to project some of these onto my screen:

• Real-time (1min) power generation/usage data
• week-long cost/usage bar chart
• electricity cost, including standing charges
• Current weather
• Time and Date

Dashboard uses ESPHome to link up to my HA server and pull the data through some helpers and sensors added to my instance. I will probably add more features as I go - for now, I'm happy with how it looks like. If you want to learn how to pull it off, I wrote a detailed guide here.

I wanted to try HA after all its growth and discussion. I run HomeSeer. And I love it. So besides the accessibility, what’s the general use for HA and what am I missing? I use for residential control. And home management. Thanks

New home assistant user, getting started with the setup.

Are you using an Ethernet based zwave and/or zigbee adapters with your current home assistant setup?

Also, just wondering, can I use more than one in a mesh like confirmation for greater coverage around the house?

Anything in this topic you can share would be of help

Thanks.

I'm looking for a device that I don't believe yet exists: a Home Assistant compatible, battery-operated zigbee, zwave or wifi sensor that perhaps clamps to a toilet supply line or is attached inline to detect flow. Rate/volume is not important; just whether flow is occurring. I want something small and unobtrusive that could go unnoticed behind a toilet.

I suspect a vibration sensor attached to the supply line wouldn't be sensitive enough...?

A turnkey solution would be ideal of course, but I've done a fair amount of board-flashing and soldering, so custom-made suggestions are welcome. I don't have a 3D printer, but I could pay someone local to do that.

Objective: detect whether the toilet is refilling longer than X minutes. I can easily write the automation; I just need a device that will report ON/OFF: "it's happening" and then "it's not happening."

Reason: Yeah, I know: just replace the flapper valve. I've done that time and time again, and toilets in my house sometimes still get stuck filling. My septic system and my water bill are both cranky about it. And so am I.

EDIT to supply what seems to be the solution for my situation:

https://old.reddit.com/r/homeautomation/comments/1i3inty/looking_for_a_device_that_i_dont_believe_exists_a/m7omccg/

I have been running HA for about 2-3 years now. Running a Zigbee network with a single zwave thermostat bridged via SmartThings. About 110 devices- about 50% Aqara, 40% ikea and a smattering of others (sunricher, hue, etc). A few local wifi implementations (Philips air cleaners) and a few cloud implementations (Daikin air conditioners, Ebeco thermostats, a few tuya devices).

I’m not an expert, but know enough to understand the complexity of HA. Have had to do some weird things with HA, such as running two additional Z2M gateways because Aqara doesn’t play will with others and one area of my house (extension behind walls that have foil in then) kept falling off the network. Before adding the extra Z2M gateways, was losing 1-2 devices per week. After that losing 1 device every few months.

Bought a Homey Pro in late November and have been migrating the devices in batches. Am now about 95% complete. Here are my thoughts and experiences.

1. With the exception of my Ikea trådfri blinds, Homey has been rock solid. After a hub reboot, the blinds need to have one off their physical buttons pressed once and everything works. It seems to be a strange bug, but it is known. Other than that, no devices have fallen off the network.
2. Everything works. Some of the motion sensitive automations are a little slow sometimes - a few second delay, but they are reliable. Same thing with switches- sometimes it takes a second or two. Did not have these delays with HA.
3. No visibility of network routing or strength. I understand that they homey 2019 hub supports this, but they removed this from 2023. A bit annoying, as this is helpful to determine why things work the way they do.
4. Homey Apps work quite well. I did have a sunricher outlet strip that wasn’t fully supported and upon request, the app developer updated it and I was able to use it a few days later. Your results may vary.
5. Use known good hardware. I have a ceiling fan using some old Tuya IR blaster using HA. Have totally forgotten how it works, so had a broadlink RM4 that I was going to use. Using the Broadlink IOS app, I could learn the remote control buttons. But using the broadlink integration for Homey, no joy. Would not acknowledge that I was pressing any buttons. Spend roughly 40 EUR and bought a switchbot, installed the switchbot app, and all is good.
6. Flows are fantastic. Especially advanced flows. Everyone manages their flows differently, but I basically set up one advanced flow per room and keep all of the flows there. Stuff in HA that took 10-15 different rules (conditionals based upon time of day) and was a small nightmare to change is now visually represented and takes all of 20 seconds to change.
7. Spouse acceptance factor. I could not get my wife anywhere near home assistant. And things would invariably break when I was travelling. Within about 10 minutes, I had her recreating some of the more advanced HA flows in Homey. This is a big win in my books.
8. Support community. The local community is knowledgable and spends the time to help people out. I have had a few questions during the migration and questions have been invariably answered in a few hours.

Thoughts about the migration… 1. All of my ikea devices were updated to the latest firmware in HA before removing them. 2. For my Aqara devices… remove from HA. Link to Aqara Hub. Update firmware. Remove from Aqara hub. Add to Homey 3. Wired Aqara and sunricher devices are your friends. When they are removed, they immediately into pairing mode. This makes the migration so much easier. 4. Ikea is not your friend. Every device needs to be manually put into pairing mode. This takes time. 5. This is not a quick project, especially with firmware updates and 100+ devices. Plan on a few boring evenings and a weekend day or two. 6. I worked room by room. A lot of my switches are not hardwired to devices, so we had about a week where half the house was controlled with Alexa (via Home Assistant) and half via the Homey App. 7. Did not create flows until virtually the whole house was migrated. This allowed me to figure out naming schemes as I went and how they would work in the longer term with minimal refactoring. Only started with the flows after everything in a room was migrated. 8. Cannot count the number of times that I made stupid mistakes … eg, turn off the light after the room has been active (should have been inactive) for 5 minutes. So the hall light never turned off except when we were all in the hall putting out shoes on. Or selecting the wrong region. This is why you should space out things and not do it all at once. Easy enough to fix, but annoying until you figure it out.

Homey shortcomings 1. Inability to update firmware. Seriously. If HA can do it, why can’t Homey? 2. I have some built in Ikea Leptiter spotlights, 3 in a row. The only way to put them in pairing mode is to hit the breaker, but Homey can only pair 1 Zigbee device at a time. By the time that the first one is paired, the two remaining have timed out, which means hitting the breaker six times… which means that the first one resets as well. I literally had to unscrew floor boards in the attic to put in physical switches for the these lights. 3. Closed source. Yes. It is a weakness, but it is also a business model. I know LG has bought them and this is a concern - will this cause a subscription fee in the long term? But will also probably mean financial stability, so it is a two edged sword. Only time will tell. 4. Homey support is slow. I emailed them a presales question a week before I bought it and got a response two weeks after I had bought it. For something that costs almost 500 EUR, this isn’t acceptable. 5. Homey App documentation. Homey has the concept of apps that support various integrations or specific functions (eg dimming over time). However most of these are poorly documented and it can take a lot of testing to get things working. Each app has a link to a thread on the homey support forums These apps would definitely be enhanced by a link to some basic documentation that shows how they work. 6. A legacy of the history of Homey… I guess it is a Dutch company and while the forums are almost all in English, a huge number of the screenshots are in Dutch. As a Swedish speaker, I can follow it somewhat, but it is very annoying, especially since Google translate doesn’t work on screenshots (easily). I get that people have their Homeys in the local language and the community is providing the help, but this is not a problem that I faced in HA. 7. Advanced flows are really great, but they really need app support. You can only do these on a computer web browser and they are so powerful. Homey really needs to figure this out.

Overall, so far, I am happy. I have been able to scale down from 3x Raspberry Pi and a SmartThings hub to a single Homey Pro. Power usage is also down. Homey has also added insights and dashboards in the past two weeks and I am starting to play with these as well - they look promising. It is great to be able to see at a glance how many lights I have on, what my total power consumption across all devices is, etc. Also nice to get the random alert that something has upgraded and not have to cringe every time I press the update button wondering what is going to break.

Does it have the same super flexability that HA has? No, it doesn’t. I know that I can do some things in HA that I can’t do with Homey. Does it do everything that I want and need it to do? So far, yes. Does it have a better interface for handling automations? In my mind, absolutely. Is it worth the money? At this point, I would say a cautious yes (getting the wife to create a flow was probably alone worth the cost). But I also buy Macs, iPads and iPhones and a Prusa. I put value on the end results. Others may (rightfully) put the value on the flexability that HA has.

Happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Background

I’m an accountant by profession, but am into tech and networking for the “fun.” I’ve built computers before and have Windows sharing currently working where a laptop is always on, running *Arr and Deluge. Those downloads then transfer to my gaming PC which has 22 TB of storage (no raid) with 6 TB free that is my Plex server. I was running VPN Fusion in an Asus router to protect the laptop, but recently moved and am currently using Xfinity's router/modem. I use NordVPN on the laptop only. I’m also taking Cisco’s network course and having fun with Packet Tracer.

I’ve moved into a new home and am looking to go all out (for me). I’m writing out my whole general plan and am cross posting, so I realize this post may hit some subjects which aren’t exactly relevant to this sub, but I think it’s valuable to see the totality of my plan so I can get the best advice. Below I’m going to try to list it all out.

Network

So far I’m strongly considering a full Unifi setup and have spec’d out the following components. I like the AI functionality and would like to integrate that with Home Assistant for smart locks and lights. House is a ranch style one floor and finished basement, so running ethernet will be relatively easy. Plan is for both APs to be on main floor on each end of the house. Looks like $1,700 in total. -Dream Machine Pro -Pro Max 16 POE -2x U7 Lite AP -1x G6 Turret AI -2x G5 Turret -1x WiFi Doorbell

Are home theater PCs still a thing? I’d like to have my NAS / Server / HTPC be in my living room and connected to my main TV. I’ll run ethernet and would like to have emulators or casual gaming as an option. I have a spare Nvidia 1060 and an AMD 5600 that would be the foundation. I’d love to find a classy case that doesn’t need to be hidden and has a minimum of 4 HDD bays (8TB drive, RAID, Jonsbo?). I still like torrenting but have been experimenting with Streamio.

Network Components

• NAS / HTPC (2.5GB NIC)
• NVR (would use the Dream Machine Pro, backup to NAS)
• Docker
• Plex / Jellyfin
• *arr suite
• Emulator (Dolphin)
• Self hosting photos and other cloud services (recipes, calendar, vaultwarden, bitwarden)
• Pi Hole (going to use a Raspberry Pi, just to learn. Can or will move this to Docker on NAS)
• Gaming PC (main device, 2.5GB NIC)
• Work Laptops, personal phones and tablets on Wi-Fi (VLANs for work, personal, kids/guests)
• Smart thermostat (Ecobee or Nest, have both)
• Smart Outlets
• Hue Hub
• Lutron Hub for smart switches
• Bond Hub (RF Repeater for ceiling fans, blinds, etc)
• Smart TVs (plan to hard wire)
• Smart Locks (have a Yale, read that this integrates best with Home Assistant)
• Smart garage door

Home Assistant

-Should I run this on a Raspberry Pi with PiHole or Docker on server? -Most interested in sensors for water leaks, CO, CO2, smoke -Front door lock (Yale Touch 2, not installed) and basement door (Schlage smart something, came with house) -Garage door opener

Things I don’t Understand

• SSH
• Samba Sharing
• Firewall, hardware or software? Does the Dream Machine already do everything I need?
• Active Directory, I want to learn this but I don’t think I have enough users on the network to justify
• VPN Server, I think I understand this, I route all of my personal device traffic to my home network, which then utilizes all the home network protections (PiHole) before reaching external internet
• Should I do VLAN or subnets to isolate traffic at home. I still don’t understand the /22, /16 on IP addresses.

Questions

• Am I trying to do too much on one device? NAS / server / Docker / Home Assistant / Emulator / HTPC all on one device?
• Don’t know what OS to use. Is ProxMox too VM focused? TrueNAS, UnRaid
• UPS of some sort, have whole house generator so only a minute of downtime at most
• I could probably go without 2.5 gb and save some money, but most of this setup doesn't logically make sense for my use case, so why not go a little overboard?
• If I use my own modem and cutout Xfinity's components entirely, do I lose my unlimited data?
• What else am I missing?

My team and I created a home inventory app primarily for appliances. We want to do more home task automation stuff, but don't know how to implement it in a way that people would actually use it - and furthermore, if this is even a product people are looking for. Thinking preventative maintenance type tasks.

We built out all the cool features to get your shit in for insurance purposes, but realizing that doesn't keep people around...

Hey r/homeautomation community!

I’m in the market for a home assistant primarily to check medicine descriptions and set reminders for my medicines so I don’t miss a dose. I'm an Indian, I speak fluent English with a neutral accent, but sometimes my speech reverts to an Indian English accent. I need a device that understands me reliably in either accent. I also want it to be able to place emergency calls without having to “fake” an accent in a crisis.

I want to cut down screen time, so a hands free voice first experience is essential. I’m also wary of how much personal health info gets stored in the cloud.

The popular options I’ve looked at so far are

1) Apple HomePod mini (Siri): I’m not an Apple user yet, but I’m curious about the ecosystem.

2) Amazon Echo (Alexa): Widely supported, has many “skills”.

3) Google Nest Hub (Gemini): I’ve tried Gemini and noticed my accent sometimes flips back to Indian English and Gemini struggles to understand Indian accent.

Are there any other assistants you’d recommend (maybe a lesser known one that handles Indian accents well)? What’s been your experience with reliability for med reminders and emergency calls? Any privacy tips when it comes to home assistants?

Thanks for the help!