Convert home to smarthome

[2Lani_318]

Question: Any recommendations/tips for a setup for smarthome automation?

House has an integrated entertainment system. Currently using SmartThings app from my phone and TV. Devices added are the TV and washing machine.

 

[B-1]

How big do you want to go?
A couple of us on here run Home Assistant but there is some learning up front.
Mine manages 2x geysers, sunsynk inverter, some lights, electric blankets in winter and I need to add a new aircon still.

 

[2Lani_318]

How big do you want to go?
A couple of us on here run Home Assistant but there is some learning up front.
Mine manages 2x geysers, sunsynk inverter, some lights, electric blankets in winter and I need to add a new aircon still.

I'd like to start off small and then grow it as I go along. I'd like to implement the smart lights as a start and then also integrate the current entertainment system with the automation.

 

[B-1]

I'd like to start off small and then grow it as I go along. I'd like to implement the smart lights as a start and then also integrate the current entertainment system with the automation.

If you have a computer you can install the docker version of HA and play around with it or if you have a spare RPi you can use that too.
Once you are ready to commit the "Home assistant green" device is good low power hardware for the typical house.

 

[SmartPad]

I'd like to start off small and then grow it as I go along. I'd like to implement the smart lights as a start and then also integrate the current entertainment system with the automation.

The Home Assistant Green is nice. What we find works well is a "refurbed" Core i3 or i5 Lenovo or Dell Mini with SSD. It is small, and you can pick them up at a pretty good price. The extra horsepower helps when your instance becomes a bit bigger, and you are running many automations or Node-Red flows.

 

[bullzeye.za]

My recommendation for a HA host is to get a used 10th or 11th generation intel NUC, load Proxmox on it and then HA on top of that. Reason being that you can then use it for all sorts of other things as well, and it's still a small, low power device.

It also supports really solid backups so that if you mess something up you can very easily roll back to a working state from before you made your mistake.

Home Assistant itself will absolutely cover your use case though, and can grow really big - I run over 200 devices off of mine across many ecosystems and it doesn't break a sweat.

 

[Kosmik]

I'd like to start off small and then grow it as I go along. I'd like to implement the smart lights as a start and then also integrate the current entertainment system with the automation.

It really depends on what you want to do but a centralized orchestration server is great and Home Assistant has already been mentioned which runs on pretty much anything.

I have mine running on a pi3b. It monitors and controls my solar system with logging, integrated various sonoff etc switches for lights, geyser and pool, as well as my paradox alarm system. With HA you can also use cross event scripting to create more complex scenarios ie: use a alarm room sensor to trigger a light activation with a timer to turn off after x amount of no movement.

I know there is android box integration and others haven't uses it much though.

My suggestion, get familiar with a centralised tool and think what you want to do. Lights management can be done via it but you need to decide the extent of home modification, whether its socket, wall switch , inline , breaker or however.

Beauty of doing a HA system is you expand as you want and HA is free and open source with a great community.

Example, my dashboard