And… you need the correct licenses for any Windows VMs.

So those Windows 2025 servers running on your laptop needs a license too… or use Linux…

Install the HA Companion app on your phone (I use the “minimal” one.from FDroid), and enable the Alarm Sensor - that provides the next alarm time (so, be careful if you have different alarms throughout the day!)

Then, I use that time to trigger the lights to start ramping up about 30mins beforehand.

Also… be careful to check if you’re at home… took me a while to realise the lights were coming on whilst we were away.

Oh, and I use Simple Alarm Clock - also from FDroid - because it fades in the alarm sound.

Not sure why you’re confused, but alarm clocks still exist too 😉

Me too, it’s so much more.natural way to wake up… but it’s still tied to the alarm time of my phone (which also fades in slowly)

Yeah, this is really the point - reliance on cloud (someone else’s computer) for fundamental functionality isn’t a good idea.

Glass is going to break before anyone bothers with the lock, so it’s not a security device it’s a convenience device… but not if you can’t use it… and you don’t have keys with you…

But, ok, if it’s fully locally controlled (HA compatible as you mention), then you’re more in control of your own home.

I’ve not seen the appeal of “smart” locks - on houses.

If I ever got one, I’d want to make all the lights on the front of the house flash like when locking / unlocking a car… maybe even with a bleep / chirp 😉

I don’t have one (because of that point), so I don’t know…

Presumably the app and doorbell are hardcoded to go to an AWS URL (so it’s “easier” for consumers), but in theory the data’s all on your wifi.

Yeah, was reading about it here too

https://www.techradar.com/news/live/amazon-web-services-alexa-ring-snapchat-fortnite-down-october-2025

Ring doorbells, Alexa, ahh… the joys of selfhosting.

And when you ping that IP address back, what happens?

Can you trace it?

Maybe setup wireshark and record what happens at that time of night…

Do tell more…

I run it baremetal, the photos / videos are all on a separate location (so are “Externsl Libraries” in Immich) and are backed up…

As far as the Immich application itself, I’m not currently backing up anything as I’ve been trialing it… but, I’ll aim to backup any configurations, but I’m thinking to maybe ignore any database - it can just relearn everything if I need to do a restore… depends how big that DB is…

My guess… you have some hardware that Linux and Windows communicate with differently.

Either the hardware or the Linux driver is potentially broken.

If you’re able to (hard with a laptop, I know), disconnect as many things as you can - even take out the Windows hardrive - and see if that helps.

For all the suggestions about the journal, you will see random things at the very end, but see if there’s anything common from earlier in the boot process.

sudo journalctl -xe may be helpful here.

• sudo to ensure you’re seeing the entire journal
• x adds additional explanations
• e jumps to the end (again, probably look further back)

Ok, thanks

I can see it’s been a while since you asked, but did you find an answer?

I’m currently using a Pi ZeroW with a mix hat array and tiny speaker and it’s frustrating me because it falls off the wifi… so I need to replace it.

Is Voice PE worth it?

Like the ones in Alien? 😳

Check out https://www.servethehome.com/

They (just him?) did a whole load of SFF / 1 Litre reviews a while ago - it’s probably better (easier) to watch his youtube channel as then you actually get to see what he’s talking about.

He also covers some of those “brandnames” and addresses some differences when they ordered identical devices and compared what was received.

Depending on what your future plans are, some of the newer boxes are multi-NIC multi-Gb devices so you might find something “better” there.

Nice breakdown

+1 for including the word “behoove” in your blog

+1 for XMPP

I’m also hoping to self-host Prosidy (when I get a spare evening / weekend), so if you could post your notes that would be good.

There are some good notes on the Arch Wiki if that helps

It seems you need more USB ports than the Green / Yellow support… and USB hubs aren’t great… so, unless you’re purchasing the hardware to support the foundation, then other options are better.

As many others have said, getting a SSD for the Pi is probably best - if your hardware has enough RAM. No hardware is wasted, small cost, etc. IIRC, you’ll need to take a full backup (all options enabled), do a full clean re-install and then restore your backup. Then select the option to move your data.

The benefit of going to another device (ie passively cooled N1xx) is that tje storage and memory allow you to expand what you’re doing with HA - more addons, better graphs (ie Grafana), longer term history, etc. If you’re not interested in all that, stick with the Pi.

Well, it depends on the app & how it’s installed.

Most bare-metal installed apps are in /etc/ or ~/.config/… maybe under /opt/ or /usr/ - just copying those files out on a regular basis is usually good enough.

Might be a little more tricky if you’re trying to backup a database / live files, but those apps usually have some documentation about backups.

If it’s a container or flatpak, etc. then it’s probably somewhere obscure.