Is Home Assistant Worth It?
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- Опубликовано: 7 авг 2024
- Even though I use Home Assistant to run my smart home, I still don't recommend it to most people. This video explores all the reasons why, and who I think Home Assistant is really for.
Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
0:18 It's a DIY Project
1:46 It's Time Consuming
3:13 It's Not for Noobs
4:41 It May Require a Subscription
5:35 Why Use Home Assistant?
6:18 Who Home Assistant Is Really For
7:20 Wrapping up 
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In my opinion, HA is just as easy to handle as other smart home patforms. It just gives you far more advanced options of wich some of them are possibly harder to understand for non tech savy persons. But if you want simple automations, or handle lights using your voice, for instance, HA isn't more difficult than other platforms.
Fair opinion. Thanks for commenting!
HA is the *ONLY* option for the privacy-minded person, not to mention the speed of entirely local execution. I wouldn't recommend running HA on a Raspberry Pi because SD cards are too failure-prone. Run it on a used thin client like a Dell Wyse 5070; they are cheaper and more reliable. Runnign a container on a NAS or other server platform is also a good option.
Thanks for commenting! I actually run Home Assistant on a Raspberry Pi 4 and so far it has been fine - but I totally get your point on using a thin client. Fortunately you can still use an SSD with a Raspberry Pi and I will no doubt upgrade at some point. Either way I think it's not a bad option for getting your feet wet but I realize this is a pretty controversial topic.
Running on a Pi is absoluitely fine! use a cheap ssd in a usb enclosure!
I started out running HA on a Pi since it's cheap and (relatively) easy, with lots of guides to help the new user. I then moved to a portainer install on an NUC since it was more powerful / reliable (SD card issue etc). My current & preferred solution is running in a linux VM on TrueNAS.
Raspberry pi is fine until it isn’t. I’ve been running mine for a couple of years and it’s starting to fail on the ssd card. Just about to move it over to a nuc for the ssd and performance jump with esphome compilations as I’m starting to play with esphome.
Just remember to make backups of your install so when the ss card fails you’ve not got as bigger piece of work.
@@SmartHomeTheory Yes, an SSD is an option, but it's not the usual route. And by the time you buy a Pi4, an SSD, and a hat or enclosure, you've spent twice the money for a system with less capability and nearly identical power consumption.
Keep them coming. Great job on a new channel
Thank you for the kind words! More on the way.
I see that your channel is pretty new so welcome to the smarthome niche! I look forward to the new perspective you bring to the space ✌🏾
Your support means a lot, thank you so much! More videos in the works.
Pretty good overview! I look forward to seeing more!
Much appreciated! Planning more as we speak.
Is this your first channel? video is very easily followable and informational... Anyways gonna start my smart home journey and was interested in home assistant as I work in tech and am willing to put in the leg work. will definitely follow the channel thank you for the informationz!
I made a stupid prank channel back in 2014 (I know, cringe), so it would technically be my 2nd channel. Thanks for the kind words, I really focused on cutting out the fluff. Sounds like you're a good candidate for Home Assistant! Planning a lot more content around this platform so stay tuned.
This is an informative video. It filled in some blanks for me. I just ordered a Raspberry Pi 5 to be dedicated to Home Assistant. My interest in HA is the ESP32Home add-on.
In HA's defense, it's become a lot more user friendly. AFAIK it was completely YAML code based in its early days whereas now YAML is basically hidden from the common users. Hopefully 2024 will be "Year of the UI" for the devs.
I'm really excited to see where this channel is going. Excellent videos so far! 👌
Agreed, it's a lot better than it once was. Still needs a bit of polish IMO and I would LOVE to see Year of the UI in 2024!
still not user friendly enough
@@hasimaktas9642 No, just because it's an open source project doesn't mean it has to be techy. There's a lot to be done, both with the dashboard and the device setup.
I'm curious, if I have a matter device added to Home Assistant, will it also be visible and controllable in google home if I scan the QR code? in other words can I view and control a matter device from both HA and Google Nest/Home interchangeably?
First very good video. I've been in home automation from pretty much the start. I started with X10 modules, then a hub called wink, then the smartthings hub, and now home assistant. IMO you hit the nail on the head, HA is not for everyone, but because of all the things you said, plus not having to have a proprietary hub, which at any time could stop working or the company could go out of business, or quit making their hubs because it wasn't making them enough money, etc. next thing you know you have no home automation platform. Happened to me and many others i'm sure. Now i make my own sensors and use them in HA via ESPHome integration. Keep up the good work.
Thank you for the support? Are there any particular topics you would like to see my cover?
@@SmartHomeTheory Me personally? No, I've been in this long enough to have very few questions, and have been using HA in particular for over 3 years. I have been a computer tech. and network engineer for over 35 years. Not sure what target audience you have in mind, but maybe start with the somewhat newer HA users and go from there. Perhaps show them what hardware they can use to install HA on and what the advantage's and disadvantage's are for each hardware type. I myself started with a raspberry pi 4, then a stand alone pc, and now running it in a VM on one of my servers. 😀
Just love it when the perfect vid comes along. I have a Philps Hue Tap dial switch. but I don't like the way you need to long press to turn off lights or how the dimmer dial controls all the lights rather than just one. Is this something Home assistant could solve or is there a better solution? Great vid, keep up the good work!
Thank you! Absolutely. Once you add individual devices to Home Assistant you can trigger/automate them in any way you like, right down to how the various presses work and which devices are affected. As for an easier solution, if the native Philips app doesn't allow you to customize these things, you could try the Alexa/Google/Siri apps as they offer some level of automation (such as routines in Alexa) that may get you some way to a solution -- assuming the Philips dial can be exposed to those ecosystems. Hope that helps!
I first purchased Hue bridge and lights a few years back. Automated them and loved that idea, as well as voice commands via Alexa. Now just recently, I jumped into the never ending (HA) rabbit hole of home automation, cause it's just so cool to have automations running, controlling your lights/switches etc via a UI. The whole process is a lot of fun, but you will need patience, but there are lots of YT vids to get you satrted. Start small though - with your Hue lights, and build from there. Even my wife thinks its cool - which is a bonus if Im spending a lot of time tinkering in HA :)
i think with the voice stuff the subscription is much more compelling because to run STT localy with whisper you need a fairly powerfull GPU to get decent response times when using the medium-int8 model which is the only usable one in my option in terms of accuracy.
before the HomeAssistant Green there was the Yellow which is already out for quite some time
Yes, that’s true. The thing is, HA Yellow was notoriously difficult to get a hold of due to the limited supply of Rpi compute modules, not to mention it’s expensive. For me, Yellow was never a strong alternative to DIYing HA so I chose to focus on Green in the video. Perhaps I still should have touched on it though. Appreciate the feedback.
I think you missed a major point say a couple of years back they were not monetising the cloud . Now they hired devs specially for UI , voice with nabu casa. So the rate of development to make it user friendly has greatly accelerated . So I think it will become a more complete system quicker . As far you point of yaml goes just an example earlier you had to code yaml to form groups of entities now it can be done via UI so the devs know the pain points for novice users and that is where there focus is
Good point! Appreciate your input.
I think you can run ZHA and Z2M at the same time, you just need a second zigbee coordinator.
You can, you’re right. I didn’t want to get too far off topic with my example but I should have clarified that part for sure. Thanks for bringing it up here. 👍
@@SmartHomeTheoryyeah I was just about to comment that because I run both and haven't had too many problems so far
My yellow was totally plug and play, except that I bought the one that came without a CM4, so I had to plug in one of my CM4s to get it to work. But sure, I ran my first own DNS in the late 90s so nobody needs to explain networking basics to me.
Sounds like you know your stuff. I think the biggest barrier to entry to Yellow, besides getting hold of one, is the price. Most beginners aren’t willing to gamble that much in my experience. Thanks for commenting!
Im a nerd, I dont know shit about networking ( i mean more than the average person but my knowledge is a 1/10. I have been using HA and its not hard.
My question is should i learn databases and move HA to SQL from SQL lite?
That being said, I want to constantly learn to keep brain sharp.
Glad to hear you've been having an easy time with Home Assistant!
I'll be honest, I haven't attempted to switch the database so I can't say whether it's worth doing. Are you thinking about this purely from a speed perspective? If so, what are you currently running HA on?
I just moved back from mysql to sql lite. Sql lite is (in most cases) quicker and better supported.
I agree this is a DIY, made for fun platform. You don't need to be a developer but you must enjoy following tutorials up at least. This said, the dashboards are SO GOOD that I can't go back to anything else.
Well said! Thanks for commenting.
This was very informative and useful, thanks!
I couldn’t mentally handle doing a DIY approach
It's not for everyone! Home Assistant Green might suit you better.
Thanks for the great overview!
I don't think this is any different than anything new any person would try. Smart home technology is not "out of the box" for any novice and this is no different. The only variable for HA is the option to do much more if/when you are ready to take on that aspect. Lastly, with so many CC's doing videos and the online community you can find the answers and get the help you need.
Interesting take! I would say there are levels of complexity that should be accounted for. The Aqara ecosystem, for example, is still considerably easier to set up, use, and understand compared to something like Home Assistant. It’s not quite “out of the box” but it’s pretty close IMHO.
Your review video are very professional!😆Sincerely inviting you to review our product.
Do subscribe! Even if you don’t need internet access, it supports the devs!!!
I'm gonna save you guys 7:33 minutes.
Yes. It's worth it. :D
As someone already using HA, this video isn't for me. I'm just here for the confirmation bias, and/or the opportunity to feel elitist.
Haha I respect that 😂
As a rule, If it doesn't work on wifi I don't buy it.
Interesting perspective! May I ask why?
@@SmartHomeTheory I just don't trust the longevity of zwave or matter or whatever other standards come out. And id rather not have 2-3 "routers" that I have to all link together in software to control my home. Seems excessive and difficult. Especially when I could invest that money into an awesome router/mesh router system that can't support 100+ devices and get full coverage of the home that way.
And when Cloud goes tits up then what ?
And when Cloud goes tits up then what ?
And when Cloud goes tits up then what ?
misschien moet je eerst eens goed inlezen. Je vergeet gewoon de Yellow. Je vergelijkt een appel en een peer. Een erg makkelijk opgenomen filmpje. Jammer dat je deze mening deelt.
Sure, Yellow is a more out-of-the-box solution, but it's still Home Assistant.
I think the vast majority of people who want a "smart home" associate that with telling google or alexa or siri to turn on a random light for them or have christmas lights turn on by remote or timer. That is fine and most people get into smart tech that way. Those who go beyond that might up for smart things or if they understand benefits of local control possibly hubitat. HA is the best option for a moderate to advanced user, and has come a crazy long way to be more user/noob friendly in just the past 2 years, but yes its not for everyone. I would not recommend it to anyone who wants a quick solution. If you set it up right, you can go months without even maintaining anything unless - I went from February to September without updating anything, touching dashboard or integrating new devices last year. Since then I have gotten back into updating and adding new gear. I run it headless on an 5th gen nuc and its literally rock solid. More specs than it could ever need 8gb ram, i3, 256 m2 ssd, so not worrying about the hardware being slow or obsolete anytime soon.
Sounds like we're pretty much on the same page! Did you start with a lower spec machine or did you go straight for the NUC on day 1?
@@SmartHomeTheory I think I started like a lot of people did, or at least how many yt videos recommend trying it out: on an old pc in a vm. I had a gateway laptop I hadn't turned on in years and had some (well more than some) free time during the pandemic so I tried it out. The laptop was still running Ubuntu 12.04 LTS lol. Used that for a bit just to figure out how to use HA, then moved it to a large dell optiplex a month later that was wall mounted just for kids to play old school video games on emulationstation in basement...then we moved and I went with proxmox install on a thinclient. Then finally, just because I liked idea of HA yellow and running a dedicated device, I went with a $60 NUC on ebay. Works great, very power efficient, not dealing with usb passthrough issues I had on proxmox and cheaper/better specs than a rpi