I just released a new track on SoundCloud called "электромузыкальный инструмент Терменвокс" (Electric Musical Instrument Theremin). It samples a recording of Leon Theremin introducing his invention the "Theremin" invented in 1928. Since I have always been fascinated with this early electrical instrument I wanted to build a track around it for a long time. I chose to combine this with LoFi House since I think it conveys a certain vintage feel.

Check it out on SoundCloud!

In this post I describe the current setup of my home automation system as well as some past developments. Finally, I will also detail what I have planned for the future.

History

My Home Automation journey started as I was gifted an old original Google Home smart speaker, and a Philipps Hue Bridge with 2 white and color bulbs. I quickly connected the speaker and used the Google Home App to add the Hue system into the mix. While one speaker and some bulbs were enough for my dorm room I quickly outgrew this setup when moving to my current 2-bedroom apartment. Eventually I added additional bulbs for everywhere possible and multiple Google Nest smart speakers. For the kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom I added regular size Google Nests and for the living room a Nest Mini. That is due to the fact I already had nice speakers in the living room so the Nest Mini was mainly for voice control.

Because I wantedmore control over my WiFi as well and the signal was quite weak in my kitchen I decided to add a Google WiFi Router to my system with an additional mesh hub near my kitchen. This mesh setup worked quite nicely and additionally the mesh hub serves as a speaker and smart voice control. I really like the idea that the router can easily be configured via an app. However, I do feel like some more advanced options are not available.

My system continued to grow and I added three more components: a smart TV, smart power strip, and smart vacuum cleaner.

As smart TV I opted to go with a Philips Android TV. It runs Android so it ties in nicely to the Google Home system. Further, it comes with Ambilight which I quite like and Google Cast included.

The power strip I got is a nice Koogeek KLOE4 with four sockets and 4 USB ports additionally. Through their app it was easily possible to add to my smart home system.

The final piece I added was a Roomba smart vacuum cleaner. While I really enjoy cooking the other housework I could do without. That is why I really like a vacuum robot. Again it could be added easily to my system and controlled either through the Google Home Dashboard or via voice control. I also set it to clean at the same time everyday.

Issues

• Not all bulb sockets support Philips Hue. In my bathroom I have special bulbs I thought were GU10 at first. However, they are slightly different. This leaves me in a situation where most of the rooms are in the smart light system while others are still operated manually. Eventualy I plan to add these rooms as well either through SwitchBots or something like Shellys. More On that in Planned Setup.
• When running the Roomba everyday you have to remember to keep the surroundings clean so it does not suck in cables and the like. This is why I disabled this routine at some point and only run it manually now.
• There are two reasons I eventually turned away from a wholly Google-based system: 1) I wanted more in-depth control over my smart home 2) I started to feel uncomfortable in general with the amount of data Google collects. Thus, having a Google smart speaker in every rooma and a Google Router was not ideal. Therefore, I eventually sold all Google hardware and switched to a more open and controlled solution based on Home Assistant.

Current Setup

This is a quick overview of most devices in my smart home system:

• Home Assistant on Raspberry Pi
• ZigBee stick (Philips Hue, Tradfri bulbs, Tradfri switches)
• Roomba
• Smart TV
• Printer
• Router
• Smart power strip
• Server

As mentioned above my current setup is based on Home Assistant. When I searched for an open source smart home solution several years ago I first stumbled upon the Java-based OpenHab. This still seems like a nice solution but Home Assistant has a much larger community and cleaner and more modern look. That is why I chose it. When I got a Raspberry Pi 4B with 8GB RAM it was the perfect opportunity for me to run Home Assistant. After the straightforward installation it was easy to add Philips Hue, Roomba, and my smart TV.

I subsequently sold all my Nest smart speakers and switched to a different router. To my surprise it was also straightforward to add my printer and router to Home Assistant. This way I can monitor ink levels and internet connections and even use these for automations.

I also expanded my lighting setup. As Philips Hue is quite expensive I searched for alternatives. I found quite cheap ZigBee based bulbs from IKEA. As ZigBee is an open standard also used by Philips Hue it is possible to add these to a Hue Bridge. Further, IKEA also adds under cabinet kitchen lights with ZigBee so I could light my kitchen as well.

With this setup I was already quite content. However, several parts were still non open-source and not completely under my control: my smart TV, Philips Hue, and my smart power strip. For my smart TV I tried out Kodi on an old Raspberry Pi I still had lying around. This was a nice solution. However, the old hardware was unable to run Kodi smoothly. Because there was a severe Raspberry Pi shortage at that time I was unable to get a newer one for a reasonable price. That is why I discontinued Kodi. I will definitely return to it at some point!

Philips Hue was easily replacable with a simple ZigBee stick. I went with the Phoscon Conbee II. It supports a wide range of devices and is easily integrated into Home Assistant. It completely replaced my Hue Bridge. Another nice touch is that I could add IKEA Tradfri smart switches so guests without the Home Assitant app are able to switch lights as well.

The last component that was still dependant on a chinese cloud was my Koogeek power strip. Luckily, I found the Tasmota project which provides a local replacement for ESP-based devices. It works by faking an update server that way replacing the stock firmware with Tasmota. The official website does not have a configuration for my exact power strip. Luckily I found one here. After flashing Tasmota I could add the power strip to Home Assistant through MQTT. For that I installed the Mosquitto Broker.

As my Google Nest devices had to go I no longer have smart speakers. Voice control and multiroom audio was nice, though. I briefly tested out snapcast for multiroom audio and MyCroft as voice assistant on the old Raspberry Pi with a connected webcam mic. Especially snapcast worked quite nicely. MyCroft still had some problems. The plan to run this setup in every room was cut short by the Raspberry Pi shortage. Eventually I plan to add speakers with something like a Raspberry Pi Mini running snapcast to every room for multiroom audio. Right now I am waiting for the Home Assitant voice assistant to mature so then I can use that.

In a different post I detail my current server setup. I also monitor and control this server in Home Assistant through the TrueNAS integration.

Automations

These are some of the automations I use in Home Assistant:

• Lights out when everyone leaves
• Lights on when someone comes back home and it is dark
• TV lights when TV turns on
• Run Roomba everyday
• Notifications for low battery/ink

Discontinued

As of right now I have discontinued multiroom audio with snapcast and Mopidy as music system, Mycroft, Kodi, and everything Google.

Planned Setup

In the future I plan to expand my setup a lot. One of the most important additions for me would be multiroom audio. For that I need a nice pair of speakers in every room to which a Raspberry Pi Mini is connected running snapcast. Then a central Raspberry Pi would run Mopidy over MPD as a music player. Also I would add spotify control through something like Raspotify. I already tried and tested this setup. Once I have this setup it would be worth checking out whether a DAC like the HifiBerry improves the sound quality. One thing I would yet have to figure out is a nice interface to group rooms and control which music the zones are playing in Home Assistant.

After I set up this multiroom audio system I would like to add voice again. If the Home Assistant Voice Assistant already matured by that point this could be an option. Other options I consider are Mycroft and Rhasspy Rhasspy. The latter is nice since it runs fully locally. However I could not find a nice solution to conduct a web search as fallback. Once this component is implemented I want to connect the voice assistant and multiroom audio. Every single speaker should be able to record a command and respond accordingly. Also starting music in different zones should be possible. Since I plan on using Raspberry Pi Minis they are probably not powerfull enough for voice control. An option would be to use every Raspberry Pi Mini as "satellite" which records the voice, sends it back to a central processor and responds with the corresponding answer.

I would also like to add additional smart sockets. Preferably ones that are able to monitor energy usage. I could use them for my dryer or dishwasher and trigger automations once the cycles finish.

Further, it would be nice to add even more automations. Right now I mainly have a smart home with controls but not really automated yet. One option I looked into is a bed occupancy sensor based on weight cells that could for example turn off lights, music, and TV when I lie down at night.

The last planned addition in the near future is to bring all lights into the smart home control including the ones with weird sockets. One option would be to use something like a SwitchBot Bot. This is a simple device that physically presses buttons like a light switch. This way I could switch the bathroom lights. A more involved and professional option would be to use something like Shellys. These are small relays you put under a light switch in a wall controllable via WiFi. The nice thing is that you do not see them and can still use your normal light switches and bulbs. If this option works nicely I would like to eventually switch to Shellys only and ditch the smart bulbs. That way visitors are able to easily understand the system while I could switch it via Home Assistant.

Obviously there are many more options for a smart home. I am constantly monitoring what is on the open source market.

In this post I detail the current setup I own camera-wise. It will be updated continuously based on the newest information.

Polaroid

SX-70

My first Polaroid was an SX-70 from the 70s. Specifically the Alpha model without Tripod mount. It is a fantastic camera as its lens is completely made of glass and its body of metal. Also, it is a shutter lens reflex camera which means when viewing through the gorgeous viewfinder you look directly out of the lens which makes it a joy to compose images. Finally, it completely folds down which is a nice party trick and makes it nice and portable. When folding up it oftentimes feels like I am breaking the camera as it requires a little more force as you would think. It is really sturdily built, though. One downside, compared to later Polaroid cameras, is that you need to set the focus manually which can be especially annoying in suboptimal lighting conditions. As an upgrade to the very first SX-70 model this model comes with a guide and additionally with markings helping you to focus. After buying this camera I also got some original accessories like a self-timer, some flashes, a sun shade, a flash diffuser, the 1.5 Tele Lens, a tripod mount, and a cable release. The most worthwile ones in my opinion are the self timer, tripod mount, and cable release. I was able to take some gorgeous selfies and nighttime photos using these. As the camera does not have a tripod mount the tripod adapter is absolutely necessary in my opinion. The sun shade is also handy in really bright conditions. The tele Lens does enable some nice portrait photos but I do not use it too often. I personally never used the flash diffuser as I never took closeups using flash. I got a bag of 10 original flash bars for cheap. Each of them contains 10 flash bulbs. The way they work is that the bulbs burn through everytime you take a photo. They do produce a super bright flash in the process. What I found is that pictures using flash usually turn out too bright for me. When I correct the exposure time down they look good. Also it is hard to set the focus correctly in dark conditions.

600

Later I also started using a 600 camera. Namely, the Polaroid Impulse. Since it is from the 80s it now comes with a full plastic body. Which makes it way lighter. The viewfinder is next to the actual lens which you always have to correct for when taking photos. It comes with a frog tongue which protects the photo in the first vulnerable moments when coming out. This camera does have a flash built in. Also focus is now fully automatic. For me this is a nice camera for taking quick snapshots as it determines automatically where to focus and if flash is needed. Photos usually turn out really well. Since there are a lot more 600 film based polaroids this type of film is more ubiquitous and more easily found. In Berlin it is possible to find both. For example Safelight or Fotoimpex. At some point I would like to get a filter for my SX-70 to be able to also shoot the higher ASA 600 film with it.

Super 8

The Super 8 camera I own is the Bolex 155 Macrozoom. It was built in Switzerland in the 60s. It is built like a tank and makes a fantastic design piece. It is the successor to the Bolex 150 with the main advantage that it is possible to focus anything from a distance of 1 inch up to infinity. For the motor it takes simple AA batteries. The only issue is the light meter which requires two PX-13 1.35v mercury cells. Since mercury was found to be dangerous these are not produced anymore. Even though they made fantastic batteries. The "official" replacement is the 625 battery. Unfortunately it is 1.5V which will cause the light meter to always be slightly off and the resulting film to be underexposed. One option is to manually correct during filming. Since Super 8 film and development is quite expensive I went for a different route. The WeinCell zinc-air battery comes with exactly the same voltage. Two downsides are that it is more expensive and it will deplete even when not used. That is why it comes with a tab. Be sure to buy extra as they are not available everywhere. I already had the problem that I wanted to start filming while on holidays and my WeinCell was empty. Apparently some people build adapters for other kinds of batteries which I might try at some points as it is a cheaper route. I usually buy film at Click & Surr a nice store in Berlin focusing on Super8 filmography. You can get the film directly with Andec development included. They also sell lots of other Super8 accessories like splicers, film leaders, film spools, cameras, and projectors. The nice thing is that their cameras and projectors are thoroughly tested and guaranteed. My camera came out cheaper through eBay. In order to test the functionality I needed to buy, film, and develop a whole film with it. So, had it not worked the Click & Surr route would have been cheaper.

Hi8

As a high camera I own the SONY CCD-TR750E from the 90s. I was able to buy a new Hi8 casette from Amazon. As they ceased production some years ago it was held in storage. Nevertheless, it works marvelously. For digitization I use a simple S-Video to USB converter similar to this one. Using OBS it is simple to digitize that way. After digitization I just record on the same tape again. That way Hi8 is a cheap format for filming analog film. Quality will probably regress once I took many recordings. At that point I would just buy a new tape.

Double Super 8

I inherited a Soviet Krasnogorsk Double Super 8 camera.
Double Super 8 is an exciting format since it has a significantly longer runtime than super 8 due to a trick. The actual film is 16mm wide. Only half of it gets exposed at one time. After half has been exposed the film needs to be placed into the camera in reverse to expose the other half. At the end after development the film gets spliced in half and attached at the ends to obtain double the runtime.

Notes on Development

It is not trivial to get Super 8 and Double Super 8 film developed. Luckily in Berlin, my hometown, a lab developing all kinds of motion picture film survived. I can only highly recommend to get the film developed at Andec. It is also possible to send the film via mail if you are not in Berlin and they will send it back developed. Digital Scans will be provided via DropBox. This lab does develop everything from Super 8 all the way to 35mm cinematic motion picture film. Also, I believe it is the only lab in the world that offers transfering negative Super 8 to positive Super 8 for projection. I usually directly film on positive film (color reversal) as I really enjoy the experience of projecting the developed film in my living room. It just gives another feel to it. As projector I bought a simple old Eumig.

In this post I describe my current hardware setup. It will be constantly updated whenever something changes. The old setup will still be included so you can see the history nicely. As of right now I have two pieces of hardware acting as servers. One is primarily a NAS server while the other runs Home Assistant and some other additional services.

1. NAS Server

This server acts as a NAS. After doing some research in 2022 I decided to go with FreeNAS as it seemed to fit all my requirements. The most important ones were that it is open-source and free. Therefore, it is truly customizable by the user. Based on FreeBSD it also supports a plethora of additional software. Last year I actually upgraded to TrueNAS Scale. It is based on Linux and thus compatible to even more software. The upgrade was smooth and it also runs with much less effort than FreeNAS. More on that later.

As the hardware options are sheer endless I drew inspiration from the FreeNAS community hardware guide. The following is the hardware I went with:

1. Motherboard: Supermicro X11SSH-F with a 1151 Intel CPU Socket
2. Processor: Intel Core i3-6100 (2x 3.70GHz)
3. RAM: Samsung 16 GB (2x8GB) DDR4-2133 ECC PC4-17000E M391A1G43DB0-CPBQ
4. HDD: Seagate ST4000VN000 4TB (3x)
5. SSD: Samsung PM961 256GB M.2 2280 SSD
6. Power Supply: Dell Precision T1650 320 Watt ATX Power Supply
7. Case: Enermax Staray ATX MidiTower Black

First, let me shortly describe my usage so you can get a feel of what I evaluate the hardware on. My main usage of the NAS is as a media server. For that I use the superb and open source software "JellyFin". I tied in Radarr, Sonarr, Lidarr, Prowlarr, and Overseerr (actually the Jellyseerr fork) for smooth downloading. Next, I run NextCloud as my own personal cloud file server. To this instance I also sync contacts, and calendar. I also run Immich, a nice image gallery, for accessing and organising my images. Additionally I use the server for backups and run some other small stuff. I will also release a post that goes more in-depth. This will also describe which other software I tried out, why I stuck with the one above and what I like and don't like about it. Now, let's continue with an evaluation of my hardware based on my workload.

The Supermicro Motherboard is a sturdy workforce as its intended use is also in servers. I went with an ECC capable motherboard for extra peace of mind. Accordingly I also chose 16GB of ECC RAM. 16GB performs nicely. However, by adding more and more functionality to the server at times the RAM will be completely used. Therefore, I plan to upgrade to 32GB in the forseeable future. The X11SSH-F motherboard luckily provides me with 2 additional RAM slots.

The processor is totally sufficient for my usage. It is able to run all the services with ease and usage is barely maxed out.

The HDD I mainly chose since I had one of these lying around from an old Synology NAS. While Synology software is definitely super nice I wanted more customizability and thus went the route of FreeNAS, and now TrueNAS Scale. I opted for 3 to be able to run RAIDZ so when one of the hard drives fails I still have all the data. Sizewise I completely underestimated what I would need and almost all of it is now used up. As it is not straightforward to add more storage to ZFS RAIDZ I plan on adding 3 4TB HDDs in addition effectively doubling the size. This time probably with a higher RAIDZ level.

I chose an M.2 SSD mainly for the operating system and swap. The capacity is not that big but by far enough for this utility. It is able to boot TrueNAS Scale rapidly and runs efficiently.

The power supply I chose mainly based on its 80+ Gold rating. As the server is intended to be on 24/7 power consumption is actually important. So far I have no complaints. It is able to power my selected hardware nicely.

As I bought a used case I did not care too much about specifics. My demands were mainly that it is a) cheap, and b) able to house all the components. The Enermax case fit that bill nicely. I like the feature of tool-less HDD mounts. I also added 3 additional fans to keep everything nice and cool.

To summarize: I am quite happy with my hardware of choice and would only recommend it. The only thing I should have definitely sized bigger is the amount of storage and possibly RAM. As I built this server myself it is easy to upgrade.

2. Raspberry Pi

I got a Raspberry Pi 4B with 8GB RAM. As this is quite a nice piece of hardware I also use it as a server for home automation mainly. On it I run Home Assistant to control and monitor all my smart home devices as well as my NAS. Furthermore, I run a reverse proxy on this Raspberry Pi to connect to all the services running in my local network through only one open port. I reach my network through a dynamic DNS. I will describe this setup in more detail in a future post as this one focuses on hardware.

I house this Raspberry Pi in a case with an included fan and heatsinks. As this fan got quite loud I usually disconnect it. The Pi still keeps cool enough with the heatsinks alone. With 8GB RAM it is more than enough to run my Home Automation.

Cold brewed coffee is a method of preparing coffee that does not involve traditional brewing. Instead, the coffee grounds are immersed into cold water for a prolonged period (above 12 hours). That way the distinct coffee aroma gets passed onto the water.

This method, also called dutch coffee, sounds strange to most. Isn't coffee usually brewed near boiling temperature? While that is the usual way for preparing coffee "brewing" cold comes with some advantages. The first is that coffee beans contain an immense amount of distinct aromas. Some of these get burned at the usual higher temperatures. Cold brewed coffee will also have less acidity which makes it a plus for people normal coffee is to acid for.

For these reasons cold brew coffee has become really popular recently. After all it produces a nice smooth glass of coffee. It is by no means a new invention, though. It is likely that the dutch brought it to Japan as a means of drinking coffee on their ships without boiling. After it got popularized in Japan, especially Kyoto. From there it became a global phenomenon a few years back.

This is my simple recipe for cold brew coffee I have used for many years. It yields around 500ml.

Recipe

Ingredients:

• 50g Coffee Beans
• 500ml Cold Water

This produces a high-concentration coffee. I prefer it that way. Feel free to add water for dillution according to your tastes. It is also possible to produce an even higher concentration and thus gain more cold brew in the end.

1. Grind coffee beans quite coarse. I use ~35-40 clicks on my Comandante C40 MK3.
2. Add the coffee grounds to a jar large enough for stirring.
3. Add water to jar after filtering. I use a simple Brita filter.
4. Cover and put into fridge between 12 and 24 hours. Stir at random intervals.
5. Use coffee filter to filter out coffee grounds. I just use my V60 filters. Either drink resulting cold brew or store it airtight. Another fun twist is to freeze the cold brew in a ice cube mold to obtain cold brew ice cubes. These can be added to all kinds of iced coffee drinks. I particularly like doing a cold brew Tonic with cold brew ice cubes.
6. Enjoy! Either pure, add milk, or anything you prefer.