Basics - recommendation for environment and set up

Configuration
1

Hello all,

completely new to HA I have been trying to read up in advance and make important decisions based on that. It would be very nice if you could give recommendations for a good approach to avoid initial mistakes that are difficult to revise

Project Objectives:
Heating control and monitoring
Switching lights, shutters, etc.
Condition monitoring
Consumption monitoring
Sensible automations
Important functions like light switching must also work in case of HA failure
Easy handling and administration
Dynamic growth
Security

Building:
4 levels each approx. 200 m², total 16 rooms

Existing hardware and software
Intel NUC6CAYH for HA possibly also other tasks
Server VM Ware with several Windows VM > at limit
Server Windows not virtualized
Network Ubiquiti Unifi, Lan in almost all rooms, complete WIFI coverage (AC Pro) Cloud Key
Gen2 Plus, some cameras, VPN
3CX phone system, Snom phones, Gigaset Dect phones
Generous Lan cabling (Cat7)
Old 4 wire phone cabling in many areas Free > possibly bus system?
Available for testing - purchase depending on final design
Aeotec Z-Stick Gen5, Eurotronic Z-Wave+ radiator drives, Z-Wave temperature sensors.
Shelly 1 and 2, Shelly HAT

Ideas
Intel NUC - Bare Mettal or Docker? > Hass.io for simplicity?
NUC in central location with Z-Stick (hop limiting).
Z-Wave radiator thermostats some wired Z-Wave+ devices > mesh.
Other wired switches, dimmers, etc. Shelly
Integration of different systems in HA where useful
Other devices possibly waiting for progress of project Connected Home over IP
HA, Mosquitto, Visual Studio Code, Samba, Influx, Grafana, OpenZWave or classic?

What can you recommend? Thank you very much for your support.

2

One of the features of Home Assistant is that whatever you do on one system in home assistant can be easily backed up and reinstalled on another home assistant system…the backup is portable.

If it were me, I’d start with the NUC and install HA supervised under Debian (with or without a desktop). Very easy to install mosquito, samba, ssh as supervisor addins in home assistant. I’d use a z-wave stick (be careful if you buy an aeotec stick).

3

Thank you ghstudio,

have a current Debian running on the NUC and managed to install and get running HA.
As I am not very familiar with Linux I thought it would be better to install homeassistant OS for more simplicity > get the option to install and manage other programs like Mosquitto etc. trough the GUI of HA.
Machine restart options at GUI…

As you have seen I find probles getting the HA OS on the NUC

What about Z Wave pros and cons of Z-Wave and OpenZWave (beta) > via Mosquitto?
What is the problem with the Aeotic Z-Stick Gen5? Model I have is ZW090-C

Best Christof

4

There is a problem using the Aeotec Z-Stick Gen5 with a RPi4. See this thread:

Solutions seem to be:

  • Use a USB hub between the Z-Stick and the RPi4
  • Do some surgery on the Z-stick
  • Replace the old Z-Stick with the new Aeotec Z-Stick Gen5+ - which works with the RPi4

I took the last option, and migrated my ZWave network from the old stick to the new one using Aeotec’s migration tool.

5

Hi Geoff,

thank you for letting me know. I have the Gen5 from an older project here.
Plan to use a Intel NUC for the project. So if problem is only RPi4 should be no deal or is there problems with the Z-Stick Gen5 as well on the NUC?
Maybe anyhow use an USB hub as space on NUC housing is tight in order to create space for a ZigBee stick and in order to get ideal position for the antenna of the Z-Stick

6

Old ZWave integration:
pro’s

  • stable
  • well integrated into HA

con’s

  • only supports version 1.4 of OpenZwave. Newer ZWave Plus devices may not be supported out of the box.
  • Restarting HA forces restart of ZWave network

QT OpenZwave (beta) + Mosquitto
pro’s

  • uses version 1.6 of OpenZwave
  • touted as the future by the HA project team
  • the developer apparently works on both the QT OpenZWave (beta) project and the OpenZwave project itself
  • runs in a separate Docker instance so the ZWave network runs independently of HA itself.

con’s

  • It’s a beta; lots of unfinished bits, particularly in the UI integration with HA.
  • the ZWave admin tool is crude, but it works.

There are also other ZWave projects, e.g.

For the moment, I’ve gone with the QT OpenZWave (Beta) addon. It works for me.

7

Should be no problem. At one time I was using the Gen5 stick on an NUC (with Domoticz) and there was no issue. The issue with the Gen5 and the RPI4 is a hardware issue that apparently only arises when the Gen5 is plugged directly into an RPi4.

8

Just to clarify your post…you have to use a USB 2.0 (not 3.x) hub between the old Aeotec and the RPI 4.

1 Like
9

thank you

this is the info needed will go with OpenZwave (Beta) ad on and a USB 2 Hub

10

Thank you all for now,
have HA running in Core version in Containers and installed Mosquitto, OpenZwave in seperate Containers. Working on onboarding devices