Hassio + hyper-v VM

Installation Home Assistant OS
1

I have previously run Hassio on my rpi3 mostly to control z-wave devices (lights, motion sensor) and also Somfy window blinds. This solution has been ok but have had problems with slow reactions and SD-card failures among other things.

So I figured I would move my Homeassistant to my always on “server” running Windows 10 Pro at home for media/storage/backup etc. The simplest solution would be to create a virtual machine with hyper-v as it is set to go and very stable. However after reading up on this I see one major issue, hyper-v won’t allow USB passthrough for my Aeotec Z-stick and my RFXTRX433E tranceiver.

From what I understand these are my options:

  1. Hassio on hyper-v VM with win10pro as host. Buy a Vera plus and set up z-wave devices to it and then also connect RFX tranceiver to it through usb. And then integrate to hassio through Vera add-on.
    This will be another middlehand that I would rather not have. Would prefer letting HA control my devices directly. Vera Plus has gotten quiet som bad reviews online.

  2. Ubuntu with home-assistant on hyper-v + virtualhere : the difference to above is that I could then set up virtualhere client on the ubuntu which hassio doesn’t support. Pass along from USB connected to my host.

This seems like a viable option getting around usb-passthrough. Any negatives to this? I would have prefered running Hassio straight as VM without ubuntu, is there anyway to install Virtualhere client on hass os?

  1. Same as 2 but using ser2net / socat. Or some otherUSB/ethernet software.

What are pros/cons compared to #2 ?

  1. Hass.io on hyper-v + PCIe card with USB slots and using DDA (discrete device assignment) to slot the PCIe with the USB devices to the VM. The big question in regard to this one is if it’s possible or not with Win10Pro as host. From the beginning it was said only Windows server 2016 allowed for DDA. There have been some posts implying Win10 should work as well now. Anyone try this?

  2. Skip hyper-v and instead go with ESXi which allows passing through USB.

I would love to hear some input from the community on the different alternatives above. Any solution I am missing?

2

I actually went with option 6 which wasn’t even listed:

I bought myself a NUC which has both USB/bluetooth. Feels a little wasteful since I already have a powerhouse server up and running. But it felt like too much hassle.

3

Did you install home Assistant directly on the NUC (if so, which OS) or still Win 10 Pro as host with Hyper-V? I have mine running on a Win 10 Pro PC with Hyper-V now but I got some Xiaomi Bluetooth Temperature & Humidity Sensors as a gift. I also have a Win 10 Mini PC which has built in Bluetooth which is currently unused. Would it be possible to have Bluetooth if I run HA on Hyper-V on a PC which has built in Bluetooth?