OpenThread Border Router (OTBR) RPC firmware for R21 based ConBee II and RaspBee II

Hardware
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FYI, dresden-elektronik is developing an OpenThread RCP firmware for ConBee II and RaspBee II:

It will not make it support multi-protocol like Nabu Casa’s Silicon Lab s Multi-PAN RCP firmware images for Home Assistant SkyConnect (and Home Assistant Yellow built-in 802.15.4 radio), but it will at least allow you to repurpose your old ConBee II or RaspBee II by reflashing it into a dedicated OpenThread Border Router (OTBR).

This alternative ConBee II or RaspBee II firmware is still in very early development, however, dresden-elektronik’s developers have stated their goal is to make this new OpenThread firmware image compatible with Home Assistant’s Thread and OTBR integrations/add-ons, e.i. allow you to form or join a Thread network and make Home Assistant a Thread Border Router:

https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/thread/

https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/otbr/

https://github.com/home-assistant/addons/tree/master/openthread_border_router

Thread-based consumer devices use one of the two Home Automation standards: Matter or HomeKit. So in the future using this OpenThread RCP firmware on a ConBee 2 or RaspBee 2 adapter will allow adding Thread-based device directly to Home Assistant, using the respective Home Assistant integration:

https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/

https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/homekit/

https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2023/02/08/state-of-matter-and-thread/

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This sounds quite interesting as I do have 2 Conbee II sticks.
I also noticed today there is a stand alone Thread firmware available for the SkyConnect now, but not sure how well it works as I flashed it as an experiment and ZHA still detects the SkyConnect, but won’t set it up and the Home Assistant OTB is not detecting it

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USB Discovery reads the description from the USB-to-Serial converter chip’s EEPROM so it will continue to detect it unless you rewrite the description on the EEPROM of the the USB-to-UART bridge chip which is seperate from the application firmware, (e.i. not in the same firmware), otherwise just need to click ignore, see:

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Thanks for the information.

Might be something to consider adding to firmware at some time, but yes I can ignore the ZHA for now.
Just have to work out how to get the OTBR integration to work with it :blush:

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