Hello Everyone - I’m just wrapping up a pretty intense whole-home automation project. I got a quote for a control 4 system + alarm system. it looked like it was going to be about $150K. I figured I could build my own thing way cheaper and it would be more powerful and more fun, and I think I was right.
Home Assistant Yellow
Inovelli White Series Smart Dimmers (about 90 of them, plus fan switches, aux switches)
Konnected.io alarm panel pro tying in existing hardwired alarm components + BLAQ garage door controllers
EVE outlets
EVE door and window sensors (for Alarmo / konnected.io)
Reolink video cameras (tracking and stationary cameras)
Reolink doorbell
Nuki door locks
ASUS NUC running docker / frigate for my NVR
STRONG server cabinet
Araknis 310 router, 210, 220, 310 POE switches
WATTbox power
MeanWell 24v powersupply for RPI devices
Rpi cm5 +Hifiberry Amp4 PRo Hats as amps/music servers for already installed wired whole-home speakers
6 samsung a9 tablets running fully kiosk as wall-mounted tablets + makes by mike tablet mounts
I also found some useful enclosures for the nuc / yellow and some cool power distribution gear for the amps. I’ll post all this with a more detailed build sheet and cost breakdown if it’s useful, but if anyone has any questions about hardware, let me know. I had zero detailed tech experience of any kind before building all this, and learning how it all works was a lot of fun. I’m presently completely jammed up with a companion app commissioning issue that is holding me up. If that doesn’t push me over the edge, I’ll be able to say it’s been great. ask me in a few days…
Why a Home Assistant Yellow if you are installing a NUC and/or a server?
- ASUS NUC running docker / frigate for my NVR
- STRONG server cabinet
i just dedicated the nuc to nvr only and kept ha separate. i have a backup nuc that i may end up swapping out for the yellow and run ha on that device instead if, for instance, i felt like the build was so big it was running slow or something. but so far its been great. the server cabinet just has the whole stack mounted in it including the pi’s / hifiberry hats, power supplies etc.
Multiple servers are hard to manage.
I buy used rack mount servers because I have space and the 8 bays allow for storage capacity. If you’re not an IT system admin I would get a NUC.
Konnected is great
Esphome devices make great sensors and relay controls.
Never used the blaq but it looks like good kit
Samsung tablets could be a pain long term. Crestron 1060 is POE and built for walll control. Search forum for info
Musicassistant may interest you
I loved RaspberryPi in past but their prices increase and small form factor pcs got cheaper and powerful. Esp devices fill in the low end stuff and gpio needs. I avoid RasoberriPi now after having issues with SD card reliability
You can get an amp and connect and esp32 y to o create an audio zone. Music assistant will stream to zone and you’ll have something amazing.
Get onkyo amp for surround areas and roku and you’ll have fully controllable System.
Smart TV is not needed. TV with HDMI CEC connected to a device (Roku/Apple TV) is all you need. You generally can’t avoid smart TVs but just don’t need to seek them out.
HA is not process/storage intense
Video/NVR/Frigate is.
You can run HA side by side. Storage becomes the issue as recordings take space. I have a setup where I got $86 mini pc and 6TB external usb HDD. HA and frigate are on internal nvme and NVR records to external HDD. NVR storage isn’t critical so don’t care about drive fail, just need workin reliable when working. Internal nvme is reliable for OS and config. Been running 2yrs in terribly hot environment without issue.
excellent. Yes, i am running music assistant. each zone is a rpi cm5/hifiberry hat and it works great. you can stream different instances of spotify to every zone if you want. im running yellow on an ssd and its working fine but yes i could just put it all in containers on that one nuc. thats prob what ill do if i have trouble with yellow. the cabinet i built has built in fans so heat has been ok. ill look into onkyo for the surround stuff. i already bought all the samsungs but ill look at the crestron i know nothing about that product.
One warning about konnected.io used as a an alarm controller: It is very amateurish. In that the I/O does not appear to have adequate or any electrical protection/buffering/isolation (don’t see any of this on the images shown on their website) and there is no support for EOL resistors.
Instead of Araknis, choose a router and switch combination from a company that does not target “network clueless” security installers.
Use a real NVR to manage your cameras. It will be more reliable, power efficient and can still provide data to HA. Depends on what you want to do, however.
so far frigate and the nuc have been pretty flawless. training the model is taking a little time, but its been interesting. what would a real nvr do differently? i had clueless installers choose araknis when they put in my wifi, so i sort of got tied into it… I have a resistor in my konnected install and its working well. I really just used konnected because the house had legacy wiring from the 70s and all the contacts worked! I figured it was a no brainer to just plumb them right in and use wireless sensors everywhere else and its working great so far (i set it all up in july). I guess we’ll see. the noonlight integration is also great and noonlight has been fantastic. so far i am really happy with everything EXCEPT this matter /thread network stuff. I cannot get my phone to commision a device anymore and I have absolutely no idea why. I have just about hit the nuclear delete and start over point…except that if i restore an old instance of OTBR i can get it to commission - at least for awhile. So I dunno.
My mistake if Konnected has updated their boards to support EoL. The only thing to be concerned with then are the non-projected inputs.
There isn’t anything wrong with Araknis per say (except that in my experience, they are sort of like a worse version than Unifi) so if it is working for you, then it works. Not something that most network installers would ever choose for a new deployment when even TP-Link makes better, cheaper systems (Omada). Personally, I prefer enterprise switches/hardware which can be found cheaply on eBay.
If you are using Frigate for “AI”, then that is an application that a dedicated NVR may not be as good with. Although many NVRs these days can be trained for recognition tasks. The advantages of a NVRs are reliability (systems run for decades with zero maintenance) and power efficiency.
I’m using custom models from frigate and training them using images from my cameras. I don’t know if its the best thing in the world, I’ve got nothing to compare it to, but its nice that everything is local - nothing is in the cloud, and it’s been fun to learn about. I have no idea what I’m doing, I just jumped into it. The araknis stuff, again I have nothing to compare to, but the web ui is easy to use and understand, and it seems to work great. I never have anything down or drop off, and I have a 310 router and 4 switches that are all araknis POE devices. I’m sure unifi etc. is better, but I can tell you my installer guys tried to sell me a 310 series poe switch for like $1,500 and instead I bought one used on ebay for $200…and it works just fine… so… keep an eye out for that…
So far - and again with no experience to compare it to - I like the customization capability of Frigate+. My house is generally hopping with 3 kids and a wife and all sorts of folks coming and going. Just for fun, I set an automation in HA that chimes through our hardwired speakers when frigate spots a car. Well, guess what happens if you park a car out front? chimechimechime… So, I built a zone and a mask and told frigate to only chime if it spots a car entering or exiting the zone, and ignore parked cars, and built some parameters around how much “new” cars should move and over what time period - now I have three cars parked out front most of the time, but all I get is a nice cheerful little “ding” anytime a NEW car comes down the driveway. It’s super cool. If it dings at 2am - red alert! It does think my kids are cars when they zoom down the driveway on their OneWheels PAST a parked car…but it’s not a big deal. Nothing is perfect…
If you incorporate ai into the mix Google Gemini - Home Assistant then you can do allot more than chime chime chime lol. It can send message to your phone or play message if it spots something specific or just tell you what is sees. I mean frigate is nice but somethings should be done in yaml too 
your project sounds dope!
The problem with this type of alarm system is that they don’t have any method for integrating tamper switches. ie: If someone cuts into the cable and shorts out the signal wires, they bypass the sensor and your system has no idea. That’s why commercial systems have resistors at the sensor and measure for different voltages at the alarm panel, allowing them to detect the difference between the sensor detecting something, or a tamper condition.
EDIT: I see this has already been raised… I should have read the other posts first. Either way, add me as another +1 to the “don’t use konnected” list.
You would be better off coding an ESP32 with ESPhome where you can use a bunch of inputs as analog to digital convertors and utilise the same resistor setup that commercial alarms have. A single ESP32 will give you 18 ADC’s to use as sensor inputs with tamper monitoring.
Asus NUC? Then, money is no object. You can buy perfectly adequate Intel NUC i5 or i7 computers for under $100 on eBay. In fact I just scored a brand new sealed in the box Intel NUC8i5 for $95. I have no immediate need for it, but I couldn’t pass the bargain up.
While many people use the Raspberry Pi or similar for Home Assistant, almost any mini-PC will outperform the Raspberry Pi5 in every metric, except power.
I run my Home Assistant server on an Intel NUC i3 (bare metal), and recently moved my Frigate to an Intel NUC i5 because 6 cameras on Frigate was eating a lot of my RAM.
For your project. One component at a time. If you try to do Everything Everywhere All at Once, then Marvin’s prognostication apples: “This will all end in tears. I just know it.”
So from a practical perspective, if wires are in the wall and only access is ate the panel, how would this be accomplished?
Is the expectation that someone with access to home will bypass before alarm activated? If not how would they gain initial access to bypass?
This is like exploits that require physical access. I mean yeah it’s a possibility but are you really worried about 007 breaking in to steal your Xbox? Maybe a hard no is a bit too far but it’s good to be aware of issue that may be important to your use case
That’s not the case though. The wires are available at the sensor as well. I used to install commercial security systems and there is a reason ALL manufacturers have tamper detection. It’s also handy as a giveaway that a mouse or rat has chewed a cable.
Agree the intel nucs are better, they don’t pull much more than the rpi’s tho either, I have power monitoring outlets and my n150 sits around 12watts I’d recommend the nuc + an Orin mini users report it’s fast as heck
Ok, I understand what you mean. You’re correct. As a practical matter, the wired open/close sensors are buried in the wall and not accessible unless you open a window or a door - and you certainly wouldn’t know where to cut to get to the wires without opening it. However, the bigger picture is that (if you managed to get past the exterior video cameras somehow) wouldn’t you just break the window, anyway? I mean, you’re not digging into the side of my house with a saw to try to find a binary sensor wire, right? you’d just break the window. The Konnected panel is on a battery backup, so you can’t cut a wire to it, and so is my server / switch / router stack, so the LAN won’t go down on a power loss. I’ve got a cell failover for the wifi, so cutting that line doesn’t help. Even if you DID break a window, you’d have to get past all the wireless motion sensors to get to the panel, which is in the center of the house. I haven’t looked into glass break sensors, but that’s certainly an option if I was worried about it. Maybe if I was a BANK I’d want something more, but I’m not sure I see a reason for this application.
I’ll say this with the caveat that it’s still early and there is plenty of time for me to hate it and throw it all away, but on the whole, I’m impressed with both the noonlight integration and the Konnected panel - they’re fantastic, and Frigate is working exactly as advertised. All my wireless devices are EVE sensors and they’ve been flawless as well. My quote for an alarm360 alarm system and a few video cameras was $12k and $65 a month for… ever. I bet I’ve got 2k in the alarm system and noonlight is $10 a month, and if I had to do it over again on a tight budget - I could do it way cheaper. If you want to put in your own alarm system and you don’t want to be in the cloud or spending $40+ a month for “monitoring” I really can’t come up with a reason not to give the whole thing two enthusiastic thumbs up. Can recommend. I’ll circle back in a few months and let you know how it’s gone. We’ll see.
Sounds like you are good with Frigate so ignore my advice about a NVR. If you have a system that works for you, then definitely stick with it.
Whether tamper protection is important to you is something you will need to decide. Or maybe, your insurance company may need to decide. Check to see what they support for alarm systems. They may not allow non-certified systems. And if you are considering connecting life saving devices to a non-certified system, then definitely don’t.
A real alarm panel (Vista, DCS, etc) isn’t very expensive and is already certified for use. It can be interfaced with HA to provide data fairly easily.
From an electronics perspective, my issue with Konnected is that they provide no buffer/isolation to the inputs beyond the minimum. If you get a decent lightening strike nearby, you’d be surprised how much power is induced on those long wires. Static electricity, induction from large motors/lighting near by, etc. Blowing out inputs may not be a big concern for, but in any alarm application, false triggering can not be allowed to happen.
I installed my commercial alarm system myself which also connects locally to HA via a custom UART interface. Cost far less than those figures and zero ongoing costs.