Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+. Older kit, and it gets worked pretty hard with between Tensorflow Lite and digesting eight 1080p camera streams. But it holds temperatures at about 55°C with a mounted fan.

I have a Unraid server and I use a Linux VMS to run it

So far so good. Raspberry Pi Zero W with HassOS. Just "temporarily"...

I am currently running it on my gaming pc, but am thinking about getting an Apple Mac mini. m1 with it's marvelous energy efficiency to run it there. Don't know if I should go with docker or run the server on Mac OS directly or maybe with VMs, but I am not sure about virtualization on the m1 machines, not a lot of content around about this. I also would love to have a Plex server setup, so maybe with an external ssd connected to that m1 Mac mini can make it work. Also great videos, thanks buddy

Lenovo m920s i5 8500 with 32gb ram..windows 10 + virtual box. I don't know esxi so well although I hear something called proxmox is interesting apparently.

😂 i feel the same. Only Network Chuck was to blame. 😋

buy her a gift with a similar price tag.kzfaq.infogaming/emoji/7ff574f2/emoji_u1f60b.png

Thank you, appreciate it! Enjoy the journey!!

It's good you've experienced them all, and yes virtualize all the things!

@@EverythingSmartHome Hello, I'm actually wondering what the 'virtualize all the things' means. Do you mean that one could have (let's use my intended setup for an example) Home Assistant, NAS Server and Linux/Windows PC to use and have it all on separate virtual machines so one 'going down' wont make the others go down?

​@@madpancake9891yeah pretty much, for example i have a server running proxmox (hypervisor) which acts as the main operating system. From here I can create multiple virtual machines to run different services. For example windows for Plex server and Linux for mail server. Basically I have one computer that pretends to be many computers

Hey Lewis...good name 😅 it's a fair point although VMWare has supported USB pass-through for a long time. The only major player out there who hasn't supported this is Hyper-V to my knowledge, and there are many other reasons other than that that I would discourage people from using Hyper-V. But yep something to take into consideration but there is always ways around that problem! Thanks for commenting and kind words!

@@EverythingSmartHome Ha, likewise :) It's funny actually, I used ESXi for a long time but was forever annoyed by the absolutely diabolical throughput when copying data off the server and its rather lacklustre performance grinding away at a hardware backed RAID10 disk config and seemingly achieving nothing much but burning electricity. Switching to Hyper-V (literally just Hyper-V, not the full fat Windows Server with Hyper-V installed) saved literally days of data copying and, bar the lack of the USB pass-through feature, it has been pretty plain sailing. Who knows, VMware might have fixed that throughput issue but Hyper-V has actually been really good for me. As an IT pro myself, I am curious what your other reasons for discouraging Hyper-V are but that could end in a healthy debate that perhaps neither of us truly want to engage in :)

I've had a conbee 2 running using virtualbox for months, but it suddenly has started acting up the last few. USB passthrough is still a finnicky beast to get reliable. i'm considering moving to a raspi 4 to just be done with it

Sounds like your going a nice natural progression of all the HA options there are! Thanks for the support, let me know how the new server goes!

Thanks Andrew, and agree!

Hi, How can you tell if what you are buying works? I'd like to move up from a Pi 3b.

You must be itching for that blue to arrive!! Thank you my friend 🙏

Thanks Nicolas! Appreciate your support as always! 🙏

Thanks, I would love to hopefully at some point!

And what’s your conclusion is the best hardware for this apps?

Try a Asus ROG board find a older one for cheap

Thank you sir, appreciate it! 🙏 P.s, drop me a line in discord, I'd love to know who you are!! 🤣

What processor and how much ram? Would the Dell Wyse 5050 or 5070 be better for what will be 150-200 devices including 3-4 cameras and possibly running Frigate?

Sounds like a great little system!

Thank you my friend, appreciate you! 🙏

Haha nice one Paul, yes that's one thing is the electricity bill!!

@@EverythingSmartHome two servers, one (big) PoE switch and an Omada controller...... 450W 24/7/365

Yeah fairly takes its toll, I was using 1100w at the other house for 3 servers and 2 x 48 Poe switches as well as some micro servers..they were not happy when they got the power bill 🤣

@@EverythingSmartHome Ouch! You've made me feel a whole lot better!

Yep also good, I've still got one running a firewall somewhere!

Cool, haven't heard or seen that one before!

Nice, we have similar setups!

Were you on a raspberry pi before going to the mac mini? Did you notice a difference in speed/reliability?

Thank you sir! I run ESXI but wouldn't recommend the free version of it, there are better options like Proxmox for free over the free version of ESXI. I'm lucky enough to be able to use the full version which is a completely different story. So I would recommend Proxmox for you personally. That sounds like a good idea, again I would run VMs rather than just straight docker but entirely up to you! Haha love it, make sure to jump in the discord if you need help or just want to come hang out with us!

@@EverythingSmartHome thanks for the advice - much appreciated.

Agree, excellent value for the performance!

Thanks! I prefer VM personally 😅

Yes you need to use etcher on the SSD/HDD that is going on your laptop with the x86_x64 generic image from HASS website.

Nice, the T320s are great, I've got 2 around somewhere!

Thanks! Unfortunately unlikely as I don't have one of these and don't have need for one at this moment in time, apologies

Sounds like your getting a ton of value there and a nice setup!

@@EverythingSmartHome Thanks!! :-). I did appreciate the video, I felt a little validated. I must have been inspired, too, because after watching the video I literally just got H.A. installed in the last few minutes. I'm not even sure what do do next, now. I have a bunch of Sonoff things in the boxes (the zigbee bridge and all of the sensors) but I guess I am supposed to replace firmware on those, so that'll wait a bit... (Tasmota), I have zigbee switches from GE in the house already (which, for those, I'm not sure what to do about alexa - I still want voice control). I don't now how the pieces actually fit together. The Reolinks might be a decent place to start, since they're not in service, and I doubt I have to install firmware. But I'm not sure what the right software is for that. Everything is a rabbit hole. I know I'm supposed to install MQTT, but I don't exactly know why yet. (and in the wings are some nodemcus for other projects once I'm comfortable). I guess I'll try to tackle the reolinks?

Hey that's awesome well done! Come join us on discord, we have a large community who helps each other out 😅

​@@EverythingSmartHome OK - A discord rabbit hole? I'm in. Maybe in the morning, as it's 5:30am and I'm exhausted. The 'advanced method' has left me without the supervisor store. I'm currently wondering if it's worth it for me to put it on an actual VM instead of a freenas jail. Maybe that's something for the discord tomorrow. G'nite, and thanks again for the kick in the pants to get started.

I understand your pain with Hyper-V, I try to steer people away from Hyper-V as much as possible these days 😟 There might not be a benefit in terms of performance BUT you could look at in terms of a benefit of expanding your knowledge and experience 😁

I'm running HA in Hyper-V, I was able to pass USB devices that are USB to Serial adaptors (zigbee or zwave dongle) but it is not 100% reliable. I have a conbee2 so I'm running deconz in the same windows machine that has hyper-v, but in windows

Awesome! No they only take E5s from what I remember

I don't know a lot about Home Assistant, I don't even use one yet, but I know that you can install it on Linux, which is way more stable than Windows.

Nice one Mark, I'm sure you'll enjoy the new system when it arrives if it hasn't already! Yes you really can't beat used office pcs for price to performance!

Thanks John! It would really depend on how many cameras, what resolution etc but its definitely not a bad place to start!

Haha maybe one day we will get there 😅 thanks, all the best!

How does this setup perform? I also have an HP T520. Doesn’t Proxmox use too much resources?

​@@pmeinma It performs well enough, opening HA is instant and no obvious delay is present when executing an action trough zigbee or wifi trough ESPhome. I don't have camara's or extensive data visualization integrated in HA. Proxmox itself is very responsive. I did not update to PVE 7 yet, I am still on 6.4.

That should work! Do you have one?

Depends on how hard you run each of those things but sure they are good little servers

Haha for sure I hear you!

ESXI, Proxmoxx etc. Here i have a NUCi5, with 32GB of memory. Besides HA it runs some VM's, with no hassle.

@@wotnix thanks for your reply, is this the same as docker containers?

@@m.romaithi6217 No. For me it's easyer. Although VM use more resourses. In the future is try Docker.

Damn that's a shame, let me know what you end up going for!

@@EverythingSmartHome I see the following options for myself: Replace the Synology NAS with something more professional - related to a high investment. Replace the Pi with a NUC - for still a fair amount of money. Add a bootable SSD to my Raspberry Pi and let InfluxDB and Grafana run directly on that device, which is probably the cheapest, but will it be reliable? The benefit of a NUC, or an upgraded NAS may be, that I have other possibilities. I.e. I could move my Plex server from my Shield TV to that device, but on the other hand, the Shield handles it quite well. So for now I will probably look into upgrading the Pi with an SSD.

Depends on your current resource usage currently I guess but could be worth trying! You can always revert it!

Nice one! Most of the PCs you'll find will be plenty powerful enough to run HA!

I'll see if I can find it for you! Thank you very much, appreciate it! 🙏

@@EverythingSmartHomeThank you so much!

I'm a Linux guy and been running it since the beginning and I prefer Debian but for a n00bie that is starting out then I would recommend Ubuntu Server.

I use ESXI but wouldn't recommend the free version for beginners, Proxmox is much better in terms of the free versions

@@EverythingSmartHome DITTO!!

For a VM server then I would go with Proxmox or XCP-NG and use Ubuntu Server for the Client side of things. However with Docker and Kubernetes becoming more and more of a standard there is not point really to do a VM unless you plan to run multiple operating systems.

I would say Debian as this is supported by the Home Assistant team. So you get instructions and reassurance that it has been tested. If you take your debian installation beyond what their instructions advise they wont support you though

Thanks! I wouldn't recommend HA on TrueNAS VM, bhyve isn't very feature rich and is pretty basic

@@EverythingSmartHome What would you recommend to run Truneas and HO with supervisor on one machine? Is it possible ?

Sure, use ESXI or Proxmox or similar

@@EverythingSmartHome I'll check it , Thank you

Thanks buddy! I like the PcEngines APU4 - great little devices! Otherwise an optiplex with a PCIe network card is great also

Hey nice, I have an r420 running for other things at the moment too, as well as an r320. Love those servers!

Did you have any luck with this after? Presume yr on about Truenas Scale.

@@firebladejohnny I am currently setting it up ... so I can give you much feedback

@@arhitektche that would be fantastic. I have to first move all my stuff of win10 pro to truenas then ill be ready to add app. Let me know how you get on?

I'm running HA on a QNAP NAS (and I believe the video should have mentioned this as one of the best options). Assuming Synology has a similar underlying Linux distro and supports containers, I'd guess it should be possible just as well.

@@sleeeptube Thank you. It does, i'll have to test it out.

Thanks for watching! eMMC has different wear indicators etc I believe to SD cards so much more suitable for that type of application so should be fine 👍

Nice!!

I would say it's a bit more complicated yes

@@EverythingSmartHome would you consider doing a tutorial on this ? Or are you aware of any other channel that you think has done a good one already ?

Nice one, enjoy!

You would lose performance doing that. Short answer is that you're better off waiting on a CPU & disk that's IO is saturated than waiting for a CPU response over even a 10gig ethernet(which is costly in and of itself). The machines that are capable of that use specialized hardware that's VERY expensive to cut that latency down. This was definitely an oversimplification, but yea that's why we don't see hardly any pieces of hardware doing that. Now what "could" work is lets say you have 3 machines that replicate between each other, but operate independently and then you have 1 master machine that feeds whole commands connected together to 1 box at a time. To keep latency down it would need to be unconnected commands. So for instance if you've got a doorbell setup to play an audio file and you're utilizing a couple different integrations &/or services to do it then that whole block needs to go to 1 machine to ensure things get done in a timely manner and orderly manner. If at the same time you had water leak detected on a sensor and needed to send an SMTP response then that could go to a different machine.

@@ImaITman Thabks for the detailed and thoughtful response. One thing I haven’t seen (and I’ve looked), is documentation or a video on what you *should* do for the best possible, most responsive system. Most of what I see is a narrow “How to do ” or they explain all the different ways you could implement something - with little to no discussion about what you *should* do - or which one is best. I’d really like to see a living document that is updated regularly that discusses how to build the best possible Home Assistant system - without tempering the advice due to cost. It could discuss the pro’S and con’s of each approach - but end with a clear recommendation on which method would be “best” from a performance standpoint. I know that HA can be installed a few different ways - but not sure which is best performance wise. Then there’s an AppDaemon vs NodeRed to think about. Install Moswuitto or use the built in MQTT solution. iCloud vs iCloud3? Replace the SQLITE DB? With what? I know that’s a huge ask - and some of it is bound to be subjective - but I’m aN IT guy and sorting through all of the options trying to understand them seems pretty overwhelming when first stating. I can’t imagine how it must make a non-IT person feel. This time around, I chose to implement HA in a docker container on an Asustor NAS - along with 10 other containers - and CPU usage is higher than I like to see - so I just bought a mini PC with a Core i9-9880H, 32 GB of RAM and 5TB of internal SSD as well as 20TB of USB3.0 attached non-SSD disk space. The plan is to install ProxMox on it and run all/most of my Home Assistant stuff on a Linux VM on it - but I’m still wondering if I should stick with Docker or install HA natively - and also is it best to leave MQTT on the NAS - or move it to the new PC also. (After reading you last reply- I’m guessing you’d say move it to the new mini-pc. Same with AppDaemon and/or NodeRed? What’s the best database to use? If you know of a good video/document that is mostly up to date - and has the recommendations I’m looking for, please share it! I think I bought more than enough compute power for a very good system and I don’t want to kneecap it by making some stupid decisions about how/where to install pieces of the solution.

That should be decent! Why not just do Ubuntu desktop and use virtual box and run Home Assistant OS instead? That way you get the nice image!

@@EverythingSmartHome That would certainly solve my initial having only WiFi to set it up issue 🙂 I suppose I could use MATE for a lighter weight system. It would possibly solve my what happens when the lid is closed issue too as I don't want the screen burning 24/7. I'll do it that way, thank you!

Great setup!

Probably one that doesn't last for very long on battery unfortunately