Some weeks ago in an order to AliExpress, I included a Zigbee E27 220v light bulb. It works perfectly in Zigbee2MQTT (in Home Assistant). Perfectly that is except for one thing – the default state setting does not work and in the event of a power failure and subsequent reconnect,…
Seeed Studio 60Ghz mmWave Sensor
Billed as a “Breathing and Heart Rate Sensor (reference MR60BHA2)” this new device from Seeed Studios got me quite excited…. the device arrived on April 2, 2025 in a well-packed large box maybe 10cm*9cm*13cm. Inside, a small box (9cm*2.5cm*2.7cm) containing the sensor and a double-sided business card pointing the buyer…
Whatever happened to everlasting solar garden lights?
I have MANY years experience of solar garden lights from the cheapest rubbish to quite expensive… what happened? Well, price – greedy importers out to make a quick buck is what happened – along with the public’s need to get something for nothing. The result is that the manufacturer builds…
Aqara FP1E Revisited Briefly
I’ve had an Aqara FP1E movement/presense sensor for some time and for some reason, only checked movement sensing. Today I plugged the unit in and Home Assistant remembered it perfectly from my last tests back in August 2024. This time I went to my Zigbee2MQTT panel which I get to…
Home Assistant Voice Preview Edition vs Google
Home Assistant Voice – Preview Edition is a small USB-powered unit made by the Open Home Foundation and supplied to me by SEEED. It is common knowledge that I hate to read instructions, so I took the unit out of the very nice box and plugged it into a handy…
Home Assistant to NAS to Mini PC – The Sequel
Mid last week, I wrote about the latest updates in my quest for an ideal Home Assistant (HAOS) setup -and I’d reached the point of using my Synology NAS (DS720+) for HAOS – this is the sequel featuring the Turewell HSI-N95 mini-PC. Firstly, no doubt about it the Synology is…
M5Stack Goodness
It’s quite a while since I heard anything from M5Stack but today I have some new goodies from them. First off – this handy little ESP32-based mini-camera: CamS3 5MP Camera. The device came complete with lead and USB-C adaptor. It costs something like $17 US dollars from their site –…
Apollo Temp-1 Sensor Unit – Apollo Automation
I’ve written elsewhere about Apollo Sensors but this weekend they sent me a set of updated Temp-1 and Temp-1B sensors so I thought I’d give them a quick entry. I’ll leave the Temp-1B to the end as it is similar but primarily battery driven and NOT a cheap battery at…
Home Assistant – Synology DS720+ The Story So Far
More reviews and gadgets coming up soon including the new SEEED Human Breathing + Heartbeat sensor (I can’t wait) and the Home Assistant Voice Preview Edition – and look out for the upcoming sequel to this post – meanwhile… Regular readers will know that I’ve been a fan of Raspberry…
The Ridiculous Windows 11 “Show More Options” and How To Bypass
I’m taking no credit for this one which I originally published on December 3, 2023. EVERY time I go to right-click a Windows Explorer window on a new PC, from as simple as DESKTOP to my SCREENSHOTS folder – I invariably want to COPY something… is it there? NOPE. I…
Reolink RLC-823S2 IP Camera – it’s a MONSTER
Well, this came as a surprise – I was expecting a WiFi new camera from Aqara to arrive this week, when this large box arrived – came as something of a surprise that the Reolink arrived first. The Reolink RLC-823S2 is a 12v or POE camera (POE adaptor not included…
The new Aqara Camera Hub G5 Pro
The Aqara Hub G5 Pro runs over WiFi and is not only a full true-colour night vision camera (image sensor 1/1/1.8″ – aperture f/1.0, resolution 2688*1520, field-of-view 133 degrees diagonal) but also a hub. It runs off 5v at up to 2A and handles both 2.4 and 5Ghz WiFi. Other…
Aqara P1 Motion Sensor – Something New?
Back at the end of 2022 I wrote about Aqara’s P1 Motion Sensor – but then I looked a couple of weeks ago at their press releases and saw the word NEW in there – something to do with improved battery life I wonder? Anyway one of them just turned…
Apollo Air-1 CO2 and other Sensors for Home Assistant
A box arrived August 2024 – for my (then) new Apollo Air-1 C02 sensor and other items. No information, thankfully the Apollo Automation website is full of it. The device, like others in the range, at the time of writing came in a low-volume 3D printed casing – always nice…
Argon40 Argon NEO5 + Poly+5 RPi5 Cases
This might be of interest to those of you who own one or more Raspberry Pi 5 boards (NOT previous models such as RPi3 or 4). Important February updates at the end. Argon40 have been around for some years now, producing a range of cases for various Raspberry Pi models.…
The Reolink RLC 1224A UHD PoE Camera
Looks-wise, the RLC-1224A is plain white and nothing to write home about but I was determined to have at least one ultra-hi-res exterior camera in my repertoire and I’m not disappointed. The hardwired (Ethernet) RLC-1224A is really hi-res – 12Mpx and has a large aperture F1.6 lense. The full description…
The Sonoff Mini-D (MINI-Dry) WiFi Smart Switch
Erm, what? This is a new Sonoff product in the MINI series – this time simply with DRY contacts instead of having one connection commoned to the incoming power. Back in the early days there was a 4-channel Sonoff controller (rather big) with isolated outputs but that has largely been…
The New Wonder? DeepSeek AI
Unless you’ve been under a rock in the last few weeks – you’ll be at least vaguelly aware of China’s DeepSeek AI -by all accounts – SERIOUS competition for OpenAi’s ChatGPT and other current AIs. I’ve spent quite some time playing with DeepSeek now and I have some good news…
Tenda Model RX9 Pro AX3000 Dual-Band WiFi 6 Router
And I’m writing about a discontinued router for what reason? I have an outside workshop which is beyond the range of my home WiFi and I’ve just fitted an Ethernet cable to get a signal out there…. but of course the cable needs something on the end of it and…
Reolink WiFi Video Doorbell – It’s a winner!
This article was written in June 2023 when I received the doorbell, now permanently in use in my UK home. See last para for updates. On opening the box for my new Reolink WiFi Video Doorbell (they have POE and WIFI versions – mine is WiFi but it seems to…