i Have gone very deep down the blue pill rabbit hole. I have been a Home Assistant user for over 2 years now. Started small with just a few wifi devices and HA running on a raspberry pi 4 SBC. Now am running HA OS version running in a VM via proxmox virtualization software. I now have 48 wifi devices, 137 zigbee devices and 34 z-wave devices all running under the blue pill umbrella. Oh i am a computer tech and network engineer, have been for 40 years.
Very good video and explanation of time needed for each platform. Everyone's setup is different, but I choose the Purple pill for HomeBridge. I set it up and forgot about it. It just works! Occasionally I'll check for updates, but I don't have the time to tinker and would rather spend that time with family and doing other things I enjoy. Word of warning... If it works, just leave it alone. No setup will be perfect. I say this because I wasted so much time in HOOBs and trying to figure things out. Homebridge was the answer. Appreciate your time and videos Eddie!
Appreciate the feedback and yes no 2 Smart Homes will have the setup .... Adding to your comment - everybody's needs are different ... However Homebridge keeps it simple and light
I have contemplated using HOME ASSISTANT just to use ESP-HOME to create smart controllers. For example I would love to use a ESP32 or ESP8266 to control a window AC machine, some have IR controls but I would love to remove the front panel of the AC were the bottoms (On/Off, temp-up/temp-down, speed, Modes, sleep, temp-display,...) n connect those to a ESP n have it appear on my HomeKit app n I can fully control the AC. I have use hubs that have IR n IF transmitters but those do not show if the signal was received or not (window AC’s, have bad IR receivers) there is no feedback, so u can be sending IR signals like on an off, temp up/down but u don’t know if the AC received all of them. It is just like when u are using a remote control n u have to press the button multiple time until it works but u are there in person n can see when it works. Therefore using a ESP wife module connected to the AC display n bottom to make the AC an over the internet device n connect to home kit.
I'm using both along with scrypted...on one machine. Have no complaints thus far as I have some products that are not homebridge supported and others that are not home assistant supported.
I’ve always had both running as well I’ve always had both running as well since Wen has some thing the other doesn’t have together everything is covered since one has something the other doesn’t have but together everything is covered
I started out with homebridge but I’m really a tinkerer, basically wanted something easy because I suffered a severe diffuse axonal brain injury back in 2014 from a car crash. Finally swapped to home assistant because I was bored of homebridge, and I’ve never looked back! It’s so much more powerful, you’ll really enjoy using it
Michael Thank you so much for sharing your experience... In a couple of weeks - I will get my sky connect, My home will be near completion to install the smart home devices and can wait to enjoy the goodies that HA brings along. Cheers
I’m really excited to see your transition from HB to HA, some of your videos are what got me onto HB many months ago but I am toying with HA now. I’m still trying to decide what to bring to HA or keep in HB where everything is super stable. I use HomeKit as my dashboard, but I’ve always wanted a tablet or 2 on the wall as a dashboard, so eventually I’ll play with that too.
Patrick ... thansk for the comment ... I have the same idea - one dashboard which will be HomeKit .. I just got my hands on a sky connect and cant wait to share content as soon as my home build is complete - 2 months to go .. cant wait. Cheers
I’ve used Homebridge for years. The big problem with Homebridge and Home Assistant is this: If (god forbid) something should happens to me, I’d give it 3 or 4 days before the wife and kids come home to a dark house wondering why they cannot get the lights to come on! 😢 For that reason, I am going fully Apple Home / Matter options only and on a simple level (smart plugs and light bulbs only and true HomeKit compatible garage door controllers on older motor openers) from now on and educating my children on the subject as well.
Yes, it's exactly the same issue at my house. If something happens to me, the techno-crazy, then the "smarthome" should still continue to work. If necessary, without all the automation. Yes, I also have a Homebridge.
That's why i have redundant hardware that has a fresh copy of Home Assistant on it. In 10 minutes me (or my wife) can have Home Assistant back up and running in case of a software or hardware failure. Have showed her how to boot it up and restore the google drive backup of HA that's made every 3 days automatically. She doesn't have the tech background i have so she couldn't have created the setup that i did but she can do this easily enough. I keep notes of all the changes I do and keep her in the loop.
@@HATipsByLarry I am thinking of creating a cook book for my wife .. Just in case something goes smart with the setup ... Thank you so much for sharing the information.
After running both for a number of years on various equipment from early Rpi's to VM's in a ESXi server, to low power thin clients, I've found that Homebridge tends not to be a very efficient way of doing most tasks. I've found I can run more in my Home Assistant server than I can in Homebridge on identical machines. I have one thing client running a stand alone Scrypted configuration and HB, but even Scrypted is now easier to run from within Home Assistant. I still keep HB updated and have a small number of services running on HB that are just easier to do than in HA, but that will change and I will move everything over to HA eventually. Home Assistant takes some understanding to get best out of it, but its worth it for the stability and the amount of development going into Home Assistant, which means that I rarely have to configure anything in YAML these days. Great video.
I currently use homebridge, I discovered it thanks to your videos. A couple of weeks ago I bought the Argon One and I'm thinking of trying Home Assistant because I can't get the fan in the box to work.
Hello Domingo ... For some reason also the Argon one fan script didnt work well for me. However on the HA - this Add ON works flawless. Cheers github.com/adamoutler/HassOSArgonOneAddon
@@eddiedsuza I am very stubborn and I have finally managed to make the fan work with Homebridge. I have done a new installation starting from Raspberry Pi OS, then I have installed the argon40 script and finally I have installed Homebrigde. Now it works perfectly.
For my new home that we have been in for 7 months - have slowly transitioned over to the blue pill. Theres a lot to learn and it's been an interesting journey so far. Start small and grow from there
Excellent video, but I still have a question: I think I'm smart enough to implement my full home automation in Home Assistant, can I use Apple Shortcuts without HomeBridge? My server is a thin client that I can still change, as only part of my house is automated (using Philips Hue, Zigbee devices, Ikea Smarthome, etc). I'm doubting now if I should continue expanding the Homebridge installation or install Home Assistant OS and implement Homebridge there to create the link to my Apple Homekit?
Recent HomeKit convert. Stumbled on your scripted with ha video which made me ask this exact question. Thanks for this. I’ll stick with hb for now until it doesn’t get me where I want to be. Looking forward to trying scripted tomorrow and more videos.
If the cams do RTSP - i'd use the scrypted or homebridge & enable Homekit secure video that will record 10 days of footage that will not account to your icloud storage
i've started using homebridge for my homekit, but the only issue is, the system needs to be kept on at all times, right? or else have to buy either a raspberry pi or hoobs device? any other way to keep the homebridge on throughout on the mac?
The homebridge service needs to run 24/07 .. If you have an old computer or a Raspberry (which most users have n use) are ideal for Homebridge. You don't need HOOBS .. For the Mac - you will need to toggle with the power settings but here's the thing it can never leave your home or go offline or else all the devices in the Apple Home app will show up as offline
Hi Eddie. Excellent video! I have a HomeKit & HomeBridge setup, but I also have Alexa (Echo) devices around my home. I like to use both. The problem is that if I ask Alexa to turn off a light that was previously turned on by a HomeKit automation, HomeKit does not seem to be aware of the change of state. So, my question is: if I go to a Home Assistant platform, can I command devices using Siri and Alexa and everything will play nice together? Or will I still have synchronization problems?
@@eddiedsuza Thanks Eddie. I appreciate your response. I'm just setting up my HA system now and so far, so good. I have an RPi5 with an NVMe SSD and Sonoff ZigBee 3.0 dongle. I just added Adaptive Lighting and I'm starting to move automations from HomeKit to HA. It's a learning curve, but it's looking good!
Not necessarily as Homebridge is purely for people just want non native HomeKit device to work in the Apple home app. Home assistant on the other hand - opens up a plethora of options with your smart home needs
I think your videos are great and very helpful. I have been using my Raspberry 4 with homebridge for 3 years. I would like to run both systems on one Raspi. Would that work? If so, please how? Thanks and keep up the good work😍
Appreciate the feedback. As long as you have a Pi thats 4GB plus - then yes you can do it using docker. And it would work - however I am not really sure if any HA fucntionality with the Docker Environment
Hola Eddie, I hope that you can help me out with this question. I want to implement this using a raspberry, but I am not sure if this will work if I don't have an Apple TV or a home pod, if you can corroborate that to me, I would be really grateful.
If you want to use Homebridge - then via the apple home app - you will be able to control devices. To automate them - then you will need a Apple TV or HomePod. Now if use Home Assistant - Then you will create all of the scenes and automations within it and then exposeall devices to Apple Home ... In this case no need of a ATV or HomePod to be the hub since HA will be doing that for you
Thank you very much Eddie, I will check my options based on what you've told me, now I want to corroborate if the Home Assistant will work with the apple Home app or if it uses its own app, I would really appreciate it, again, thank you in advance.@@eddiedsuza
@@eranieles You can use the apple home app and if you have all the time in the world - you can create your own dashboard and then find a away to make it accessible to all your Home members.
Does home assistant interstate with apple shortcuts well? As this for me is a sticking point as tools on shortcuts I imagine aren’t on home assistant as they are local/app driven
Hi There, from what i Gathered ... No it doesnt interstate with Shortcuts... However you have the ability to build the same via HA (under automations) ....
ciao utilizzo home assistant come ponte per homekit. l’unica cosa che non riesco ad impostare sono le prese che in homekit mi riconosce come interruttori. come posso risolvere? grazie
Hi Eddie! I have a very specific question and wonder if there's a way to get in touch with you directly? Do I email you through your new website or is there another way, like through Discord? Thanks!!
Well ... I am still documenting my journey. Just got HA installed in my new home. Moving in next week ... However i still have a couple of HB plugins that work well than HA ... So not completing abondaning the platform 😅
Do check out my newly launched website 🔑 buildasmarthome.org and get to know my Smart Home Services
i Have gone very deep down the blue pill rabbit hole. I have been a Home Assistant user for over 2 years now. Started small with just a few wifi devices and HA running on a raspberry pi 4 SBC. Now am running HA OS version running in a VM via proxmox virtualization software. I now have 48 wifi devices, 137 zigbee devices and 34 z-wave devices all running under the blue pill umbrella. Oh i am a computer tech and network engineer, have been for 40 years.
Larry .. Thanks for sharing your experience. And as well starting small but HA is too addictive ....😅
Very good video and explanation of time needed for each platform. Everyone's setup is different, but I choose the Purple pill for HomeBridge. I set it up and forgot about it. It just works! Occasionally I'll check for updates, but I don't have the time to tinker and would rather spend that time with family and doing other things I enjoy. Word of warning... If it works, just leave it alone. No setup will be perfect. I say this because I wasted so much time in HOOBs and trying to figure things out. Homebridge was the answer. Appreciate your time and videos Eddie!
Appreciate the feedback and yes no 2 Smart Homes will have the setup .... Adding to your comment - everybody's needs are different ... However Homebridge keeps it simple and light
I have contemplated using HOME ASSISTANT just to use ESP-HOME to create smart controllers. For example I would love to use a ESP32 or ESP8266 to control a window AC machine, some have IR controls but I would love to remove the front panel of the AC were the bottoms (On/Off, temp-up/temp-down, speed, Modes, sleep, temp-display,...) n connect those to a ESP n have it appear on my HomeKit app n I can fully control the AC. I have use hubs that have IR n IF transmitters but those do not show if the signal was received or not (window AC’s, have bad IR receivers) there is no feedback, so u can be sending IR signals like on an off, temp up/down but u don’t know if the AC received all of them. It is just like when u are using a remote control n u have to press the button multiple time until it works but u are there in person n can see when it works. Therefore using a ESP wife module connected to the AC display n bottom to make the AC an over the internet device n connect to home kit.
Hey Nicolas ... I just flashed 3 ESP8266 with ESP Home as i am working to use it as a rain water tank sensor .. Lets see where it takes me
Proud Tinkerer here. Switched from HOOBS the HA a couple of years ago. There’s was a steep learning curve but was totally worth it!
🙌🍻🙏
I'm using both along with scrypted...on one machine. Have no complaints thus far as I have some products that are not homebridge supported and others that are not home assistant supported.
I am exactly in the same boat 🛥️! Using scrypted as well which is purely for cameras
Scrypted can be installed in homeassistant as a plug-in and working for me great.
@@PawelPolskiPL wow didn’t know. Will go and dig in now - cheers 🍻
Yes indeed, the adaptive lighting is brilliant and very customizable! Love it!
We agree! Cheers
Im using both, but in a befinner stage in home assistant. Looking forward to your home assistant videos in the future 😊 keep up the good work 🙌🏼
Awesome! Thank you! Cheers
I’ve always had both running as well
I’ve always had both running as well since Wen has some thing the other doesn’t have together everything is covered since one has something the other doesn’t have but together everything is covered
I started out with homebridge but I’m really a tinkerer, basically wanted something easy because I suffered a severe diffuse axonal brain injury back in 2014 from a car crash. Finally swapped to home assistant because I was bored of homebridge, and I’ve never looked back! It’s so much more powerful, you’ll really enjoy using it
Michael Thank you so much for sharing your experience... In a couple of weeks - I will get my sky connect, My home will be near completion to install the smart home devices and can wait to enjoy the goodies that HA brings along. Cheers
@@eddiedsuza no problem 👍🏻 ooo not long for you, good luck with it! Get in touch if you want any info on HA, although it might be very limited 🤣
@@michaelthompson657 Oh hells yeah - I'll connect with you ... HA is limitless lolz
@@eddiedsuza cool 😎 oh yeah it so is!
I’m really excited to see your transition from HB to HA, some of your videos are what got me onto HB many months ago but I am toying with HA now. I’m still trying to decide what to bring to HA or keep in HB where everything is super stable. I use HomeKit as my dashboard, but I’ve always wanted a tablet or 2 on the wall as a dashboard, so eventually I’ll play with that too.
Patrick ... thansk for the comment ... I have the same idea - one dashboard which will be HomeKit .. I just got my hands on a sky connect and cant wait to share content as soon as my home build is complete - 2 months to go .. cant wait. Cheers
I’ve used Homebridge for years. The big problem with Homebridge and Home Assistant is this: If (god forbid) something should happens to me, I’d give it 3 or 4 days before the wife and kids come home to a dark house wondering why they cannot get the lights to come on! 😢 For that reason, I am going fully Apple Home / Matter options only and on a simple level (smart plugs and light bulbs only and true HomeKit compatible garage door controllers on older motor openers) from now on and educating my children on the subject as well.
Lovely ! I am currently building my home and have the same thought process - keep it simple and there will be always continuity with or without me 🐣
Yes, it's exactly the same issue at my house. If something happens to me, the techno-crazy, then the "smarthome" should still continue to work. If necessary, without all the automation. Yes, I also have a Homebridge.
@@bernds9696 Thanks for sharing your experience. Cheers
That's why i have redundant hardware that has a fresh copy of Home Assistant on it. In 10 minutes me (or my wife) can have Home Assistant back up and running in case of a software or hardware failure. Have showed her how to boot it up and restore the google drive backup of HA that's made every 3 days automatically. She doesn't have the tech background i have so she couldn't have created the setup that i did but she can do this easily enough. I keep notes of all the changes I do and keep her in the loop.
@@HATipsByLarry I am thinking of creating a cook book for my wife .. Just in case something goes smart with the setup ... Thank you so much for sharing the information.
After running both for a number of years on various equipment from early Rpi's to VM's in a ESXi server, to low power thin clients, I've found that Homebridge tends not to be a very efficient way of doing most tasks. I've found I can run more in my Home Assistant server than I can in Homebridge on identical machines. I have one thing client running a stand alone Scrypted configuration and HB, but even Scrypted is now easier to run from within Home Assistant. I still keep HB updated and have a small number of services running on HB that are just easier to do than in HA, but that will change and I will move everything over to HA eventually. Home Assistant takes some understanding to get best out of it, but its worth it for the stability and the amount of development going into Home Assistant, which means that I rarely have to configure anything in YAML these days. Great video.
I have dipped my toes completely with HA and kept HB for some plugins that work well than the HA integration. Using scrypted with HA as well
Been using the purple pill here and been also thinking of taking the plunge into the great blue waters.
It wasn’t that bad. The only issue is - moving to HA to use the automations and in depth features that come along. One baby step at a time. Cheers
I currently use homebridge, I discovered it thanks to your videos. A couple of weeks ago I bought the Argon One and I'm thinking of trying Home Assistant because I can't get the fan in the box to work.
Hello Domingo ... For some reason also the Argon one fan script didnt work well for me. However on the HA - this Add ON works flawless. Cheers github.com/adamoutler/HassOSArgonOneAddon
@@eddiedsuza I am very stubborn and I have finally managed to make the fan work with Homebridge. I have done a new installation starting from Raspberry Pi OS, then I have installed the argon40 script and finally I have installed Homebrigde. Now it works perfectly.
Same here. Been on the purple pill for years now. Thinking of switching it up to the blue one.
Hava a spare RPI, so I'm gonna try it out.
Thanks!!
I hope i havent started a movement to take the blue pill 😇
Obrigado por compartilhar suas experiências e suas escolhas! Obrigado mesmo! 👏🏻👏🏻
Por nada ! 🙌
Awesome vid, you saved me from going down that never ending rabbit hole.
h aha ah aha ha ah aha h Unfortunately I got sucked in ...
Trust me, the only way you can avoid the rabbit hole is to NEVER get into Home Automation in the first place on either or other platforms. :-)
@@paul_grimsley Sometimes I think the same as well ... Oh well technology ...
That was very informative I have been on the purple pill for the last 3 years now and has been great,I’m curious about the blue pill
For my new home that we have been in for 7 months - have slowly transitioned over to the blue pill. Theres a lot to learn and it's been an interesting journey so far. Start small and grow from there
@@eddiedsuza good plan that's my goal to start out small
@@1csearle all the best. 🙏
Absolute love your work and please do keep posting more Smart Home content!
Thanks Matthew. And definitely will continue posting more videos. Have a ton coming up on my smart home build. It’s in the tail end of completion.
Excellent video, but I still have a question: I think I'm smart enough to implement my full home automation in Home Assistant, can I use Apple Shortcuts without HomeBridge? My server is a thin client that I can still change, as only part of my house is automated (using Philips Hue, Zigbee devices, Ikea Smarthome, etc). I'm doubting now if I should continue expanding the Homebridge installation or install Home Assistant OS and implement Homebridge there to create the link to my Apple Homekit?
Go full in with HA ... It will also replace Apple Shorcuts as well.
Recent HomeKit convert. Stumbled on your scripted with ha video which made me ask this exact question. Thanks for this. I’ll stick with hb for now until it doesn’t get me where I want to be. Looking forward to trying scripted tomorrow and more videos.
Let us know on your progress . Cheers
You our the best teacher love the great karma and looking forward to your new teachings 😊
Yoru welcome Richard ... Cheers
home assistant cant see xiaomi devices. hb can
I use both 😊
Lovely. I wouldn’t say it’s the perfect combo. However, I seen that in some cases the Homebridge plugin delivers better device functionality.
Great video mate - really helped clear things up 👍🏻 Subscribed 😉
@@lahmyaj awesome thanks 🙏
Great video Eddie, I was wondering the difference between the two. Thanks for your videos.
Steve long time no see... Thanks for the feedback .. Cheers
0:43 let's talk about HA ui. 😍😍This looks very clean. Where can I find this good looking ui for ha?
Refer to this page to enable it for you. Lots of tutorials available - github.com/bastienwirtz/homer
i want to store my security cams local not micr sd. what is the best for that.
If the cams do RTSP - i'd use the scrypted or homebridge & enable Homekit secure video that will record 10 days of footage that will not account to your icloud storage
i've started using homebridge for my homekit, but the only issue is, the system needs to be kept on at all times, right? or else have to buy either a raspberry pi or hoobs device? any other way to keep the homebridge on throughout on the mac?
The homebridge service needs to run 24/07 .. If you have an old computer or a Raspberry (which most users have n use) are ideal for Homebridge. You don't need HOOBS .. For the Mac - you will need to toggle with the power settings but here's the thing it can never leave your home or go offline or else all the devices in the Apple Home app will show up as offline
I have Ubiquiti Protect Camera and Doorbell integrated to Homekit via HomeBridge. I do not get any notifications on Apple TV ever. What am I missing.
Hello Bhuvan .. Access your Apple TV and within settings - go to notifications to enable it
So well put together! Thank you!
You are so welcome!
Thanks for this. just what I needed
Cheers
Hi Eddie. Excellent video! I have a HomeKit & HomeBridge setup, but I also have Alexa (Echo) devices around my home. I like to use both. The problem is that if I ask Alexa to turn off a light that was previously turned on by a HomeKit automation, HomeKit does not seem to be aware of the change of state. So, my question is: if I go to a Home Assistant platform, can I command devices using Siri and Alexa and everything will play nice together? Or will I still have synchronization problems?
Hey Ian .. Yes that is possible with HA .. I tested with Google Home & HomeKit with device reflecting changes on both sides ...
@@eddiedsuza Thanks Eddie. I appreciate your response.
I'm just setting up my HA system now and so far, so good.
I have an RPi5 with an NVMe SSD and Sonoff ZigBee 3.0 dongle. I just added Adaptive Lighting and I'm starting to move automations from HomeKit to HA. It's a learning curve, but it's looking good!
@@iansoper3453 I love the adaptive feature with HA.
Homebridge because I want a life besides the smart home 😆
And we all do 😅
So basically, if you are stuck in Apple eco system then HomeBridge, else Home Assistant?
Not necessarily as Homebridge is purely for people just want non native HomeKit device to work in the Apple home app. Home assistant on the other hand - opens up a plethora of options with your smart home needs
I think your videos are great and very helpful. I have been using my Raspberry 4 with homebridge for 3 years. I would like to run both systems on one Raspi. Would that work? If so, please how? Thanks and keep up the good work😍
Appreciate the feedback. As long as you have a Pi thats 4GB plus - then yes you can do it using docker. And it would work - however I am not really sure if any HA fucntionality with the Docker Environment
@@eddiedsuza Thank you for the answer. I have managed it. But I had to install dietpi on my dietpi 4. From there I was able to build everything.
Thanks for the very helpful video, subscribed.
Thanks for the sub! Cheers
Is my question too! Thanks!tech savvy me)
Any time! Cheers
Hola Eddie, I hope that you can help me out with this question. I want to implement this using a raspberry, but I am not sure if this will work if I don't have an Apple TV or a home pod, if you can corroborate that to me, I would be really grateful.
If you want to use Homebridge - then via the apple home app - you will be able to control devices. To automate them - then you will need a Apple TV or HomePod.
Now if use Home Assistant - Then you will create all of the scenes and automations within it and then exposeall devices to Apple Home ... In this case no need of a ATV or HomePod to be the hub since HA will be doing that for you
Thank you very much Eddie, I will check my options based on what you've told me, now I want to corroborate if the Home Assistant will work with the apple Home app or if it uses its own app, I would really appreciate it, again, thank you in advance.@@eddiedsuza
@@eranieles You can use the apple home app and if you have all the time in the world - you can create your own dashboard and then find a away to make it accessible to all your Home members.
Does home assistant interstate with apple shortcuts well? As this for me is a sticking point as tools on shortcuts I imagine aren’t on home assistant as they are local/app driven
Hi There, from what i Gathered ... No it doesnt interstate with Shortcuts... However you have the ability to build the same via HA (under automations) ....
❌echo (echo echo) ✅ eco (eh-ko)
No space before punctuation mark, example ‘can you write properly?’
I tried
ciao utilizzo home assistant come ponte per homekit. l’unica cosa che non riesco ad impostare sono le prese che in homekit mi riconosce come interruttori. come posso risolvere? grazie
They casn be changed within Homekit by going to accesory details and changing its type
Hi Eddie! I have a very specific question and wonder if there's a way to get in touch with you directly? Do I email you through your new website or is there another way, like through Discord? Thanks!!
You can via info@buildasmarthome.org
How easy or difficult is the transition from HB to HA?
Well ... I am still documenting my journey. Just got HA installed in my new home. Moving in next week ... However i still have a couple of HB plugins that work well than HA ... So not completing abondaning the platform 😅
Top parabéns
Obrigado 🙏