You may want to think about some transparent frosting decal. I have it on my office. Simple to apply

@kz6fittycent

3 ай бұрын

100% agree!

@dlewis9760

3 ай бұрын

I've done that to 2 bathroom windows in 2 houses. My sister always thought it was stupid. Then she did hers to 5 windows around a Jacuzzi. "I should have done this years ago!!! Sure beats using the shades!!!"

@orektez

3 ай бұрын

@@dlewis9760 tried to convince my parents to do that with their bathroom, and they didn't see a point until their neighbor ended up by the window while chasing his dog. i think all bathroom windows should be frosted by default.

@vidm96

3 ай бұрын

I used that for my ground-floor office as well. You have decal that is sticky backed, and you have decal that sticks through static. I'd recommend the latter, as it is far easier to apply.

@kevinwhite9919

3 ай бұрын

yep, and it reduces sound and heat transfer. it's great stuff, and you can leave portions of it off if you still want to sometimes see out through the window. we leave a low square open for the cats, and the upper foot so we can see outside when standing next to the window.

SimplyBurnt! Always there when you need it!

I switched from Ring to a Reolink doorbell as it can be a completely local video doorbell without internet. I am quite happy with it.

@Jozefbonnar

3 ай бұрын

Would recommend Reolink as well, can even run off poe

@SchoolforHackers

3 ай бұрын

And Reolink is the brand everyone praises. Got it!

@tomhallums

3 ай бұрын

Reolink POE is great, but the motion detection is downright rubbish. Triggers when it switches to day/night and the no-detection zone does nothing.

@Jozefbonnar

3 ай бұрын

@@tomhallumsyes it does do that going from day to night but I have the notifications come from person detection not motion so it doesn’t matter to me as much

@janjongkees3273

3 ай бұрын

@@tomhallums do the object detection with frigate and coral or so. much better

That Chime Connector thing is an opto isolator, which turns the button on the SimpliSafe doorbell into a low power switch for the relatively powerful mechanical chime. It also seems to give the SimpliSafe doorbell a small amount of power so it can function. It solves the buzzing and burning issue because now the SimpliSafe is not drawing power constantly through the mechanical chime (causing buzzing) and it makes the button on the video doorbell no longer experience huge current when you press it (causing burning). Seems to me that you could just use the Chime Connector with a doorbell transformer you had before, and a suitable resistor where the mechanical chime used to be. I'm quite surprised SimpliSafe didn't account for installations without a mechanical chime...

@emolatur

3 ай бұрын

SimpliSafe marketed it as a drop-in replacement for a button in an existing system, and, as such, its two terminals are effectively /bridged together/ when the button is pressed, in order to power a mechanical chime. Anything they could have done here to make it suitable where there ISN'T a chime would have either made it UNsuitable, or complicated installation, where there IS. A jumper setting would be a possibility - there's another step. Three-wire connection would be a possibility... but just making a two-wire switch that somehow just magically knows when it should stop being a switch . . . is not. Personally, I would have included a fuse - and made sure, in the manual, near the instructions to replace the fuse, to point out that the fuse should only ever blow if the user has ignored the rest of the manual. and I'd expect anyone professing to be any kind of engineer in any discipline having anything to do with electricity to realize full well, in advance, that a two-wire device that should replace a button to know very well that putting straight power into that button without a load is a dumb idea.

Just wanna say i think its awesome how close you are to your community. Like you respond to comments, and read through them, because people geniunely have good suggestions! I love this, and you're just really down to earth!

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Well thanks! I've found the YT community (at least in the tech space) to be a wealth of information. The comments are where some of my best ideas originate :)

I don't know about you, Jeff, but I have a very hard time with companies that think it is acceptable for them to send you a refurbished product when you buy a brand new product that turns out to be either a DOA or dies shortly after starting to use it. They've all been doing this, but it's not ok.

Sending out refurb units when you send something back as being faulty should be illegal. How on earth can they think thats an ok thing to do when you paid for a new item?! Really we need a self-hosted opensource doorbell option, I've got a couple of ring doorbells and hate them, both for their silly 10 minute live limit and the locked down nature, but also because they only function about 80% of the time, and of course even being in the UK if us-east-1 goes down, so does my doorbell.

@Saand1338

3 ай бұрын

I lament that I completely lack any electrical engineering knowhow, a DIY camera doorbell using a PI Zero W would be a pretty cool (if bulky) project to undertake. I like using Pi Zeros as personally controlled indoor security cameras, and adding a doorbell to that setup would be pretty great.

@flandrble

3 ай бұрын

because you didn't send back a brand new doa unit. Although if the replacement is in poorer condition you can complain.

hey jeff, for the 3day blinds home assistant integration you can use their wifi dongle thingingy and locally control them using the 'motion blinds' integration in home assitant. the stuff they installed is just the wholesale chinese radio standard which many other companies use so it's easy to locally integrate

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Awesome. Though does their dongle require any kind of cloud integration? The sales rep seemed to not know anything about Home Assistant... you'd think for the people looking to buy motorized blinds, that would be one of the top solutions people use! Or maybe a lot of the folks with the money to get 100% motorized blinds in the home have more dollars than sense, and they just live with whatever software the installer puts in :O

@zuighemdanmaar752

3 ай бұрын

@@JeffGeerling from what i know you need an account in their app but in the app you can get an api key which you can use to control it locally. home assistant has instructions in their manuals of motion blinds

@PhilipSHempel

3 ай бұрын

We have our house setup with 3-Day blinds. I have these configured on the wireless vlan that does not allow internet. Once I got the API key for the 2 controllers, in help and about, and hitting the logo I think like 5 times. I was able setup in Home Assistant I had thought about getting a 433mhz sdr, only so I can look at other stuff, but until then, this works perfectly

@bobbymelbourne4502

3 ай бұрын

Another thing worth considering would be a bond bridge which lets you control radio based devices it’s not cloud based and exposes a pretty good rest api. Pretty sure it has homeassist integration as well

@zxcvb_bvcxz

3 ай бұрын

Bond Home may be able to do it too

I went through 3 different 'Smart Doorbells' which all failed. Ended up making my own from a Pi Pico & ESPHome. Using an AC relay and AC to DC power board it just wired in and runs off the bell transformer...... a bit of YAML and it's HomeKit compatible too.......

@whitneydesignlabs8738

3 ай бұрын

Thinking of doing the same with an ESP32-CAM. Somehow need to add small speaker an mic, maybe on a Rpi Pico etc.

@hubertnnn

3 ай бұрын

If you are already using a PI, Then wouldn't it be easier to just attach a speaker to PI's GPIO port rather than using all the voltage conversion and relays to make a chime work. Plus a speaker could play any tune.

@whitneydesignlabs8738

3 ай бұрын

I think adding audio to a Pi Pico is a bit more involved than just putting a speaker on a gpio. But I will let @Senshikaji answer that.@@hubertnnn

@ashchap

3 ай бұрын

I did a similar thing - installed a dumb doorbell with a battery powered chime and linked up a relay that drives a pi pico GPIO. The pico tells homeassistant when the button is pressed via an ESP-12S wifi module

@Senshikaji

3 ай бұрын

@@hubertnnn I wanted to make a 'more or less' drop in module to use existing wiring & historic door chime. Yes, if I was making a new install your method is cleaner, but another advantage of the way I did it is to separate the AC doorbell 'signal' from the pi; the pi receives a nice clean on/off from the relay whilst being able to use a higher voltage for the outside bell push.

I sure love my REOLINK Video Doorbell PoE Camera for $75 bucks delivered. They have a wireless version too. HA integration and no doorbell phone home nonsense (no need for reolink account).

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Oh hey, didn't realize they have a PoE cam! I might have to test it out.

@benjaminlong7317

3 ай бұрын

@@JeffGeerling I have 3 of them installed at my house. The app is a just a little sus, but it integrates really well with home assistant. I haven't worked on getting 2-way voice to work for answering the doorbell yet, but I've seen success stories. I can view the camera and listen to the audio though HA without any effort. I also set the 'person detection' to turn on lights. I have their 180° camera with floodlight as well. I use HA to control that too. Everything is PoE, except for one WiFi doorbell I have installed to watch our animals out in the yard. I've been happy with all of them overall.

@albullit

3 ай бұрын

I have the Reolink PoE too. It’s great. Work in HA so I can block it from calling home and have HA send a notification when someone is at the door.

@impy1980

3 ай бұрын

@@JeffGeerling Yea Reolink announced it fall 2022 I believe, just a shame they don't include both Wifi and POE on the one device really, especially since a lot of non tech people will buy the Wifi version "coz it's easy" and later realise they have thick walls or their ISP router Wifi sucks, then they are stuck, or gotta shell out about the same again (the POE version is cheaper). I would rather pay $5-10 extra for the doorbell to have both included in one device if I'm honest. I think everyone who has tried or tested smart doorbells conclude the Reolink is the overall best, particularly coz you're not forced into the cloud nonsense. I think over the past few years Reolink have listened to customers and they've now implemented POE into their more "consumer friendly" CCTV cameras, which is great. I have 2 Reolink cameras, 1 indoor and 1 outdoors, both were Wifi, but the outdoor has to negotiate a double bricked thick wall, and can be 5-15 secs behind the indoor camera depending on time of day and weather, so I've now wired the network as well as the power, but if, when I bought the E1 Outdoor 2 and a half years ago, was POE, as there is a version now, I would've gone straight for the POE without question. I record both cameras to my QNAP NAS, really easy to setup on the QNAP NVR once you do the usual native smart device set up, both have motion detection recording set up on the NVR program, and do so reliably, and QNAP lets me view 14 days without paying for their Elite NVR version for longer, plenty of time to go review any footage of incidents. Reolink does give you a free cloud plan that stores 7 days footage if needed, I used it in addition for a while when we had some trouble making neighbours as a backup, but I'd sooner keep everything local when possible, which is why most people choose Reolink over the competition.

@kf4hzu

3 ай бұрын

I have the new Reolink doorbell that runs off the doorbell transformer. They have you bypass the chime in the instructions. It works very well.

I didn't know cavemen carried hard drives back and forth! I thought they used 8" floppies--after the dinosaurs and their punched paper tape went extinct.

@Mr.Leeroy

3 ай бұрын

Ofc they did not.. Hard drives vere simply too heavy to carry, they cruised them on trolleys with stone wheels and donkey to pull.

@whiteb0rd

3 ай бұрын

Real Cavemen carried individual discs for their handy waist-high hard drives.

A lot of UPSes have really cheap fans, so you could also look to exchanging them for Noctua fans. I did the same for my Eaton UPSes and it makes really a huge difference. And while you're at it, please also check the connectors to the batteries as those often don't make as good contact as you would expect. So after opening the cables could have been moved a bit showing how awful the batter connector really was but remained unnoticed as long as the cable was clamped in a specific way.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

I did open it partly, got the batteries out... but the way that model's put together it's not easy to replace the fan... and I think it might even be soldered in :(

@TD-er

3 ай бұрын

@@JeffGeerling At least the Eaton UPS had some connector to the PCB so I could cut the wires and re-use the connector. My UPSes don't measure the RPM, so no problems there as the RPM of the Noctua fans is lower than the original ones and a too low RPM could otherwise maybe trigger some alarms if it were measured.

@davideyres955

3 ай бұрын

Make sure they have the same cfm rating or you could end up not moving enough air to keep it sufficiently cool. Most ups are from server rooms or data centres so noise is not a consideration so it’s a bit outside their area of expertise even if they are consumer grade kit.

@TD-er

3 ай бұрын

@@davideyres955 Yep, did that too and not mounted those extra cables Noctua includes to lower the fan speed.

@hubertnnn

3 ай бұрын

Are you using a double conversion UPS? It is weird that the UPS fans are on all the time. Most UPSes should turn their fan off after the battery is charged. The only exception are double conversion ones, since those are constantly converting power from 220V down to battery voltage and then back to 220V. They have the advantage of perfect voltage with no drop at all when power goes out, but they get used up faster since they run 24/7 instead of just being on standby.

Id suggest government auctions website, and any recycling website of a nearby university, stuff is usually available and its usually in summer vacation time when departments get renovated.

I have a stupid button on the door. But I connected it to a few transistors with an ESP8266 that runs Tasmota. A relay then activates the doorbell. Every time it rings I get an email.

It needs a bell/ chime or resistor (like Ring requires) in series because it shorts out the supply like the dumb buttons do when you ring the bell. If there’s not (enough) series resistance then your smart doorbell will go up in smoke. The buzzing of your chime is caused by the current that your smart doorbell pulls to keep it’s circuitry going. The chime connector adds the series resistance but also makes sure that your chime gets all the power. That’s where the optoMOS relay is used for.

@hubertnnn

3 ай бұрын

If a chime is not connected then the circuit will not get closed, so no power to fry the doorbell.

@zyeborm

3 ай бұрын

Wow that seems like a heck of a bold circuit design. A jumper on the PCB or probably even software to not short the wire when pressed seems like a fairly obvious option as well as a fuse. Like the fuse seems mandatory.

@Tillyface89

3 ай бұрын

Most smart doorbells come with the resistors, like for instance, my Amcrest units come with them but they also work fine without the chimes and are just straight wired. Seems like a lot of poor design assumptions on the simplifysafe side.

@Tillyface89

3 ай бұрын

You need the wire to short to activate the chime but maybe something like an isolator relay shown where the doorbell runs off battery while activating the relay so the chime runs but the doorbell is not getting murdered by the current.

@tomsixsix

3 ай бұрын

You would have thought they would consider this possible use case and add a current limiting circuit to the device, or a mode where it doesn't short the supply on ring.

I couldn't find an ESD-safe workbench used, so I'm using a Husky workbench with a sizeable anti-static work mat (with a return path) and Steve's large GN soldering mat on top of it instead.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

That's definitely an option I've considered. That plus a few shelves on the walls might work out if I can't find something decent otherwise. My ideal would be a good workbench with a few shelves and attachment points, but I'm guessing unless I get lucky and some lab closes down in St. Louis, those kind of benches are going to be slightly out of reach.

@yugo_

3 ай бұрын

​ @JeffGeerling, I considered adding two stacked ULine electric top shelves, 10" deep-ish; that's okay for any hot-air station or oscilloscope. Sadly, they're not cheap :/

@Mitch3D

3 ай бұрын

Seville UltraHD workbench works for me, but peg board and not a lot of upper shelf space. I just use an ESD strap but the workbench itself isn't grounded like it should be. Plenty of LED lighting helps a ton though, a simple magnifying articulating arm light helps so much.

@zyeborm

3 ай бұрын

@@JeffGeerling ESD safe is nice, but not a massive requirement for most things these days. Outside of raw mosfets most electronics are much more robust to (moderate) esd than they were in the 70s when looking at an IC whilst thinking about patting a cat would fry it. ;-) For general Pi work the best workbench is one you have and add a mat if you need.

The unifi G4 doorbell pro is the best one i've used. It's the only doorbell I know of that can be run over POE. Such a useful feature. Never overheated, locally hosted & the package camera is amazingly useful. I think you had some unifi gear at some point? Might be worth a shot.

@refaelazi5913

3 ай бұрын

Same, Jeff you should definatly upgrade your network and camera system to Unifi, it works well!

@TheObsesedAnimeFreaks

3 ай бұрын

it's also compatable with access if i remember correctly so he can install an electronic striker and keep the front door locked, if he doesn't already have one.

a standard doorbell is just a mechanical switch so I'm assuming that the smart doorbell works in a similar way, so without the chime, it basically shorts out the transformer because there is no load. I'm sure that the doorbell is pulling a little power, but if it expects a chime to be there to drop a large portion of the voltage actuating the solenoid, then I'm sure something started to fry. I'm kind of disappointed that they didn't test for that situation, but i guess it could have been overlooked.

Hi Jeff, I installed a smart doorbell at my parents place, and the following thoughts may be helpful as I plan to use my experience as a lecture for my students: The resistor and transformer size are related issues. The reason why the buzzing and camera cut-out happens is because the voltage from the transformer is not high enough -- this seems counter intuitive but bear with me here. The input to most of these smart doorbells is a standard rectifier leading to X regulation circuit, which means the apparent AC voltage that the doorbell sees will directly affect the current draw, but inversely because the doorbell is drawing some amount of power (voltage x current). The higher current means that the mechanical chime will continuously vibrate. As an aside, the current flowing through the mechanical chime inductor results in an equivalent voltage drop, if you want to work out some VAC voltage drops :) As *another* aside, the vibration of the chime continuously changes the voltage across the chime inductor, which leads to intermittent performance from the doorbell. Here's where it gets slightly complicated -- the resistor bypasses the inductor to drop the VAC across it, so that the doorbell sees a higher voltage. This also results in less current through the inductor/resistor pair, leading to lower vibrations. So anyway, why did I go through all this wall of text? Because my parents had a doorbell transformer from the early 90s that was only 12VAC. The resistor trick, while bringing the camera online, didn't solve the buzzing because the current draw was still too high. I replaced the transformer with a slightly larger VAC transformer, and there was noticeably less buzzing. Installing the resistor completely neutralized the noise. The one final note I'll leave is that the VA power rating of the transformer also matters too -- if the transformer cannot keep up with the current draw, then the transformer will heat up and cause issues too. Actually, one more final note: be careful about those generic "smart doorbell" transformers because the ground is a non-isolated ground to the primary of the transformer. (Actually, one *more* final note: the Nest, I believe, uses a supercap instead of a lithium ion battery to provide power to the circuit when the doorbell button is pressed, because otherwise the doorbell would just cut out in power. Much better design.)

1:09 love the poster Jeff, Oona Räisänen stumbled upon my recording of the dial-up handshake years ago and turned it into this poster. It always put the smile on my face when I see or hear that little recording I did end up in so many places. I love your videos by the way. Now I feel like I'm a little part of one of them :)

Love you bro. Great journey, well deserved, thanks for sharing.

I have friends who had issues with ring doorbells. They found that weak 24vac transformers would cause them to not work because the chime was an issue. So people would buy "hot" transformers. The nest has capacitor kit to prevent the voltage from dropping too much when the doorbell switch closes the circuit. And others have bypass wires for the chime. Its interesting to me what a challenge it is for the bell manufacturs to resolve this. It's not like the doorbell is not a standardized product nationwide. I guess the complexity of a chime coil and switch causing voltage spikes while causing the button, camera, switch part to live with zero volts momentarily when pressed is a bigger issue than i realize, maybe.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Honestly I think they should sell two versions: one for people who want to use old school mechanical chimes, and another for modern installs / new installs where people just want a smart doorbell that sends them an alert when someone rings. If they had that, they could make a simpler DC-only version, and have installers ensure there's 12vdc or whatever they pick to the bell.

@jakej1837

3 ай бұрын

A lot of video doorbells require 30VA transformers. Older 10VA ones simply don't provide enough power. Anyways, I have an Amcrest AD110 video doorbell I bought years ago and it has been working flawlessly. I bought a 16V 30VA transformer at the time as per instructions (I tried the 10VA old one and it wasn't strong enough to power on). My home had a digital chime and the doorbell came with a small adapter box (similar to the one shown in the video) that allowed connecting the digital chime. So I think the issues mentioned in this video applies to that specific model/company, not to all. Given the condition of the replacement, I going to guess it was a refurbished model, so it may be internally defective (and was not properly fixed).

@theofficialgman

3 ай бұрын

@@JeffGeerlingOther doorbell manufacturers have solved this in software years ago. On the original Ring Doorbell and Doorbell 2, pressing the button always activates the a physical doorbell by basically shorting the contacts of the two wires you have connected. On later models, they have options in their software to disable that (eg: the option called "No In Home Chime) which I assume means that they disable that shorting via software. The older hardware models and your SimpliSafe doorbell too must have that shorting being implemented via fully in hardware and not controllable or updatable via software. That resistor kit from ring (or one you make yourself) is the workaround which allows the doorbell to still trickle charge its battery while allowing the energy to dissipate via the resistor when the doorbell shorts those contacts on pressing the button.

@nichenson7987

3 ай бұрын

It's not just ring. The Nest Hello does this as well especially in low temps. All summer it does fine but usually during a cold snap on the winter when someone pushes the button, it chimes and then shuts down. My guess is whatever capacitors they are using for when the chime closes does not work well at the lower temps.

@austin3171

3 ай бұрын

Quick question - did you verify the voltage coming from your transformer, both when idle and under load (streaming video, button pressed) @@JeffGeerling - Apologies if you said this and I missed it, I got distracted a few times while watching.

I love this progress!

10 years ago I bought a 6 foot Gladiator brand workbench for my garage. Very sturdy and nice but somewhat expensive. At the same time my Coworker bought 2 off Craigslist for half price of one.... You may want to look for a used bench.

For your blinds, if you want to go down the fully open source route you can use ESPHome with an RF receiver (although I don't know if this can support rolling codes if your remote uses those). I recently did this with my Louvolite blinds, an ESPHome-flashed Sonoff RF transmitter/receiver (need to cut a couple of traces and solder a couple of resistors) and used "remote_receiver" to read the raw rf pulses from the remote and play them back with "remote_transmitter". I did also clean up (round) the received raw pulses since you could figure how long each pulse was "supposed" to be (multiples of 300 in my case). If the protocol is something that ESPHome can decode you then it'll be a bit simpler than that

At 4:16 the penny dropped for me, years ago I was an early adopter and I installed an ring doorbell. I built my power supply with a 240v to 18v transformer and an in-line 25 ohm resistor (it need to be 50w, but I had an old 200w version from my radio transmission days) it works a perfectly with lots of head room on the power side. Fully understand the mistake I nearly missed it myself. Glad you are all safe and love the networking update.

@zyeborm

3 ай бұрын

having a resistor inline is such a dodgy "fix" I really would love to see a schematic of wtf they are doing on their power supply side. Like if their current draw goes down the voltage is going to go up anyway.

@peterwilbrink718

3 ай бұрын

​@@zyebormThey need to short circuit the supply to use the chime, as it's in series with the doorbell. I don't think the beefy resistor is a dodgy fix. The power losses will be very small when idle.

@zyeborm

3 ай бұрын

@@peterwilbrink718 only if you have a chime. Having a fuse seems like a premium idea as well for something that deals with any sort of user supplied power either way. Having a jumper in the device or a software option to not short the power seems like low hanging fruit too.

@peterwilbrink718

3 ай бұрын

@@zyeborm absolutely! The manufacturer should've taken precautions.

@marksterling8286

3 ай бұрын

@@zyeborm absolutely NOT a dodgy fix, the in-line resistor takes the load when the doorbell shorts the power supply. The resistor power rating (w) does not denote the power that it will draw, that’s done with its resistance and the supply voltage. The power rating is the maximum power the resistor can displace . So a large watt resistor won’t use more power, but it can safely displace more power if it needs too. With regards to fitting this in the doorbell, that would be impractical my 25 ohm 200w resistor is about 3 times larger than the doorbell.

Yikes! Thinking of building my own with an ESP32-CAM... I have a retro corner too. Apple ][e. :)

@marria01

3 ай бұрын

have you managed to find a camera module that doesn't totally suck? Every single one I've tried looks like something out of a mid-00's flip phone. Looks like a MIPI based module is the only decent option, which basically rules out the ESP32.

@whitneydesignlabs8738

3 ай бұрын

I guess the level of suckiness of the ESP32-CAMs is relative. The price is right and being able to hardcode software in C++ has some advantages. But granted, image quality is marginal. I have been experimenting with low cost IP surveillance cameras lately. Much better pixel/$ ratio. But also a much larger form factor. At that point it becomes an integrated system and not so much a stand alone door bell appliance. @@marria01

Hey Jeff, Sand is a great idea. You can also put the lipo batteries into a bucket of saltwater. It has the added benefit of slowly dissipating the battery charge. We do it for damaged drone batteries that we are nervous about handling or storing.

Thanks Jeff. Was in the market for 1 . Appreciate the video

Fair, and comprehensive feedback!

I agree with @Cycleranger. I would go up like 6+ feet with frosted tint. Talk to any local auto tint places, a lot of them also do commercial stuff!

For my upcoming automation and smart housification I'm planning on doing a generic matter/thread button as a doorbell, and just write all the integrations for it in homeassistant. Same for alarm sensors.

regarding something like the desk: I know that our university here sells things like that, that departments no longer need. Might be worth checking if there is anything like that local.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

I'll have to check with SLU, Webster, or Washington U - I know I've picked up a couple pieces of surplus furniture from SLU at least before, they might do a little estate sale style thing every now and then.

Loving my Ubiquiti G4 doorbell paired with the Ubiquiti UP Chime. No voltage, no burning. Just plug the chime in the wall and it works.

I've installed a Reolink doorbell and it works like a charm. All local and compatible with home assistant.

I am working as a QA engineer. And everything that has anything related to the camera is a pain in the ass. Bugs, bugs, strange behaviour, shenanigans with the power, and more.

You can add the Govee Lamp over following Home Assistant HACS implementation. "Govee Lan Control"

Jeff, God has blessed you with such a great family. I still pray your health issues get worked out.

Loving the dial up picture!

Great video Jeff. Glad to see you using your superlative engineering skills in building out your studio. Very nice job so far. As far as the SimpliSafe issues, I’m glad I went with Ring from the start 😀

There are a few HACS Integrations for home assistant which should work with the Govee lamp, I use one called govee (plus 1 for naming originality) which handles my led strip well but YMMV

Great video - as usual! I would say you were more than fair, balanced and non-bias in your review of the door bell. You have spent more money and more time on the doorbell project then I ever could. My sister and her family have Ring - I don't think they have ever had an issue. She loves it. Maybe something to consider? Or if you are wanting to go the "corporate way," install a IP camera and a FOB door access system. They are not that expensive and you can generally connected them together so that when their is motion or someone FOBs-in, the camera starts rolling and of course most of those systems are capable of an SMTP notification. As for the electrical bench, I had my dad ask the neighbour guy two houses down (a carpenter/wood worker) to build me a wood electrical bench when I started college, just after high school. I had it in the basement for years (the entire family used it too!). Now it's in the warehouse of my office. It's been a good, LOW COST option and gives you the opportunity to build it the way you want and need. For me, I have built-in electrical plugs every two-feet - so it's ideal. Building your own electrical bench with your father maybe a good reason for another video.

If you're carrying a drive back and forth, does that mean we get a video about the bandwidth of SneakerNET?

@bartz0rt928

3 ай бұрын

Pretty decent bandwidth, but the latency is atrocious.

I'm glad I went with a $5 doorbell and a 4k camera running poe over my door even more now. I will be interested in integrating the blinds with HA, as I may do this myself. I also plan on getting my offgrid solar setup working with HA as well, along with automating my greenhouse and garden on down the line.

9:22 YW! Looks so much better!

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Haha there you are! And thanks again for the suggestion. Still trying to make sure it's good from other camera angles though-I might have to play around with how I light that corner of the set.

This goes to show how not all smart devices are actually smart. Thanks for the video!

Still watching but the first minute of this is relatable. I have gone through 3 smart doorbells from 2 different brands, and they all have the same problem: They *significantly* overheat. Even in 40 degree weather in the shade, they are more than "warm" to the touch. Not painfully hot to touch, but significantly warm to make you do a double take. In the Las Vegas summers, I've already had one melt.

The Unifi PoE Doorbell Kit is excellent. I have two on my house.

As always, Good Luck. And good work.

Shots fired at Simplisafe, HA! Thank you for being honest with us, even tho they are sometimes a sponsor.

I absolutely love these vlogs!! If you’re looking for a work desk, check used office furniture liquidators. There’s usually one in every major city, they might have some more specialized desks for cheep! Also! Don’t forget to add more expensive items to your insurance as riders, costs a little extra but ensures they’ll be ensured outside of standard insurance. You might also get a discount with security system installs.

I have that same TrippLite (or similar). Ended up opening it and replacing with a Noctua fan and all good. You could even put a pots in line to power the power to the fan.

I have had nothing but issues with the camera. It's also been a problem with actually recording motion and doing what we expect of it to do. IE, I constantly don't get notifications of people dropping things off on my porch or it recording if my alarm isn't on, which is counter intuitive, if I'm at home I don't want the alarm ON to be able to record.

For the workbench need, home depot has some husky rolling/stationary(comes with feet and wheels) workbenches for

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

I've had my eye on a few of them, though I really want a wider bench - especially after talking to my Dad, it seems like most of the time when they build out radio engineering shops, 8ft or 10ft are the norm unless there's absolutely no space. Makes it easier to work on a couple projects at once, especially if one needs to spread out more.

@garrethtinsley2435

3 ай бұрын

​@@JeffGeerlingwhy don't you build one? I used a piece of worktop on top of two filling cabinets for years but I'm sure with your skills, tools and contacts you can do much better lol

This stuff is why I like my Amcrest doorbell. There's no internal battery and it's been firewalled so that it's not allowed to talk to the internet at all and just streams video and two-way audio to frigate over RTSP and RTC. I don't know any other doorbells that you can get the video stream directly from that way.

Shout out from St. Louis. I have two of those. I had to replace my doorbell which was an old buzzer type, and it also did not play nice with my old router.

Personally I find IKEA does some good modular benches and desks. Once I couldn't find the right kind of work desk in their home office section, I went to their kitchen section and actually found a kitchen table that actually suited my purpose for a work desk.

Myst! On an old Mac, it would bring back some memories.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Mmm... this one could even do Riven, Myst III/IV/V!

@Lorondos

3 ай бұрын

Woohoo! I wonder if the Riven Remake will have a Mac port that might work (long shot), something to explore down the road! @@JeffGeerling

Been very happy with my arlo pro doorbells and unifi protect

I have a 3000Va APC ups in my lounge room, to make it compatible I replaced the fans with noctua units. The pinout in the plug is different so be aware you may need to change yours if you do that. Large online dual conversion and line interactive ups units will probably have fans running the whole time as there is power running through the transformer full time and it'll get warm. The batteries don't like warm. My APC unit has 2 fans, 1 that runs full time and 1 that kicks in as needed when it actually goes into UPS mode. Another suggestion. I ran power *from* this ups on a dedicated circuit throughout my house/office I put orange outlets on the walls for the points that come off the UPS supply. I know fishing new cables now to do that would be a pain in the butt but for your application perhaps you could just run all the points on your existing circuits off the UPS if it's beefy enough to handle something heavy running for a little when a failure starts? Alternately nice excuse for a giant UPS off ebay for cheap and some new batteries ;-) I've seen some like 30-100Kw units going for basically scrap value. Then you can put all the noisy in your server room.

I'm currently using a nest doorbell but my previous install was RING and they say you should have a 50Ohm resistor in line with the doorbell I guess to limit current. I use the same electrical setup with my Nest doorbell and it works fine too (I also have a 1 or 2 amp fuse inline (can't recall if it's 1 or 2...) for safety). As for "how efficient" the resistor is ... I used a THD power resistor put it in an enclosure with drilled air holes and it's been running for years.

It's not cheap at $300-380 but I love Ubiquiti's G4 Doorbell Pro, the only downside is it requires an NVR from Ubiquiti running Unifi Protect which adds at least $200 to the cost of the doorbell. Even though it requires Ubiquiti's NVR to function you can enable RSTP streams for each individual camera so you can view it in other software or use something like Scrypted or a Home Assistant plugin. There are two versions: one that can be powered by USB C or a doorbell transformer and a PoE version. I have the first version and use the PoE to USB C power adapter and it works great.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

That's my issue with Ubiquiti's gear... once you're in for a penny, you're in for a pound! So far I've avoided that temptation :D

Very interesting video. Your studio has come a long way. Also, scrap simply safe, go with a Reolink doorbell camera, I have had zero issues with mine.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Might go this route!

@SchoolforHackers

3 ай бұрын

Yup, everyone who mentions Reolink says they’re great. Point noted.

If you want to jump to a different doorbell I highly recommend the Unifi rotect doorbell from Ubiquity. Love the videos and thanks for the update.

That ASRock Rack Altra ARM build is going to be wild

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Starting on it momentarily :)

I'm really enjoying my Ubiquiti G4 Doorbell Pro. Local storage, notifications, AI detection... It's been great.

An Action Retro/Jeff Geerling teamup would be awesome!

Jeff the bottom door thingies make it less easy to do under door attacks :D

A smart doorbell is trying to emulate a mechanical button, so if you wire it to the transformer without a chime in series, the smart doorbell will short the transformer output when it tries to ring the chime! It's like the classic battery, switch, light bulb circuit, but with a transformer, doorbell button, and chime, respectively. Note that the chime is the "load", and the doorbell button is the "switch" here. When the smart doorbell isn't ringing the chime, it just draws a trickle of current through the chime to power itself, hopefully not enough to make it buzz. When the smart doorbell is ringing the chime, it acts like a short and the transformer powers the chime. So your original circuit without the chime is your smart doorbell acting like a closed switch straight across the transformer output! The beefy power resistor in the ring kit is there to provide a "load" to emulate the chime. Of course the SimpliSafe engineers should have anticipated this problem and added internal current limiting to prevent this problem. I'm sure this is a common issue, and it's a potentially dangerous flaw. At a minimum they should have added a fuse so it would fail immediately but safely.

I found two good options for something portable (rolling), scaffolding is readily available, new, and used in lots of sizes. For something more permanent, pallet shelving or heavy-duty shelves from Home Depot and others. Basically, you don’t use the bottom shelf, and then it’s a desk. The bottom shelf can be used above for storage.

PowerMac G4 looks sick 👌

Yeah, if i ever feel the need the upgrade to a "smart" doorbell, it'll be a wired one without a battery 😂

"24V" transformer can actually be for example 26V when you have 115 instead of 110 at your place. That thingy should have a lot of slack, if I would design it I would do exact calculations for worst case scenario and add at least 2V on top of that, that would result in like 30VAC absolute voltage. You can measure what your transformers output.

@JeffGeerling

3 ай бұрын

Yep; the 24V transformer was outputting 26V (but that should not cause the device to burn up!).

Strange, I've been running that SimpliSafe doorbell for about 6 months now on a basic 16V/10VA doorbell transformer I got off Amazon with no issues- button works, camera connects and detects movement, etc. No mechanical chime, it was all new wiring, house didn't have an existing doorbell so I had to pull wire to a spot next to the door.

I did my own smart door bell with an ESP8266 and an app in flutter. I hooked everything to firebase and the free tier works fine for this. I have ringer history, door open history, also hooked up an NFC reader to open my door. Can also control remotely when to open the door using my flutter app. It was a nice project to work on

Hey Jeff, I used to work at Ring and whenever we saw doorbells break like this, its because the wires were shorted somehow, somewhere (or the issue i describe below was the other common factor) . 24v is kind of high, i understand the specs say 8-24, but I would say 12v should be fine but you need to verify your actual internal wall chimes power requirements too, if that doesn't line up youll have similar issues. I belieeve that is likely the choice for their "8-24v" spec, so they can be more compatible with multiple physical chimes. The buzzing chime can be because you need that chime relay device for sure, this is the case on the Ring Pro doorbells and there was a very serious risk of fire if they were not installed properly with the relay device. I had a tech who was like "yeah man ive been installing ring pros for 2 years and never once put the relay on it" as im melting in my chair like "oh god....". In my personal opinion, after working at Ring for how long I did, if it buzzed at all then the internal chime is already damaged even if it doesn't fully show it yet.

For the door being hard to close, you might want to look into getting a door closer. It would allow you to adjust the speed at wich the door closes and the force that it uses to do so. Some of them even have a pin that you can twist and it holds the door open! They can be quite nice

Kendall Howard lan desk / workbenches... they're awesome. I got mine at Rackfinity and it's a decent price (pick the width you want). I preferred the 4-post for my home lab since the heights of each shelf are more adjustable than the 2-post, but either way you'll have some good options.

Workbenches: get on I-44 west to Springfield. Grizzly Industrial. They sell engineered wood workbench tops that are almost too nice to be used as a workbench. I’ve got one in my kitchen that I made a center island out of. I used another in the bath to update a vanity from the nasty old 1968 formica garbage that was in there before. And I have a couple of them in use as workbenches. They also sell the stringers and all the metal pieces that you need. You can have a really nice customized bench for well under the prices you were quoting.

I’ll have to check our stuff because when I installed the SimpliSafe doorbell I used the wires from the old doorbell and it’s worked for years now. The mechanical bell doesn’t ring though. I read you have to do some alternate wiring to make the “analog” chime work again like the old doorbell button.

Jefff !!! Good to see ya man I hope you are doing well !!

I'm currently 1/3 way through, and i think the background with the sticker plate and the other picture looks great!

I know you don't have a lot of Unfi Gear; however, I run Protect at homeoorbell; i and use their dt's really nice to have all my security cameras on one pane of glass.

I love the 56k Dial Up visual representation poster, that's awesome.

It's interesting that Simply safe say you need an elec/mech chime but then send you an opto-isolater to get rid of a problem caused by having the chime connected. The buzzing makes me think that they're using a MOSFET to switch the chime but they're leaking current through to the chime all the time. Sounds like a right lash up!

@eDoc2020

3 ай бұрын

It's wired in series with the chime so if they didn't leak current it wouldn't be able to charge its battery. The current leakage is just a bit too high for this particular scenario. I would presume the optoisolator module is mainly intended for use with electronic chime units.

For your workbench ya might want to look in to an Ikea Fredde desk/hutch, it looks quite similar to the models shown. The middle or monitor shelf can be anywhere between the desktop and the top shelf allowing a bunch of equipment on the 2 shelves and still have a small monitor space. There is also some smaller shelves on the upper sides to hold more light-weight equipment.

I just bought a hikvision doorbell. Poe for power. Onvif for camera recording. And works fairly well.

Workbench: 6' L x 25" W butcher block counter top from Lowe's or Home Depot for about $200 and then some round steel table legs from Amazon for another $50 or so. Nice and heavy. Stain and polyurethane if you want to add some protection.

Every time I watch your videos, I think: 'Oh man, I do like that poster with the Dalek'.

The buzzing in your chime you described sounds like the solenoid being stuck. This was an issue I had too when I was connecting my parent's EZviz smart doorbell. It's been a while, but you might want to try another wiring option on your chime. usually these solenoid types have different wiring options.

For the remote control, if you can't get SDR to work, you can slap a RPI Relay HAT and do a little bit of soldering to emulate button presses through home assistant (bonus points if you use a buck converter to converter Pi voltage to whatever the remote accepts so you never have to replace batteries).

Hah I was also looking for a way to digitize my doorbell recently. The original chime burned out, but I had an unused Sonoff mini relay, so I wired it to the button and connected it to Homeassistant which listens for button presses and casts a doorbell sound to a google home speaker, and it also sends a notification to my phone. I've also set it up so that a 3 second press triggers the Coming Home scene. These sonoff things are nice since they work with 110 / 230V AC directly, fit neatly behind light switches and can be flashed with Tasmota or ESPHome. Hopefully it doesn't catch on fire too lol

I looked into this before connecting up my Ring doorbell to wired power, reading between the lines the doorbell basically shunts / shorts out like a button would, in order to ring an existing doorbell chime, this makes them unsuitable for direct connection to a transformer as you found out, my solution? A low voltage light bulb wired in series, sure you can buy the expensive resistor, but the light bulb was cheaper still. Someone pushes the doorbell, the light flashes to absorb the short circuit, the ring doorbell is happy :)

Congratulations for defeated the sound monster! Actually your voice sound excellent in studio.

G4 bringing back good memories ❤

I know this sounds silly, but Home Depot has an adjustable workbench that I'm using for my electronics bench. It's been working great and you can easily mount a backsplash pegboard to it. It's also cheap. The smaller one is $250 and easy to assemble in a couple hours.

Yeah, you need that chime adapter as it sits in the middle to act as filter to prevent noise and errant voltage from killing the doorbell or the chime. The Nest doorbell’s instructions mention damage will occur if not installed.

@estyrer2

3 ай бұрын

-edit- I just installed a Nest wired DB for my parents. Installing the chime adapter was the first step in their instructions. The chime still isn't chiming at the moment but nothing has burned up as of yet!

Got the Ring about 5 years ago and it just works since then. I don't even know the voltage of my old school mechanical chime. Ring just vampires what it needs and all is well.

I've pitched to every creator I could think of now the idea of making your own Wireless doorbell with an open source user self hosted OR a subscription to a company. HA, Push notifications plus a camera and all shouldn't be too hard for nerds to setup but I could also get some peace of mind setting my family up with one using an open source design that I pay someone else to host... So theres me now pitching it to you Jeff!

You can get sound attinuated supply registers, and an acoustic lined z-duct for return air. No need for a ductless unit.