If you are running something on your computer that requires an always on connection (I think at one time I had Splunk or something like that running for logs), Does letting it go to sleep or hibernate affect that? My gut says yes, but I got don't know for sure. Just curious.
Hibernate is basically the same as being powered off completely, except it saves a snapshot of the ram to disk so that it can boot back up in the same state. So for sure hibernate would not be processing anything.
Sleep keeps the computer on but in a low power state. The connection is still alive, especially to listen for Wake-On-Lan if enabled. But the processor or OS wont be doing much of anything to my knowledge so any running applications are essentially paused.
3 Likes
So basically, for something that need to be always on both of those need to be disabled?
Yes, the only power saving method you can really use is where it shuts off the monitors after X minutes of idle.
1 Like
Ok, that's what I thought, I was just curious if I was thinking about it the correct way.
So, the Influx/Grafana dashboard, does that require always on, or is that all in the two clouds?
If you set it up using the cloud systems then your HE hub goes direct to the Influx cloud and you don't need any other local server running at your home.
1 Like
Whenever I hear "Always On" I anticipate someone will utter the words "RasPi" in the context of setting up standalone hardware to handle specific server needs.
Since I dislike leaving my PC running unattended – and don't relish devoting new hardware to each new project – I've found great joy in leveraging some of the extra horsepower under the hood of my Synology DiskStation NAS (expressly purchased for use with Plex Server streaming, in addition to SSD-based network storage and cloud account backups) using Docker containers.
I mention this by way of encouraging you to ponder whether such a NAS solution, running easy-to-deploy Docker images, might be a viable and affordable alternative to your current setup? I've got HA, Reactor, Echo Speaks token support and other images "always on" doing their job and persisting through multiple power outages in ways that a PC might not.
1 Like
Yes, leaving it powered up unattended is becoming a bit more of a concern lately. I'm in the initial stages of several projects which may affect this practice, all of which will take me far beyond just the Home Automation realm. I also am loath to continue adding more and more little devices for all these things. Right now, in addition to my laptop (turned workstation) I have a Beelink Mini PC running HAOS, exclusively for bringing my litter robot into Hubitat. Maybe one day I will get enough focus to see what else I can do with HA, but it's really not much of a priority, and not where I want to spend my tinkering time primarily.
Adding a NAS is part of these other projects, but it is something I won't be able to do for a while, probably in the six months to a year time frame. I'm still in the research phase of that. My immediate project, hopefully in less than six months, is to run network cable through the house (that will be this fall once it cools off) and get a better, and hopefully more secure network established.
1 Like
I run Home Assistant on a HA Yellow (PoE version, not that it matters.) I am running the InfluxDB and Grafana add-ons within HA. They work great, and receive routine updates by the core HA team. I send data from Hubitat, IoTaWatt, and HA to InfluxDB. It works great! I also run the Node-RED addon as well. HAOS does a fantastic job running multiple addons, which are really just containers. Thus, no need to add any additional hardware. Just use your Beelink mini PC running HAOS to run additional HA add-ons.
2 Likes
Whatever you are running on your laptop that it needs to be always on, you could probably move to the Mini PC
2 Likes
To be honest, I don't know that there is anything right now. It very well could just be that in my instance its too mush hassle to get the computer back up once its shut down or sleeping, Ill do some experimenting.
The mini pc was wiped and is only running HAOS. At the moment all im really using it for is to bring my litter robot in to HE. I keep intending to sit down and look at doing some other stuff, but Just haven't had the discipline to do it.
Ive got that working just fine in HE right now.
Could you explain the HA to InfluxDB a bit more? What are you doing with that? I have thought of tinkering with Node red. Last time I looked at it I was going to have to set up a cloud account somewhere else, and it just looked too complicated. Am I sensing that I can run it just using HA?
Another thing I have been looking at is using ESP Presence for room presence. The video was talking about MQTT. again, something else I don't understand. Same thing, last time I looked at that it looked like I needed to set up yet another third-party account to make that work. Am I off? can I do all those just with my little Mini PC and HA? Admittedly, when I looked into both of those things, was WAY before I even contemplated anything with HA, and I havent dug into HA very deeply yet.
If the software you're running doesn't require much processing power, I would suggest you to acquire a MiniPC, since its consume is much smaller than a regular PC, like @jtp10181 said. That is the solution I'm using to keep my Echo Speaks server running 24/7.
Where are you running the InfluxDB and Grafana servers?
I streamlined and simplified things by running those servers + others directly on my HAOS system. This allows my Hubitat C-8 Pro hub to transfer data directly to InfluxDB running on HAOS. I can then use Grafana, again running on HAOS, to create and display any visual charts/displays that I'd like.
I collect all of my Home Assistant device/entity data in InfluxDB, just like I do Hubitat data. InfluxDB is my long-term historical data archive.
No need to create any cloud accounts or instances for any of this stuff. I run it all locally directly on my HAOS platform. HAOS is a purpose built Linux kernel that is optimized for running 'containers'. The Home Assistant Core is a container. Home Assistant Supervisor is another container (IIRC.) HAOS Add-Ons are all just packaged up containers for things like InfluxDB, Node-RED, Grafana, NUT, etc... The user never needs to learn anything about docker containers, docker commands, etc... They 'just work' with very minimal configuration.
Again, no need to create any new accounts. HAOS can run the Mosqito MQTT Broker as an Add-On. I have a development HAOS instance running on a RPi that I use for testing things out. As you can see below, I am running the Mosquito MQTT Broker, as well as Zigbee2MQTT, on that system to allow me to try out Zigbee devices on HA.
HAOS has quite a few Add-Ons available, which are maintained regularly to keep them current. This makes keeping them updated fairly straightforward, as opposed to having to learn Docker running on a different system.
2 Likes
Im running this. Im 99% sure im running both using their cloud integrations.
Are you also doing that through HADB? I probably need to sit down and play with HA more. Right now it’s such a disorganized mess . My dashboard is just a jumble, and I can’t figure out how to put stuff how i woud like it (or get rid of stuff i don’t want there. It keeps finding other devices and giving me qr codes for pair but it is generic and i have no idea what they are. Needless to say with HA i still have a big learning curve to deal with.
Looks like im going to need to sit down and look a little deeper into alot of this. I really though alot if this stuff was a much bigger hassle than it was worth.
From what you’ve mentioned, you’re probably not running influxdb or grafana on a computer in your home.
2 Likes
That can be easily confirmed by checking 2 things.
@lcw731
Open Influx DB Logger and check the URL/Host it is sending the data to.
What is the URL you use to view the Grafana dashboards. That will tell you if it is local or cloud based.
2 Likes
I would convert your beelink from HAOS to Proxmox server running HACore. All of those add-ons are simply docker containers and you can run a separate docker host on the same server. Then, if there's something that you want to run that isn't part of the HA universe, you can just add another container as long as your hardware can handle it.
I used to run an HAOS VM, but with all the addons and what not, restarts would take on the order of 2-3 minutes. With HACore, restarts take 15 seconds, tops. Not going to lie, it's a bit more maintenance, but worth it for me in the long run vs. dedicating a whole PC to HA when it probably won't use 10% of it's capabilities. If you really prefer the simplicity of HAOS, you can just spin up a VM.
This site has a ton of helpful proxmox scripts that make things SUPER simple.
Yep, as I suspected, both are cloud based.
Humm. Not exactly opposed to doing that, but also, I would have no clue how to begin doing something like that. switching it from Windows to HAOS was easier than I thought it would be, but I also don't really know what I did, I just followed the instructions in the HA documentation. For a short-term solution, this may be an option. In the longer run (about a year out) I plan on essentially redoing everything. Runing cables, looking at going to Ubiquity, router, WAP, adding a proper NAS, replacing my laptop that I use as a workstation. All of that is in the planning stages now.
It's definitely a learning curve... but it's a hobby! 
That said, for the price of a beelink (they're on sale!), having a test bed to try things out is invaluable in regards to maintaining WAF. To my wife's dismay, I have perfectly good computers laying around doing nothing so they get relegated to test beds when I need them.
that's just me though. My wife knew what she was getting into when she married me... Side eyes aside.
3 Likes
I think OP already has what’s needed with respect to hardware. That mini pc is presumably capable of doing quite a bit more than running the home assistant OS with a single cloud-connected device, if thats the direction he wants to go.
1 Like
