Ah yeah, phone is a frequent sync with FolderSync, including deletions, and USB is a manual backup. A rental VPS is a good idea…

What do you use for 3-2-1? I try, so far I have my phone, backed up to a server HDD via SMB (Too poor for RAID-1 atm), and the very important stuff sent to a USB drive and returned to a drawer. Am I doing it right haha

Right? My one has developed a nasty case of defective WiFi/Bluetooth chip. I’m convinced it’s a superficial, intentional break. Flashing it could well revert what Google’s doing to it

Aside from being hella slow, I just don’t like that it can’t use the same directories as my network shares and requires uploading. This script might help but honestly I just stick to the basic shares because of this

From my experience using a mailserver with no PTR and an ISP who likes to put their addresses on a PBL, it’s very good. Gmail tends to be the most annoying and wants that PBL listing removed or you’ll go to spam for new recipients, but other than that 10/10. I’d be interested to hear what your findings are if you do test it!

Get yourself a Sonoff ZigBee bridge! Hue light support is practically native, and they act as extenders to reach your other ZigBee devices! Just don’t expect to be able to sync them with any movies or peripherals. I think there is a virtual Hue bridge on HACS and that might help with that, but idk

Smooth sailing for me too, shockingly. I’ve recently added my 26th service to Proxmox - LibreELEC (Kodi), with the very complex matter of monitor passthrough. It’s such a versatile program and it has replaced my Chromecast with more features and side bonuses than I could’ve imagined. Another huge step towards degoogling.

Nice… I use ytdl-sub for downloading music, highly recommend it. You can write tag metadata but if you want embedded stuff I’d recommend trying beets. Running both as a user whose primary group matches Jellyfin is a must if you want stuff saved next to the video files… The dev is also very active.

I just installed Ollama and use gemma3 for now. I wanted to use dolphin-mixtral but holy crap it wants more RAM than my entire setup

Snikket is great. I liked my choice of Prosody with Monocles and Gajim for server, Android and Windows/Linux, respectively

XMPP for my attempt just worked, voice and video calling too. The Android clients Monocles, Cheogram and Conversations are great, as for desktop they all look like 90’s messaging clients haha

I ultimately switched to Matrix because the encryption key sharing is much more friendly, at least for helping non-enthusiasts use it, and I didn’t realise I could decrypt old XMPP messages for new clients by transferring them manually, but at least Element Web is nice. It has flaws, definitely - on Android I find myself using Element Classic for creating unencrypted rooms and voice/video calling using my TURN server, and Element X for general messaging, caption and Markdown support. That’s another thing - for me the Element clients are the closest to being usable, the few others are borked.

In short XMPP is ugly but functional, and the client devs try their best, and Matrix is enticing but, as you said, finicky. Element is pretty but their new client that promises full e2ee for calling hasn’t reached a level I would consider out of Beta yet.

I was more a 00’s kid into consoles, so this was introduced to me via Fallout 3, then Dark Souls

This. Why pay £6/m when, with self-hosting a Samba/NFS/NextCloud instance, I pay a fraction of the corporate cost.

Currently I’m paying ~£15/m as my server now has a GPU for better streaming and local assistant purposes. It uses ~80W. Without the GPU I was paying ~£4.50/m, which gets me:

• Network-wide traffic protection, ads, spam etc.
• Hub to remotely control, secure and automate my home
• Cloud media, frequently synced between devices
• CCTV
• Password management
• Email
• Notekeeping
• Instant messaging
• Streaming for locally stored movies, shows, music, podcasts, books, audio books and YouTube subscriptions
• Multiplayer Minecraft server
• Website/blogsite
• Remote desktop access
• Group video calling/presentation hosting
• 54TB shared storage between everything
• Network-attached storage

Imagine the cost of outsourcing all these services for unlimited access, unlimited* storage, unlimited e-mailboxes, and complete independence** from outside influence. I know I’d be paying £8/m to Google for their 2TB media storage plan alone.

*Limited by the drives you can afford
**Relying only on the developers of the software
It cost approx. £200 for the base parts, £200 for the GPU and £900 for the hard drives. A valuable investment.

I’ve worked out that I’ve had the server running for 3 years. If I take into account the money I have saved by not paying Google £8/m, I’ve saved £40/year. If I account for Netflix £25/m, I’ve completely covered the £900 I spent on storage. Disney+ £15/m takes me well over the remaining hardware costs. The media I own is far less than that offered by streamers but it’s everything I can need for the next 20 years+. I’ve counted. Every other service is just a bonus.

Does it connect to your WiFi, is that how you get the IP of the camera?

TL;DR: They’re a damn good choice, and I don’t know how offline they can be.

I use Proxmox, Reolink 810s, and I have AgentDVR logged into the cameras via https (443) to get info, and ONVIF (8000) for the stream. It takes a little tweaking via the camera app or web GUI if you want the onboard AI to omit large or small objects for screenshots or notifications, which I have controlled by HA. I use the AgentDVR and Reolink integrations. Here are the features I’ve got:

• AgentDVR logged in to the cameras’ admin account (definitely no Reolink account)
• Reolink cam rolling footage based on motion, on onboard MicroSD
• AgentDVR 24/7 footage saving directly to a mounted high-capacity HDD
• Reolink cam, with detection, sends a screenshot with a configured naming format via FTP directly to Home Assistant’s www folder (but this and notifications can be handled by either piece of the setup)
• Home Assistant monitors the folder with folder_watcher and an automation prepares to send my phone a notification (Fdroid - not Google) once the image has ‘closed’)
• I’ve saved my automation script in which HA does the screenshots instead of the Reolink cam. I’ve kept the clickAction to the Reolink app in there because it’s very complicated
• My cameras are connected to my home WiFi but they can also connect to an NVR or a PC for a completely isolated link (you’ll need a PoE injector, I use this for up to 4 cameras).

If you use the Reolink app, then it will use the Reolink servers via several domains. I haven’t checked traffic on the cameras yet. It can be fully offline but I choose not to for a better remote experience using the app.

I set them up a long time ago, scanning a QR code on the camera using the Reolink app. I don’t know if it can be handled another way.

any … device that uses Wifi is to be avoided

Same here with TPLink. I avoid Tapo for its more anti-consumer features like cloud dependence and WiFi, and stick to Kasa, but I do have a KP303 which was pretty much the only smart strip in production, and unlike the other Kasa plugs the strip can’t be configured without logging in.

Right? My Reolink detect on device so it’s definitely ms. Even having HA handle screenshots with the delayed feed through AgentDVR would make it under 2s. OP’s NVR is apparently running it through AfterEffects Pro and airbrushing before export

As I’ve seen gaming server subscriptions go from £36/y to £23/m (Xbox) in a few years, and cloud CCTV storage from £40/y to £16/m (Google via acquisition of Nest) in a few months, I say we count our stars when a subscription cost remains fair.

I hear you. I’ve taken to writing myself guides on how to set up things based on what worked for me, in case I need to again, purely because of how complicated each one is. Might write blogs later aha

Yeah, the way things at going I feel like I should protect myself further with a VPN, but it does break some of my services’ access. Just another hurdle in the track to net independence that will be overcome! Heaven knows we’ve overcome many to get where we each are.

No need to bust your brain trying too hard - you’ll find an answer eventually!