Garage Doors, E‑Ink Dashboards, and Entity Chaos with the Evil Genius Dave Slusher
Home Assistant Podcast
Ad break
Notion sponsor spot describing Notion Agent features and where to try it using the podcast link.
Podcaster Dave Slusher joins Phil and Rohan to share hard-won smart home lessons: building a reliable mesh, solving a 100m mailbox sensor with Z-Wave Long Range and the ZWA2, and retiring MyQ with RATGDO + ESPHome. We also cover using an e‑ink terminal as a Home Assistant dashboard.
Support the Podcast
Get early-access to episodes and an ad-free feed by supporting our Patreon.
Support Rohan and Phil on Patreon
Share your story
We wouldn't be able to do this podcast without community members and home automation enthusiasts sharing their stories. To register your interest to come share your home automation journey, head over to homeassistant.fm and click share your story.
Chapters
00:00:00 Welcome
00:01:23 Guest intro: Dave Slusher’s podcasting origin story
00:04:59 Discovering Home Assistant
00:07:20 Hardware journey: Raspberry Pi 3/4, SD crashes, backups, staying on Pi
00:09:40 ZWA2 portable capability
00:11:10 Zigbee mesh realities
00:13:56 The mailbox quest
00:19:16 Power monitoring the lawnmower + adding Z‑Wave plug to the mesh
00:20:31 Beating peak electricity pricing with calendar‑driven automations
00:24:50 Buying for Home Assistant
00:31:26 Audi e‑tron HACS
00:33:00 ‘Terminal’ e‑ink display
00:41:11 Fun APIs: Domino’s throwback and accidental developer‑friendly brands
00:44:25 Update strategy + restoring from backups when an upgrade breaks boot
00:46:26 Entity naming conventions, device vs entity IDs, and maintainability
00:49:18 The router kill‑switch: renaming a plug and unintended automations
00:52:19 Ping watchdog automation for internet recovery (8.8.8.8)
00:54:58 Labels, documentation, and making a smart home family‑friendly
01:00:00 Selling a smart home: what stays, what goes, and account handoffs
01:02:16 First device nostalgia: Sonoff relay, app sprawl, and converging on HA
01:07:52 Next projects: buying with purpose, reliability over novelty
01:10:00 Mac mini (Linux Mint) homelab, Synology vs Docker, consolidating services
01:12:18 Package tracking with 17Track, long strings, and dashboard rendering
This episode was made possible thanks to our sponsors
Home Assistant Cloud by Nabu Casa
Easily connect to Google and Amazon voice assistants for a small monthly fee that also supports the Home Assistant project. Configuration is via the User Interface so no fiddling with router settings, dynamic DNS, or YAML.
If you're looking to upgrade your smart home - you can’t go past Zooz! Zooz offers a range of affordable and innovative devices, including water leak sensors, water valve controllers, smart plugs and scene controllers.
For the best prices on all Zooz products, head over to thesmartesthouse.com
Notion brings all your notes, docs, and projects into one connected space that just works — it’s seamless, flexible, powerful, and actually fun to use. With AI built right in, you spend less time switching between tools and more time creating great work.
Try Notion, now with Notion Agent, at notion.com/homeassistant
Hosts
Phil Hawthorne
Twitter: @philhawthorne
Bluesky: @philhawthorne.com
Rohan Karamandi
Twitter: @rohank9
Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands
Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy
The AI-powered Podcast Player
