You know, Herman, I was walking through the hallway earlier and I saw Daniel tweaking those Zigbee door sensors again. It got me thinking about how much our living situations dictate our relationship with technology.
Herman Poppleberry here, and you are absolutely right, Corn. It is the classic renter's dilemma. When you are at the mercy of a landlord who considers a single drill hole in the wall a personal affront, your options for anything permanent are basically zero.
Exactly. And Daniel sent us a really interesting prompt about this. He grew up in Ireland in a detached house with a full-blown professional alarm system, but for the last decade here in Jerusalem, he has been living in various apartments. He has built this really impressive setup using Home Assistant, Zigbee sensors, and that Alarmo add-on to keep things secure. But he is looking toward the future. He is asking if he ever buys a home and finally has the freedom to do whatever he wants, should he stick with the DIY approach or go back to the professional systems of his childhood?
It is a fantastic question because the landscape has changed so much. Back then, the line between a toy and a tool was very clear. Today, with things like Home Assistant and the latest Matter one point four standards, that line is incredibly blurry. Daniel is basically asking if he is playing with a very sophisticated toy or if he has actually built a legitimate security tool that can stand up to a professional installation.
Right, and he even mentioned LoRa, which stands for Long Range, as something he is looking into. I think we should really dig into whether there is a middle ground here. Is it a binary choice between a guy in a van installing a proprietary box or a bunch of open-source scripts and cheap sensors?
Well, let us start with the landlord factor because that is the genesis of his current setup. In a rental, you cannot run wires. You cannot mount a heavy siren on the exterior of the building. You certainly cannot have a monitoring company calling the police if you do not have the legal right to modify the infrastructure. So, DIY is the only path. But the moment you own the dirt and the walls, the math changes.
It does. And I want to push on that because I think most people think the difference is just about who installs it. Like, if I install it, it is DIY. If a pro installs it, it is professional. But there is a deeper architectural difference, isn't there?
Oh, absolutely. When you talk about a professional system, like a Honeywell or a DSC or even the modern ones like Ajax, you are talking about hardware that is designed for a single, solitary purpose: reliability under duress. These systems are often UL-listed, which means they have passed Underwriters Laboratories testing for things like signal jamming, power failure, and physical tampering.
Whereas a Zigbee sensor Daniel bought online for ten dollars is designed to be cheap and small.
Exactly. A standard Zigbee door sensor is a wonderful piece of engineering for what it is, but it operates on the two point four gigahertz frequency. That is the same frequency as your microwave, your neighbors' Wi-Fi, and your Bluetooth headphones. It is a very crowded neighborhood. If someone really wanted to get into your house and they had a simple signal jammer, a standard Zigbee mesh can be knocked sideways relatively easily.
That is a point we touched on way back in episode seventy-eight when we talked about Zigbee versus Matter. The vulnerability of the frequency itself is a real factor. But Daniel is using Home Assistant, which is running locally. He is not reliant on a cloud server in Virginia to tell him his front door just opened. Does that local control bridge some of the gap?
It bridges the software gap, definitely. Local control is the gold standard for privacy and speed. When the internet goes down, Daniel's alarm will still trigger the siren in his living room. That is a huge step up from something like a basic off-the-shelf smart camera that becomes a paperweight if the Wi-Fi drops. But the hardware layer is still the weak point. In a professional system, the sensors often use different frequencies, like four hundred thirty-three megahertz or eight hundred sixty-eight megahertz, which have better wall penetration and are less susceptible to common interference.
Okay, so let us talk about the Alarmo add-on he mentioned. For those who do not know, Alarmo is this fantastic integration for Home Assistant that basically turns your smart home entities into a security keypad. You can set an away mode, a home mode, and a night mode. You can define entry and exit delays. It feels like a real alarm.
It feels like one, and for ninety-nine percent of situations, it acts like one. It can flash your lights, it can play a barking dog sound on your smart speakers, and it can send a notification to your phone via Telegram or the Home Assistant app. But here is the critical question
what happens if the power goes out?
Well, if Daniel has his Home Assistant server on an Uninterruptible Power Supply, or a UPS, the brain stays alive. But what about the siren? What about the internet router for that notification?
Exactly. A professional alarm system has a massive lead-acid battery in the main panel that can keep the entire system, including the high-decibel outdoor siren and the cellular backup module, running for twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Most DIYers forget that their notification system is only as strong as their internet connection. If a burglar cuts the fiber line outside the house, your Home Assistant server might be screaming into the void, but you will never get that push notification on your phone.
So, the professional advantage is really about redundancy and the hardened nature of the hardware. But Daniel's point about landlords is so real here in Israel. Even if you want a professional system, getting a company to come out to a third-floor apartment is a nightmare. But if he buys a house, he is looking for that middle ground. Is there a way to get that professional-grade reliability while keeping the flexibility of Home Assistant?
There is, and that is where it gets really exciting for a tinkerer like Daniel. There is a middle ground called hybrid systems. Think of things like Konnected point I-O. It is a piece of hardware that allows you to take a traditional, wired, professional-grade alarm panel and bridge it directly into Home Assistant.
Wait, so you get the best of both worlds? You have the physical wires going to the doors, which cannot be jammed, and a battery-backed panel, but you can still use the Alarmo interface to control it?
Precisely. If Daniel buys a home, he could pre-wire it with actual copper wires to every window and door. No batteries to change, ever. Those wires go back to a hardened panel. Then, he uses a bridge to let Home Assistant see the status of those sensors. So, if the alarm is triggered, the professional siren goes off, but Home Assistant also knows to turn on every light in the house and start recording on the cameras. That, to me, is the ultimate setup.
I love that. It reminds me of episode eighty where we talked about industrial reliability. You want the core safety functions to be dumb and robust, while the smart features are an additive layer, not the foundation.
That is the perfect way to put it. You do not want your life safety to depend on a software update that happened at three in the morning.
But let us talk about the monitoring aspect. In Ireland, Daniel mentioned a system that might have contacted the police. In a DIY setup, you are the monitor. You get the text, you look at the camera, you call the police. Is there a world where DIY systems get professional monitoring?
Actually, yes. There are services now that provide professional monitoring for DIY systems. You pay a monthly fee, and they give you a dedicated cellular bridge. If your system triggers and you do not acknowledge it on your phone within thirty seconds, a human being in a call center looks at your verified camera feed and calls the authorities. It is becoming much more common in twenty twenty-six.
That seems like a solid compromise. But I want to go back to Daniel's mention of LoRa. He is thinking about range. If he has a larger property, Zigbee is going to struggle. We know that from our own experiments in the backyard.
LoRa is a game changer for detached homes. It stands for Long Range, and it can literally transmit for kilometers. If Daniel has a gate at the end of a long driveway or a shed in the back, Zigbee or Wi-Fi will never reach it without a ton of expensive repeaters. A LoRa sensor can run on a single battery for years and reach the house effortlessly. But again, it is about what you are protecting. If it is a gate sensor just to let you know the mail arrived, LoRa is great. If it is the primary sensor for your front door, you have to consider the latency.
How much latency are we talking about?
It can be a few seconds, though modern LoRaWAN stacks have gotten that down to under fifty milliseconds in some cases. Still, in a security situation, three seconds is an eternity. A wired sensor is instantaneous. A Zigbee sensor is milliseconds. LoRa is the slow and steady tortoise of the wireless world. It is reliable, but it is not built for speed.
That is a really important distinction. It sounds like for Daniel's future home, the hierarchy should be: wired sensors first, professional-grade wireless like Ajax or PowerG second, and then your DIY Zigbee or LoRa stuff for the nice to have notifications.
Exactly. And let us talk about the Family Approval Factor. If Daniel is the only one who knows how to disarm the system because it requires a specific swipe gesture on a custom tablet, that is a bad security system.
Right, because if he is not home and a guest or a family member triggers it, and the only way to stop the siren is to find Daniel's hidden Raspberry Pi, you have a major problem.
You have a catastrophe! A professional system comes with a physical keypad. It is tactile, it is obvious, and it works even if the Wi-Fi is down. One of the biggest mistakes DIYers make is replacing a physical keypad with a touchscreen. Touchscreens fail. They lag. They need power. A rubber-buttoned keypad connected via a wire to the panel will work for twenty years.
So, when Daniel moves into this hypothetical future home, he should probably look at installing a dedicated alarm panel that has its own keypad. But can he still use Home Assistant as the primary way he interacts with it?
Absolutely. Most modern professional panels, especially Ajax, now have official Home Assistant integrations. You do not even need to hack them anymore. You get the it just works reliability of a professional system, but you still see every sensor in your Home Assistant dashboard. You can still make your living room lights turn red if the alarm goes off.
I think there is also an insurance angle here that we should mention. I know back in Ireland, and even here in some cases, insurance companies give you a discount if you have a certified alarm system. Does a Home Assistant DIY setup count?
Almost never. Insurance companies want to see a certificate from a licensed installer and proof of a contract with a monitoring station. However, in twenty twenty-six, some insurers are starting to offer up to fifteen or even twenty percent off premiums for comprehensive systems that include water leak detection and fire safety, but they usually require that professional monitoring layer. If you tell them, Oh, I have a really cool Python script running on a NUC in my closet, they are going to laugh you out of the office.
That is a very practical point. The savings on insurance premiums over ten years might actually pay for the professional installation.
It often does! That is the sweet spot. Daniel loses none of the fun stuff, but he gains a massive amount of peace of mind.
It is funny, isn't it? When we are young and we have more time than money, we love the DIY grind. We want to compile every kernel and solder every connection. But as we get older, and especially when we are talking about the security of our family and our home, that it just works factor becomes incredibly valuable.
It really does. There is a specific kind of stress that comes with a DIY system when you are away on vacation. You get a notification that a sensor went offline. Is it a low battery? Did the Zigbee mesh collapse? Or is there someone in your house with a jammer? With a professional system, the panel does a self-diagnosis and tells you exactly what is wrong. It takes the guesswork out of it.
I think Daniel's experience in Ireland really colored his view of this. Those old-school systems were bulletproof but very limited. You couldn't check them from your phone. You couldn't integrate them with your lights. I think he's afraid that by going professional, he's going back to that rigid, boring world.
And that is the misconception we need to bust! Professional security in twenty twenty-six is not the same as it was in nineteen ninety-six. You are no longer choosing between a smart home and a secure home. You are choosing the foundation upon which you build both.
So, let us recap the advice for Daniel. If you are in an apartment, stick with the Home Assistant and Alarmo setup. It is brilliant, it is portable, and it is a great way to learn the ropes. But the moment you own the walls, stop relying on Zigbee for your life safety.
Right. Phase one of owning a home: run the wires. If you can, wire everything. It is the cheapest and most reliable thing you will ever do. Phase two: install a hardened, battery-backed panel. Phase three: bridge that panel into Home Assistant for all the cool automations and notifications.
And what about the LoRa idea? Is there a place for that in his future home?
Definitely. Use LoRa for the peripheral stuff. The mailbox, the shed, the moisture sensor in the far corner of the garden. Things where if the signal takes five seconds to arrive, it doesn't matter. But for the front door, the bedroom windows, and the smoke detectors? Stick to the professional stuff.
You mentioned smoke detectors. That is a huge one. Most people do not realize that your smart home smoke detector might not be legally sufficient for fire code in many places.
Exactly. Fire and life safety are a whole different ballgame. In a professional system, the smoke detectors are often interconnected. If one goes off, they all go off. And they are monitored twenty-four-seven. If you are unconscious from smoke inhalation, your Home Assistant notification isn't going to save you. A monitoring center calling the fire department will.
This is making me want to go home and check the batteries in our own setup. It is easy to get complacent when things have been working fine for a few years.
It is. And that is the final point about DIY versus Professional: maintenance. A professional system will nag you until you fix a problem. It will beep at you every hour if a battery is low or a sensor is tampered with. In Home Assistant, if you forget to set up an alert for a low battery, that sensor might just die silently, and you won't know until it's too late.
That silent failure is the scariest part of any complex system. We talked about that in episode one hundred fifty-six with the smart home status lights. You need a way to see the health of the system at a glance.
Precisely. If you are going to stay DIY, you have to be your own system administrator. You have to schedule regular tests. You have to check the logs. For most people, that becomes a chore very quickly.
Well, Daniel is a tinkerer, so I suspect he actually enjoys that part of it. But even for a tinkerer, there's a limit.
There is. You want to spend your time building cool new features, not debugging why the back door sensor stopped checking in at two A.M.
This has been such a good deep dive. I think the takeaway is that the middle ground isn't just a compromise; it's actually the superior configuration. Use the professional hardware for the must-work tasks and use Home Assistant for the want-it-to-work tasks.
Well said, Corn. It is about layering your defenses. It is like an onion. The core is your physical locks and wired sensors. The next layer is the professional alarm panel and monitoring. The outer layer is your Home Assistant automations, cameras, and smart lighting. Each layer makes the others more effective.
I hope that helps Daniel plan out his future dream home. It's a big shift going from a shoebox apartment to a detached house, but it's the perfect opportunity to do it right from the ground up.
Absolutely. And Daniel, if you are listening, please do not forget the outdoor siren. Even in twenty twenty-six, there is nothing quite as effective at stopping a burglary in progress as a hundred and ten decibels of noise and a flashing strobe light. It is old school, but it works.
It definitely does. Before we wrap up, I want to remind everyone that if you're finding these deep dives helpful, please take a moment to leave us a review on your podcast app. Whether it's Spotify or Apple Podcasts, those ratings really help more people find the show and join the conversation.
It genuinely makes a huge difference to us. We love seeing the feedback and hearing how you guys are implementing these ideas in your own homes.
And if you want to get in touch with us, just like Daniel did, you can find the contact form and our entire archive of over four hundred fifty episodes at myweirdprompts.com. We have an RSS feed there too if you want to subscribe directly.
Four hundred fifty-three episodes in, and I still feel like we've barely scratched the surface of all the weird and wonderful ways technology is changing our lives.
That is the beauty of it. There is always a new prompt, a new sensor, or a new way to break our home automation.
Guilty as charged.
Thanks for listening to My Weird Prompts. I am Corn.
And I am Herman Poppleberry.
We will catch you in the next one. Stay secure, everyone.
And keep tinkering! Just maybe with a backup battery.
Good point. Bye for now.
See ya.
