This looks like a viable competitor to the recently announced HA Voice Preview hardware. Looks like it’s sold out at this point but there will be more coming. More microphones, presence detection and a builtin amplifier to run fairly substantial speakers.
It’s wild that we’re getting two solutions in a couple days after a few years of nothing
I hope it’s not just a coincidence. I would love to see Home Assistant as a smart speaker platform progress.
Yeah, I watched the video thinking he had developed something similar and HA announced their’s, so he has to announce his…
But, I see both products as options not competitors as such - both are non-corp, privacy-first, hackable devices - just pick the flavour you like
Nice
You’re right, they are maybe different levels to a problem but not direct competitors. But I am sitting here deciding if I wait to see another round of this come out rather than buy a Voice Preview, so they are competitors to an extent. I want the mmwave and good voice control, as well as extra GPIO and a modular design, so I’m leaning toward waiting and not spending money on the Nabu Casa version. I support them in other ways so I don’t feel guilty.
It seems interesting, although it will cost 95€ with the speaker, but I guess that’s gonna be a definitely better audio than the one of the HA Voice. The disappointing thing is that they don’t sell the enclosure nor provide a 3D design to print your own ☹️
Edit: I’ve just watched the video; this is a public beta (not shipping yet to Europe), they will provide enclosure (specs to print our own to) with speaker and also all the accessories. I’ll keep an eye on the website to check when it will be out of beta and available for Europe. I’m very excited about it!
Sort of confused on what this “is” exactly. It’s trying to be too many things at once. It’s an ESP board with a microphone and speaker output, but also has an mmwave sensor in a hat for a carrier board…alright?
This isn’t the format of want any of those things in, honestly. A much smaller ESP32 nano can do the voice, a different device for streaming, and dedicated sensors for mmwave make WAY more sense.
Well, that’s just like, your opinion man.
Right‽ Gotta love when people think that their opinion is the only one that matters.
Dude is making one board that’ll work for as many situations as possible and letting you decide what you want to do with it (and it’s right there in the name - future proof!), but somehow that is honestly too much.
For myself, I like having options.
Also, the official HA hardware also has an expansion port on it, think this guy complained about having that on there as being too much?
Personally I think the mm wave sensor they chose is kinda junky. But that doesn’t bother me because nobody is forcing me to add it on.
A unit in a main area that can do presence sensing and has good audio IO is something I would happily buy. The board is separate so you can use an ESP32 or a rPi.
Ah, that wasn’t super clear to me. So GPIO hate on an ESP32 carrier makes more sense. Since mmwave is directional, the sensor placement on this was confusing as hell to use as an RPi hat, but 🤷
Looks promising!
