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Comment by mmackh | Hacker News Reader

There’s something to be said about an independent system you can understand and expand. What I think will be next frontier in home computing is truly understanding and owning the systems that run a smart home and that comes with understanding the environment (sensor data, presence detection, etc.). We live in an interesting time where embedded development has become so accessible and powerful that we can interface with multiple wireless protocols and state of the art sensors with not a lot of capital investment. If we think what can come beyond screens and imagine more ambient computing systems - maybe we’ll see new and interesting innovations

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>We live in an interesting time where embedded development has become so accessible and powerful that we can interface with multiple wireless protocols and state of the art sensors with not a lot of capital investment.

Even on Amazon the ESP32 is less than $5 - means like $1 in Shanghai. Various sensors (even the ones with Bluetooth connectivity) are similarly dirt cheap. You can have a bin of such components like you would have a bin of bolts and nuts 30+ years. Basically we live in a golden era of development (which can disappear in US due to tariffs)

>If we think what can come beyond screens and imagine more ambient computing systems - maybe we’ll see new and interesting innovations

my bet is that it will be more robotics related with practically no humans involved. It is a bit of paradoxical - like for example if we add enough development to existing robots we can for example have an AMZN warehouse run fully without people which in turn would mean that we can have robots there much simpler in various aspects as the absence of humans relaxes a bunch of requirements.

An ESP32 module suitable for hobby use is about 4$ here in Viet Nam. You can get the "raw" ones for maybe 0.50$ less. We're near China, so electronic component price is usually higher than Chinese prices by 1-20% (modules and hobby components on the higher end). If you're ever curious about prices, the good online retailer here is thegioiic ('World of ICs', we love naming businesses 'world of something' here).

Locally, 4$ is probably "more money" to us than 5$ is to you.

Don't get me wrong, it's still a marvel that we can have something so good so cheaply -- but correcting for cost of living, it feels less affordable for us here in Asia.

Anyway, not a criticism. Just sharing a slice of life from over here in case you were curious.

You can only cover some very specific cases like that for robotics.

Also, besides some really huge companies, I would be nervous as a business to rely on a third party so much that I didn't have a workforce of my own.

Yes, it works for automotive (extremely consolidated sector with huge capital), or Amazon, or chipmakers... But they've already gone through that transition. Who else needs that?

I just bought a bunch of these and a reflow soldering gun.

The real bottleneck is getting custom pcbs made.

The best companies that do this are in China and soon will be tarrifed

Learn how to roll (etch) your own?

For limited applications it's really not that difficult :)

Too many chemicals. Not nearly worth the time when you can order from JLPCB for $4 a board

> What I think will be next frontier in home computing is truly understanding and owning the systems that run a smart home and that comes with understanding the environment (sensor data, presence detection, etc.)

That's gonna be a while coming - we're now entering a stage where we won't even understand the code that gets written.

Now, sure, some holdouts will understand the code, but that's not going to be the norm soon.

I totally see what you mean - with minified js bundles and mobile walled gardens we've probably already been in that stage for a good ten years - and AI-driven development that we don't even monitor is likely going to make that worse in the short term...

But I do wonder if LLM-driven code analysis might actually increase code comprehension and agency for laymen?

I've been quite impressed with AI's ability to decipher and visualise code and system relationships in e.g. mermaid diagrams.

Perhaps the representation of code will become more elastic (i.e. you have literal code, or AI-produced translations you can directly manipulate)

There's a balance to be struck here.

Coming from HomeKit, I've tried (_really_ tried) to move to Home Assistant. The gap in usability was too enormous for me to cross, and I'd brand myself a hacker.

I won't trust any kind of a "smart" device to operate the front door lock - ever - but smart lightbulbs are still stupid lightbulbs. I can just flick the switch.

Privacy concerns are valid - I can be profiled based on usage. But it's not like Apple doesn't know my precise location already.

With all that in mind, I'd say usability comes first.

I'm not sure what aspect of smart locks you don't trust. If it's reliability, most also accept a physical key as a backup. As far as security, I'm under no impression that the firmware is free of vulnerabilities, but any hack is likey to be at least as hard as lockpicking the average lock, which most people can master with a 10 minute YouTube tutorial. If you're a lock nerd and have upgraded all your locks to some Fort Knox style Medeco model, then sure a smart lock will probably be a downgrade, but for the average person I don't think it's substantially worse than what they already have.

Gold coins were replaced by paper money. Paper money was replaced by credit cards. Now credit cards are being replaced by smartphone wallets. My phone or watch can still pay for stuff while they're offline. For the past 5 years, I didn't carry a physical wallet. I'm doing more with less, and failing safe.

If the lock freaks out - and yeah, I'm having problems with my HomeKit stuff every now and then - I need the physical key on me. That already defeats the purpose. Otherwise I need to grab the spare key from wherever I keep it. This is not a mere inconvenience, this is an emergency procedure.

I like the eurorack-esque modular design. Not everyone will want the same base layout, so making it swapable like that is a nice touch.

Actually this thing would be a lot sexier if it were in fact complying with Eurorack standards, imho. There's no better environment to be dropping an alternative computing platform than directly into the rack alongside the rest of the interesting modules of the 21st century ..

Creator here!

I did consider Euro Rack, 19" racks, MiniATX and other case standards. But with any of these options, i wouldnt be able to keep the price low. The case including all parts and assembly cost is roughly at 20€ per device. It's an off-the-shelf part, with only lasercutted parts in two materials, and a single custom component which is yet to be determined what's the cheapest manufacturing option.

I wanted to keep the price low and any of the options above would increase the price by at least 40€, which is a subatantial part of the components

It looks like it could be future-compatible with a possible Euro Rack refit? Nothing cooler than DIYing a DSP for your DIY modsynth!

Heightwise, it fits: 100mm vs ER's ~128mm; trickier with depth - 180mm vs "deep" ER modules ~100mm. One option would be a rack with no back panel. Power in ER is already being distributed via a ribbon cable so this shouldn't impact the ability to install standard modules. Electrically - 12V, perfect match.

What is the width of each module? Assuming (250mm-case)/8 ~= 30-32mm?

Module spec should be around 85x28x100 mm size, so we'd have a deep module with around 15mm of "front extrusion" to fit the modules.

It's definitly possible to re-layout the backplane into a different mechanical design, and reduce the number of slots

Final specs will be shared soon, i have to do another revision of the hardware design as i figured mechanical properties like that the "stickyness" of PCIe slots is good enough so you dont actually need mechanical screws to fasten the modules

I can buy a small Eurorack module box for 25eu, including power supply and handles.

So .. I dunno .. just seems like with a bit of extra design work, Ashet could become Eurorack compatible at least, for those of us who want to hack it into that environment.

But anyway, I see you are quite busy with other issues, I'll pipe down about it.

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