Comment by VladVladikoff | Hacker News Reader

Comment by VladVladikoff | Hacker News Reader

I’ve recently been looking into what older gen IoT devices I can buy used for cheap and are also hackable (some existing progress has been done before me is my bar). My first adventure was with an Amazon Echo Dot 2, I picked up two off Facebook marketplace for $5 each and managed to vibe code my way into a working implementation of LibreEcho (which does not currently support the echo dot). I’ve got that wired into my home local AI brain so it can do tasks like add grocery items to shared notes, or download movies or TV shows (jellyseer+flexget+jellyfin+etc).

My next plan is to do a doorbell. I want it fully local only and I know there are providers who offer this brand new for $$$ but I love the idea of picking up cheap IoT devices and hacking them instead. My current candidate is EZVIZ DB1C but I haven’t bought it yet and definitely open to suggestions!

Amazon had these little Dash buttons about 10 years ago. The goal was you would click one, and it would re-order that product from Amazon. Many were branded.

Basically just a wifi button. I hacked one so I could, in my brain fog, record the moment i started and finished feeding my infant by sending a ping to a server via a simple click.

There's a bunch up on eBay. Could probably 3M tape one beside your door. Easy solution, esp if it's shielded from rain.

Oh, can a Dash button talk to my Google home mini? I imagined it would be the same problem I currently have.

A zigbee button/doorbell would work well, but then we'd have two buttons on the front door unless we hid the Blink's integrated button somehow.

This is cool! I have wanted a button I could slap when I sit down at my desk that sets off an hour timer to get up and stretch.

What about building something from scratch? Or is it the repurposing you like?

I looked at that at first but man you can’t beat $5. I was looking at a build which was $200 in parts just to get started. It’s also no simple task to build a mic array that is separated from speakers and having a decent speaker cavity etc. my skills with speaker chamber design and 3D printing are no where near my programming skills.

What’s your home local ai setup?

3090 GPU, Qwen atm, but probably going to switch models at some point.

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