Hello! I'm running HA on Raspberry Pi 3B+, according to tutorial on website. So far it works great, but I have problems with running (or understanding how to) any tts service.
I'll try to explain what I'd like to achieve:
I switch the switch to switch the lights A device is sending signal, a switch, temperature sensor, anything. I want to have automation which will say, let's say... "The device X triggered this automation". The thing is, I want to hear it on speaker connected to audio output (3.5mm jack socket) on raspberry.
I want Raspberry (still talking about this native HA server) to be media player controlled by HA, to be able to output TTS and such stuff. Maybe I haven't explained it enough due to my newbieness, so I'll surely answer any questions you might have. 🙂
#Audio on Raspberry Pi running HA
vapid cedar
stuck vector
The general recommendation is don’t use the 3.5mm jack for audio. It’s not really supported in HA and for those that have managed to get it working, it didn’t work well at all (loss of audio, poor quality, etc). You’d be much better off using an external audio source (Google chromecast or some other type of external speaker). https://community.home-assistant.io/t/speaker-soundcard-for-raspberry-pi-4-best-practice-august-2022/454909/3
Personally, I use my Sonos speakers for TTS notifications. But there are cheaper alternatives as well including building your own ESPHome speaker if you’re diy-minded.
vapid cedar
Thank you for reply! Well, I still have Raspberry Pi 1 which have quite satisfactory audio, i guess that's HA problem then regarding handling it? The thing is, I'd rather want to keep it 'local', without need to send audio over network, rather directly output it either to regular speaker or amplifier through aux port.
stuck vector
HA isn’t really supporting anything to do with locally controlled ports (3.5mm, GPIO, etc) on PIs any longer. Since HA is a server and isn’t meant to really interface with local hardware in that aspect.
vapid cedar
Can I run additional things on raspberry Pi besides of HA then? Or HA system doesn't allow it?
stuck vector
If you use HAOS, you can use addons which do support “additional things” (kind of). But if you want to directly interact with the hardware, you’d probably want to run HA Container. The downside to that is you lose the ability to run addons.
But, addons are really nothing more than docker containers with some HA “magic” added in to be able to run in the HA interface/os.
vapid cedar
Well, thanks for answers. Seems Raspberry was kind of overkill for my needs then 🙂
stuck vector
No problem. I know a lot of people would like local control of the raspberry hardware, but that’s not the direction HA wants to go in.
vapid cedar
If I understand correctly then, in my case it would be better to let raspberry run on Raspbian and HAOS be on different machine so it could control raspberry then?
stuck vector
That could work. It depends on what you want to control on the raspberry hardware. Can you give some more details? Like, you want to route audio to it? What are you actually trying to do in detail (be as verbose as you’d like; It’ll help me help you lol).
vapid cedar
Okay. See, I have right now quite basic setup at home. Six Wifi bulbs, then few more normal ones turned on/off via zigbee relays, thermostat which operates my gas boiler. Then at other place I have humidity/temperature sensors connected to fans and sprinklers at tent with my old wooden boat to help keep proper humidity in. But I like to expand and learn. I'd love to use GPIOs, be able to run scripts on raspberry (as I've said I still have my old raspberry Pi 1 so technically it still would be possible I hope), to automate things I'm still not sure what they would be 🤪. For sure I'd like to be able to connect raspberry to my audio system as music player, AND for TTS announcements from HA. Surely TTS plays a big role here.
vapid cedar
Umm... hello?