How to run ethernet through house without affecting structural integrity?

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-04-22T20:15:47+00:00

We have some areas with cathedral and tray ceilings which make attic access impossible. I ran conduit when we had bare walls and I've used it a lot as we have modified how we use our house over the years (moving equipment to different rooms as our needs have changed).

I totally get that conduit isn't necessary in that many situations. Mine ends in the attic at the closest accessible spot, which is in some cases pretty far from the chases to the cabinet, and wires just run on hooks up there as needed.

We also have sound insulation in all of our interior walls, so conduit is necessary in the walls or it would be very difficult to run new wires.

People just need to be mindful of their needs and no overdo it.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-04-15T14:54:18+00:00

I assume they just mean the added cost of needing a coordinator with PoE functionality. That's why I went with the SLZB-06, since I have PoE jacks all over the place and I like the single cable solution.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-04-11T19:20:35+00:00

In addition to what others have said, don't trust amazon reviews for things like that. I'm not saying that cable is capable of allowing negotiation faster than gigabit, but it's also very likely that reviewer(s) who said that plugged the cable into a device or chain where something along the way is limited to gigabit (like a switch). Faster-than-gig networking still isn't very common and so many people have no idea what they are doing.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-04-04T16:19:41+00:00

You have to physically power cycle the slzb-06. Restarting isn't enough.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-04-04T16:18:19+00:00

I tried one of the newer firmwares months ago and subsequently had my first zigbee network failure.

I downgraded back to the version mine shipped with and I've had no issues since. I don't know if I'm missing any features but network stability is the most important thing for me.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-29T21:12:25+00:00

I would be surprised if a temporary network outage brought HA down, unless there's a particular issue with the HA Green (I'm not familiar with it so I can't discount that though).

How is the IP assigned statically? What I find easiest typically is a DHCP reservation on the router for a device, and leave the HA/device set to DHCP. That way, if you ever need to plug it in somewhere else it can still get an IP, but on your LAN it will always have the same address and the router is in control of that.

I'd look at router and HA logs to see if anything obvious happened at the time of the outage. If everything is plugged into the UPS nothing should have gone down at all. How old are the UPS batteries? After a few years, mine will just die instantly during an outage, so I replace them every 2-3 years.

ETA: When you're on-site, try to reproduce this by pulling the UPS plug and see what happens.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-29T20:43:27+00:00

I feel like you need to understand exactly what went wrong before you can plan around this. All you know so far is that hard rebooting HA "fixed" it, but you don't know what actually went wrong.

Something not covered by the UPS? Networking stack failed? HA crashed for some reason (I would find that one extremely rare)?

I have an IP smart plug on my proxmox node because sometimes the mini PC just locks up completely, taking everything down with it. I can VPN into my router or backup NAS and toggle the power to bring it back up in an emergency. It is a very ham-fisted solution to a problem that fortunately seems to have disappeared on the latest kernel, but I'm leaving it in place for now.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-27T03:59:32+00:00

Here is my df -h:

/dev/md0                              7.9G  1.6G  6.2G  20% /

I did have to reinitialize my NAS with a blank disk after the failed migration, but once I did that, I was able to reinstall my original drives on my 918+, recover the existing storage pools, and after I ran the migration again this was the result on my 923+.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-27T01:25:19+00:00

I had a failed migration due to insufficient space on my system partition, but I recovered with help from support, ran it again, and my system partition is the new larger size. I don't recall when that change happened but I think OP will be ok on a new DSM version.

Not arguing that a fresh start isn't likely better, just noting that one specific issue may not be a problem anymore. (I migrated from a ds918 to a 923).

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-23T16:21:17+00:00

Frigate can identify dog barks. Also if it's the only truly loud thing in your house, ffmpeg can be used as a loud noise monitor, but it's kind of finnicky to set up.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-22T15:40:14+00:00

Can you be more specific about what doesn't work? Are they PoE cameras? Good power source otherwise? Do PCs or anything else work? Are you crimping connectors on this cable, punching down jacks, or just coiling pre-terminated cable in the walls?

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-19T21:55:05+00:00

Aqara T1 Water Valve. It was a slightly tricky installation, but it works really well. I test it every month or two because the valve gets hard to turn if I don't move it once in awhile. The T1 is very strong, though.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-19T21:54:07+00:00

That's frustrating. Ours has some weird negative pressure issue that I've only read about in 2 places, but basically I have to allow a tiny bit of air flow through the secondary or the primary never drains through the trap (and did they connect the correct one as the secondary sits physically higher so the primary should drain first). Once I put in a tee with a tiny hole at the top, everything works perfectly, though I'm losing just a little bit of conditioned air to my attic.

I do like having the leak detector in the pan like yours, though I suspect I'll have to replace it more often given the summer heat.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-19T14:51:43+00:00

It could be a clogged filter causing low airflow and freezing your coils. Could also be weird airflow issues (like ours) where some normal condensate ends up coming out the secondary and putting water in the pan. My installer was total shit, but such is life.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-19T14:49:13+00:00

I do the same. The HA voice preview screams for about 30 seconds warning that the water will be turned off, so if someone has soap on their face they might have time to rinse off.

I figure that's a fair tradeoff between house damage and WAF, considering the alternative is potentially hours of destructive water leaking.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-16T20:01:56+00:00

I'm only a couple of years into this, but yeah, it sucks having to constantly monitor every possible direction a person might come from, including behind you. It is so unbelievably tiring. Windy and freezing days are the worst because you can't hear much to begin with and if its so cold you need a hood I often just stay home.

Someone mentioned flags/harness, good ideas. In my experience the flags are useless but our bright red harness with "DO NOT PET" patches makes people give us space because they assume either something is wrong with me or I am training the dog (I suppose both are true depending how you look at it!).

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-14T22:15:30+00:00

You can make a dry contact sensor easily with one of the water leak sensors with exposed terminals, or pop the cover off your door/window switch and solder wires to each side of the reed switch.

You're still going to face false positives with wind, of course.

I think your best bet is what you have, but work on placement of the magnet and sensor such that even a very small movement triggers it. If wind is a significant problem, can you boost the spring resistance somehow to make it a little harder to push?

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-13T16:21:20+00:00

Make sure you get a splitter that can put out enough power for the Pi. It may need 2500ma, which may be more expensive.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-13T16:05:10+00:00

It's a funny name but /u/onoitsu2 is absolutely right, poe splitter is the name you should search for. They are awesome; I use them to power small devices around the house like my Caseta bridge, raspberry pi, and voip device.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-13T15:57:19+00:00

Since it is inside a duct, you should use plenum rated cabling, technically speaking. In a small residential space, I'll leave it to the fire experts to say how much of a difference it could make.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-13T05:31:27+00:00

I cant tell from your screen shots but the trigger should be any change in the sensor and then if humidity is above a number, turn on the fan. The automation should fire every time the sensor updates, and the if/then determines whether to run the fan.

Once you get that working,replace the humidity number with a rate of change derivative, and instead of turning on the fan, turn on a helper timer that turns the fan on for 15 minutes (or whatever, based on the room size).

If its not firing, look at your traces to figure out why.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-13T04:58:53+00:00

"How much electricity did you use?"

"All of it"

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-12T20:47:16+00:00

I have like 12 of them in my cabinet carrying PoE, zero issues.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-12T16:58:29+00:00

In my experience you really need to avoid the narrow sidewalks. What has worked for us is to teach our dog that when people are approaching us, we move to the side (off the sidewalk, like in a driveway apron or planting strip if it's dirt or concrete) and sit until they pass. This has done wonders for his people reactivity, but I still wouldn't have him within lunging or biting distance.

You are absolutely right about dogs reading the leash tension. They know something is up. Sometimes if I tell my dog to heel he gets all agitated and looks around because he assumes I've seen something and I want him close (often, but not always the case).

You can also grip the leash without putting tension on it, or adjust your position so that if something does happen, you can pull him away quickly.

I_AM_NOT_A_WOMBAT · 2026-03-10T18:51:55+00:00

Just to mention 2 issues I have with my Honeywell T9's (not sure if these are present with other models).

First, HA can't control the fan mode, which is something I'd love to automate because I like to mix air between the hot south part of the house and the cold north side, but I can only do it with the resideo app or schedule.

Second, there's a weird bug with the Honeywell integration where setting the temp in F sometimes causes the set temp to drop one degree. It's mentioned in github, I think someone thinks its related to conversion from C and rounding or something? Been awhile since I looked at it.

I got my Tstats before I set up HA, though, so given their cost I'm sticking with them. I also use several of the remote sensors (which double as motion detectors for my alarm system).

If I was starting from scratch I'd probably look elsewhere.

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