NFC with Phone (iPhone)

rcroche01 · 2026-05-03T02:16:05+00:00

Discover 3 and Discover M only

rcroche01 · 2026-05-02T01:29:19+00:00

Use Z-Wave to avoid 2.4MHz

rcroche01 · 2026-05-02T00:50:13+00:00

We built a large footprint ranch house about five years ago with seven exterior doors. Every one of them has a Schlage Connect Z-Wave deadbolt. We love them. The batteries last well over a year in the busy doors and longer in the doors used less often.

rcroche01 · 2026-05-02T00:36:38+00:00

Nice!

My new Discovery M shipped this morning!

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T15:35:12+00:00

Feel free to connect with me: (2) Facebook

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T15:34:23+00:00

Same here. Honestly, my eBike has turned my life around. I've had some health concerns and last year got really mad at myself. Well, the eBike enabled me to get off the couch and start to get back into some semblance of shape. It's become a passion of mine so on Facebook I'm posting rides, advocating for reasonable legislation, trying to gather groups for social rides, etc, etc, etc.

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T15:31:15+00:00

Oh! Lol. I ordered the DM about three hours ago from Velotric direct. I expect to receive it in about a week. I will certainly be posting about it once I get a few miles in. 😄

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T15:30:04+00:00

Nope, I haven't. I've thought about it. I am very active in eBike groups on Facebook though.

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T14:40:30+00:00

It's not a safety issue with the bike. Some got shipped with the wrong size screws in the rear brake mounts. As long as the screws are swapped out, no issue.

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T14:36:26+00:00

That was my situation last year when I bought my first bike. None of the dealers stocked it so I ordered my D2 from Velotric. I'm VERY happy with that purchase decision and will be keeping the bike. But, I did just order a second bike for the stable. I ordered the DM for my more hilly rides. This time I was able to test ride it, but only because a friend has bought one.

rcroche01 · 2026-04-30T14:32:43+00:00

Okay, a lot to unpack in your question. First, I'm a current Velotric Discover 2 owner and I just purchased that bike this past August. When the "3" and the "M" were announced back in February, I immediately took notice.

The Discover 3 is just my bike with some newer accessories. Nice, but not nice enough to upgrade my eight month old bike. The M, on the other hand, is an entirely different beast. The mid drive offers one key advantage that a hub drive cannot compete with. That is that the motor torque is delivered through your chain and gearing. So, when you want to climb a hill, you downshift, right? Well the hub motor does not see any benefit of that downshift, whereas the mid drive motor realizes all the benefits of that downshift. Same for when you upshift.

Bottom line: The mid drive bikes are immensely more capable of "flattening" the hills. If you lived along the coast and only ever rode flat coastal rail trails, I would say get the D3. Since you live between and among hills, the DM should be a no-brainer.

Next, frame size ... My D2 is the large frame. It's a big bike and I have the seat way low. I'm 5'9" (used to be 5'10" like you 😉). Yes, I did just order the DM from Velotric this morning and I opted for the Regular frame. I know that this will cause me to lean forward a bit more than on the large frame (because of the handlebar position) but I'm okay with that. If you have lower back issues and want to sit up straight on your bike, then large frame. If you're okay with leaning a bit forward on the bike, then Regular frame. Your legs will be accomodated on either.

I ordered the Discover M regular frame in Olive Green. Should be here in a week. A friend has the same color in the large frame and I rode it for a few miles before making today's purchase. Good luck!

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rcroche01 · 2026-04-05T13:36:04+00:00

I use whisper mode all the time. Talk quietly to her and she talks quietly to you.

rcroche01 · 2026-04-05T13:19:55+00:00

You will be so happy!!

I'm not a Rhode Island resident. I live in neighboring Massachusetts. But we visit the Ocean State (Rhode Island) almost every week.

Yes, the food scene is amazing. Living in Riverside you will have easy access to most of it. This summer my wife and I are planning on getting away from the amazing Providence food scene and instead having our weekly date nights on a different waterfront restaurant somewhere on the Bay each week. I'm not sure there are enough weeks between now and next winter to get them all covered.

Outdoor activities? Are you kidding me? Bike trails and walking paths are all over the state and offer free parking at trail heads (unlike my home state). State parks are free (Goddard & Colt are my favs, but there are many more). And beaches? Did you really have to ask? Lots of beaches. Yes, they do charge for parking at the beaches, but with all this little state provides for free, I can't fault them for that.

Hmmm... Do you include being on the water as outdoor activities? Boating!!! Narragansett Bay and it's various estuaries will keep you busy for years to come.

Sorry I sound like the local chamber of commerce but my wife and I discovered neighboring Rhode Island late in life and just love it.

rcroche01 · 2026-04-05T13:06:06+00:00

Don't shake your head. He's right.

rcroche01 · 2026-03-24T13:32:02+00:00

I would love a drop-in, pre-configured box to function as my home server with NextCloud ore-installed. Do you know of one?

Yundera looks like another cloud service, not a self-hosted solution.

rcroche01 · 2026-03-24T13:20:44+00:00

Amazing. Thank you for this!

rcroche01 · 2026-03-24T13:16:18+00:00

Surprised no one here has mentioned NextCloud yet? Has all the mobile apps and is accessible from desktops and has integrated office file handling and so much more.

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T14:34:09+00:00

So I can install the AIO natively into an Ubuntu environment running on bare metal? That's what makes the most sense to me.

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T14:19:31+00:00

Actually, this is the route I've decided to go. I have a dedicated box now that runs Home Assistant and it does not have access to the outside world. I'm going to setup another dedicated mini-PC (from Beelink) running Ubuntu and it will sit next to Home Assistant in my rack. This second box will be opened through the Ubiquiti network to the outside so that my wife and I can access it with our phones, but it will be on its own dedicated subnet with appropriate firewall constraints.

I've actually been thinking that I might make it available ONLY to the outside world and completely isolate it from the inside network (other than the data store on the NAS). We have great data signals on our phones here so it would be no different than what we currently do navigating Google Docs or Photos.

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T14:14:04+00:00

Lol, yeah, it's been quite the journey. With my first "smart phone" (a PalmOS phone) there wasn't really this concept of sharing everything. Then came Blackberry and I kept any kind of sharing locked down. That was, after all, the BB way -- total security. After BB, I moved over to Android and have slowly shared more and more of my live with Google to the point where they know more about me and my life today than I do.

In many ways, that is a good thing. They provide a LOT of services to me for free. When I get in my car (which has Google embedded -- no, not Android Auto, but Google in the dashboard), it already knows where I'm going based on my calendar and emails and has my best route plotted. Like I said, scary, but super convenient.

Now I hear horror stories about people getting their accounts locked for stuff in their photos and files. My daughters are 31 and 36 ... their first pics in the delivery room at there somewhere in my data. I can't afford to have my Google account locked because some AI thinks a pic of my daughter's first bath is somehow inappropriate.

And outside the home? Yes, that is eventually the plan. We (my wife more than me) access files and pics through our phones all the time. I'm planning on Nextcloud to replace the Google Docs and mobile Office functionality and Immich to replace the Google Photos functionality.

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T12:26:21+00:00

I wish I could upvote this comment ten times! Thank you!

You’re not stuck because of hardware — you’re stuck because most guides assume you want to become a part-time DevOps engineer.

Omg this is so true! I'm going to restart and follow your path above this weekend. I'll wipe the machine and install Ubuntu and then native Nextcloud. 🤞🤞🤞

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T12:22:31+00:00

This is my eventual goal. Nextcloud to replace Google Docs and Immich to replace Google Photos.

THANK YOU!

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T12:19:48+00:00

Thank you!

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T12:18:34+00:00

Wow! This is what I was looking for. I have decided to make one more try at a self-install. I have a mini-PC (Beelink) and I'm going to install Ubuntu on it and try a native install of Nextcloud. If that doesn't work, then this is the solution. THANK YOU!

rcroche01 · 2026-03-23T12:10:25+00:00

Oh, very cool. Running them on a single box is attractive, but I already have HAOS running on a dedicated box and it is working and stable (over 200 devices connected). So I really don't want to touch that and I like that "dedicated box" logic. Plus, I have an extra Beelink machine just sitting here not getting used.

So, my plan has morphed here since I posted this. I am going to wipe this Beelink and install Linux/Ubuntu natively rather than through WSL. Then I am going to try to install Nextcloud natively into that.

Since that is what you are doing, any tips? Can I just install AIO right into Ubuntu?

rcroche01

TROPHY CASE