If you have nay knowledge of networking (or want to learn), start setting up restricted VLANs to isolate your smart devices. Only allow them access to specific services/devices like your media server.

For dedicated hardware, there are plenarily of options. A Raspberry Pi will work to start with, there are Linux images with Kodi such as LibreELEC and osmc (I have used both in the past and they worked fine), and Android TV images also that can run apps. I suppose you could also set up a generic Linux install and run the Jellyfin client or similar - not sure if there any turnkey options for that.

We have a couple of Apple TV boxes and they perform well, the Jellyfin apps for them have really improved in the last year or so too.

What’s wrong with Elegoo? I don’t have their printers but I’ve used a fair bit of their filament which seems to be good value.

Considering an upgrade myself so wondering what to avoid.

It’s worked well for me so far. I chose Homarr because it has a GUI for dashboard creation, I wanted the whole family to be able to use it and they aren’t all up to editing YAML etc.

I use Homarr and initially created a really complex dash, but I’ve since whittled it down to just the bare essentials as a homepage.

Links to my most used web pages and self hosted services, and a couple of vital metrics that I would need to act upon quickly.

For everything else I have Grafana dashboards I can dip into as I need to.

A VPS is going to have all the same problems as a local server in terms of inexperienced users, and will also add all the extra hassle of managing and paying for the VPS account.

I would say the best options for emergency access are local backups and documentation, which you already have. You could also consider keeping additional copies of essential passwords (like email accounts etc) in a simpler vault like Keepass. Or even physical copies written down in a security envelope in a safe.

I didn’t know alternate Windows shells where still a thing. I remember Litestep was another back in the day.

I hadn’t heard of Moonfin before, it looks promising as an Apple TV client. Any pitfalls with it?

I’m using Jellyfin with 2 Apple TV 4Ks, one newer and one older. As other commenters have said there is no complete official Jellyfin app for Apple TV.

Swiftfin is the in development new app for Apple platforms, but it still very incomplete. Basic video playback works, but there are a lot of missing features like music and live tv support. The interface is functional but still fairly crude, and in the current version there’s a lot of ugly overflow issues in the UI. Video playback has always been reliable for me though. It will improve as development progresses but for now it’s very much a work in progress.

The other option is Infuse, which has a much nicer and mature UI, but also isn’t fully feature complete for Jellyfin. It also a proprietary app with a subscription to unlock all features. I’ve tried the free version and it seems to work well enough, video playback was smooth.

I think there are few other small apps but I haven’t tried them.

I wish there were better options for clients as the Apple TV is the best streaming box I’ve found but the Jellyfin support could be better.

I’m using a Drayton Wiser thermostat, which uses WiFi but has a fully local integration via HACS. Has worked great for me so far.

Unfortunately many parts of Sailfish are proprietary though.

As a British person that’s something I thought I’d never see.

Arrested on his birthday too.

UniFi Protect now has limited ONVIF support allowing various 3rd party cameras to work with Protect.

UniFi cameras can have RTSP enabled also, but it requires UniFi Protect to enable the setting.

What model of label printer is that?

So far I just keep recipes in whatever I’m using for notes.

Some of these dedicated programs look interesting though. Thinking about it, it would be handy to have some dedicated cooking features, like being able to search for recipes by ingredients.

We have a cheap and reliable black and white laser printer at home for convenient printing of stuff like return labels.

On the rare occasion colour of photo prints are needed, there’s a great little independent print and photo place in town that does prints for pennies.

Seems to be the best of both worlds.

The owner’s phone:

I used to read them, they often had good in depth tutorials. The Format branding has been going for a long time, I can remember reading Amiga Format.

There were a few other Linux magazines as well, Linux User, Linux Magazine, Linux Voice. I think there’s still a Raspberry Pi magazine as well which covers a lot of Linux stuff.

There are 4 bay units that would fit on a 10” inch shelf. I’ve seen some DIY projects too.

Using SFF/mini PCs is also popular, there are models that can take multiple SATA/NVMe drives

There are few if any 10” UPS units available anyway so weight is less of a worry. It’s one of the biggest weaknesses of the 10” system currently.

Power costs vary a lot around the world, depending on where OP lives every little saving can help.