Home Assistant has just released its final update for 2023, and it’s packed with exciting features and improvements. The new release, version 2023.12, is all about making your smart home experience even better.

One of the highlights of this release is the redesigned login page. It now features a modern and welcoming design that greets you when you access Home Assistant via your local home network. The login page is smart enough to remember your login when you’re at home, eliminating the need to repeatedly log in. And when you’re accessing Home Assistant from outside your home network, the login page still ensures the security of your system by asking for your username and password.

The thermostat card has also received a makeover in this release. It now matches the stunning new entity dialog introduced in a previous release. The new design is not only visually pleasing but also adds support for features like HVAC mode buttons and presets, giving you more control and customization options.

Another exciting addition is the numeric input feature for tile cards. This feature allows you to control number entities and number helpers directly from the tile card. You can choose to use it as a slider or as an input with up/down buttons, making it easier than ever to interact with your smart home devices.

The default dashboard now offers more options to customize its behavior. You can hide certain areas, hide entities that don’t belong to an area, and even hide the energy summary card. This gives you greater control over your dashboard and allows you to tailor it to your specific needs.

The history dashboard has also received significant improvements in this release. It now combines state history with long-term statistics, providing you with insights into the past. This enhancement allows you to look back further in time and analyze data more effectively.

Home Assistant continues to expand its integration offerings with new additions in this release. Devialet, Linear Garage Door, MyPermobil, OurGroceries, and V2C are now supported integrations, giving you even more options to connect and automate your smart home devices.

In addition to these major updates, there are numerous other improvements and bug fixes in this release. The full changelog can be found on the Home Assistant website.

Sixfab has introduced a 5G Modem Kit designed for the Raspberry Pi 5, featuring the Quectel RM502Q-AE 5G Sub-6GHz M.2 module, a proprietary internal antenna for Sub-6 frequency bands, and a USB 3.0 bridge connector. The Sixfab 5G Modem Kit for Raspberry Pi 5 includes a variety of specifications:

• Sixfab 5G Modem HAT for Raspberry Pi 5
  • M.2 socket for 5G module
  • Nano SIM card holder + embedded SIM
  • USB 3.0 port and 40-pin GPIO header for connection to the Raspberry Pi 5 SBC
  • Misc
    • User button
    • Status, power, and user (GPIO21) LEDs
    • EEPROM for Raspberry Pi HAT compliance
    • 2-pin fan connector
  • Power Supply – 5V via USB Type-C port (on HAT itself)
  • Dimensions – 88.1 x 57.7 x 21.7 mm
  • Approvals – FCC, IC, CE, UKCA are in progress
• Quectel RM502Q-AE M.2 module
  • 5G NR: 3GPP Release 15 NSA/SA operation, Sub-6 GHz
  • LTE Category: DL Cat 20/ UL Cat 18
  • Max data rates
    • 5G SA Sub-6 – Max. 4.2 Gbps (DL)/Max. 450 Mbps (UL)
    • 5G NSA Sub-6 – Max. 5 Gbps (DL)/Max. 650 Mbps (UL)
  • Host interfaces – USB 3.1 or PCIe 3.0
  • Dimensions – 52 x 30.0 × 2.3mm
  • Weight – 8.4 grams
• Extra tall 40-pin GPIO stacking header
• Power Supply – 5.1V 3.0A DC power adaptor with universal plugs
• Plastic spacer kit

The kit, priced at $450, is compatible with various boards and computers, including the NVIDIA Jetson Nano Developer Kit, Beaglebone SBC, Asus Tinkerboard, NXP i.MX 8 devkits, and regular PCs, offering drivers and tools for both Windows and Linux. Additional components required for operation include a Raspberry Pi 5, a microSD card for the OS, a 5G SIM card (unless using the eSIM is an option), and an extra 5V USB-C power supply to separately power the Raspberry Pi 5 and Sixfab HAT.

Source: CNX Software – Embedded Systems News.

MediaTek has introduced two new WiFi 7 chipsets, the Filogic 860 and Filogic 360, targeting mainstream routers and client devices. The Filogic 860 features a tri-core Arm Cortex-A73 SoC designed for up to BE7200 routers and gateways, while the Filogic 360 is a WiFi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 chip designed for smartphones, PCs, laptops, set-top boxes, and OTT streaming boxes, offering up to 2.9 Gbps bandwidth.

The Filogic 860 and Filogic 360 chipsets provide more cost-effective alternatives to the previously introduced Filogic 880 SoC for up to BE36000 routers and Filogic 380 clients chip, which can achieve up to 6.5 Gbps PHY data rate.

MediaTek Filogic 860 Specifications:

• CPU – 3x Arm Cortex-A73 cores clocked at up to 1.8 GHz
• Network Processing Unit (NPU) – Hardware QoS acceleration and Tunneling Offload Engine for VLAN / PPTP / L2TP / GRE
• Networking Crypto engine (EIP-197) – For IPv4 NATP / IPv6 / DS-Lite / 6RD acceleration
• Memory I/F – DDR3, DDR4
• Storage I/F – SPI-NOR, SPI-NAND, eMMC, SD
• Networking
  • Wi-Fi 7 (802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax/be)
    • Up to 7.2 Gbps (BE7200) PHY performance
    • Tri-band support – 2.4GHz, 5GHz, 6GHz
    • Key Features – BW40 (2.4Ghz), BW160 (5/6GHz), 4096-QAM, MLO, MRU, and AFC
    • Antenna – 4×4 (2.4GHz) + 5×5 (5/6GHz); Filogic Xtra range to boost receiving distance using an extra antenna
  • Ethernet
    • 1x 10GbE (USXGMII)
    • 1x 2.5GbE PHY
    • 4x 1GbE interfaces
• USB – 2x USB 3.2 up to 5 Gbps each
• PCIe – PCIe 3.0 up to 10 Gbps
• Other I/Os – UART, SPI, PWM, GPIO and OTP

The Filogic 860 is expected to be used in WiFi 7 enterprise access points, service provider Ethernet gateways, mesh nodes, retail routers, and IoT router applications. Although software support details are not provided, MediaTek is likely to offer support for Linux-based distributions such as OpenWrt and/or Debian.

MediaTek Filogic 360 Specifications:

• Wi-Fi
  • Wi-Fi 7 (802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax/be)
  • Tri-band – 2.4GHz, 5GHz, 6GHz
  • Antenna – 2×2 triple-band
  • Max Throughput – Up to 2.9Gbps
  • Wi-Fi 7 Features – Up to 160MHz BW, 4096-QAM, Hybrid MLO (eMLSR), MRU
• Bluetooth Dual 5.4, LE Audio
• MediaTek Bluetooth and Wi-Fi coexistence technology
• Single chip with RF, Baseband, MAC, iFEM
• Host interface – PCI Express 2.1 or USB 3.0

The MediaTek Filogic 860 and Filogic 360 WiFi 7 chipsets are currently available for sampling to customers, with mass production scheduled for mid-2024. Therefore, routers, gateways, and client devices utilizing these new chips are expected to hit the market in the second half of 2024. More information can be found on the respective product pages and in the press release.

Source: CNX Software – Embedded Systems News.

Home Assistant has released its latest version, 2023.11, packed with new features and improvements. Here’s what you need to know:

• To-do list entities: Home Assistant now introduces a new entity type called “To-do list entities.” These entities represent a list of tasks, and you can create multiple to-do lists and manage them through the new “To-do lists” item in the sidebar.
• Shopping lists are now to-do’s: The shopping list feature has been converted into a to-do list. Existing shopping lists will be automatically converted upon upgrading to this release.
• Integrations providing your to-dos: Automations can now be created to create, complete, or clean up tasks on your to-do lists.
• Matter 1.2: Home Assistant has upgraded its Matter implementation to version 1.2, benefiting from stability improvements and preparing for new device types.
• Customize information in Tile cards: The Tile card now displays entity state information, and you can now customize the information shown on the card by adding attributes to the state content.
• Select any date range in the energy dashboard: The energy dashboard now allows you to select a custom date range to view the energy usage of your home over a specific period.
• New conditions for the conditional card: The conditional card now includes new conditions such as user condition, numeric state condition, and screen condition, allowing you to show or hide cards based on specific criteria.
• Restarting into safe mode: You can now restart Home Assistant in safe mode, which disables all custom integrations and custom frontend resources.
• Set up Improv Wi-Fi devices directly from Home Assistant: If you have a device that supports Improv Wi-Fi over Bluetooth and you are using Bluetooth in Home Assistant, you can set up the device directly from Home Assistant.
• Configuring script fields in the UI: Script fields can now be configured in the UI, allowing you to define variables in your script and provide a UI for your script fields.

The release also includes several other noteworthy changes, new integrations, integrations available to set up from the UI, and bug fixes. For a full list of changes, you can refer to the changelog.

This release showcases Home Assistant’s commitment to providing a comprehensive and customizable home automation experience. Whether you’re managing tasks, customizing your dashboards, or integrating new devices, Home Assistant 2023.11 has you covered.

For more information, visit the Home Assistant website.