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Moving to Free Software and Self-Hosting of Data
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HowTo Geek ☛ I Tried Running My Smart Home Without the Cloud—Here's What Happened
It can be hard choosing a smart home platform at first glance, but if you look a little closer, then it’s clear that one stands out: Home Assistant. This is especially true given the context of cloud reliance. You only need to look at competing, proprietary platforms to see why.
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Make Use Of ☛ I replaced Google Keep for my whole family with a free and open-source alternative
My cousins and I, along with a neighbor, started using Google Keep to coordinate our weekly gaming sessions and movie nights. We'd create shared notes, post strategies, tips and tricks, game suggestions, and vote on movies. But as weeks went on, the app just didn’t feel adequate for the type of note collaboration my group needed. Google Keep was good for personal use, but it just felt a bit rigid for collabs.
Then I discovered Memos, a self-hosted note-taking app where you can collaborate and share notes on feeds just like on social media. Since I was already self-hosting my own services at home, there was no reason not to try Memos. At least, everything would stay private and better meet our needs. A week later, our group coordination runs smoother than ever, everyone had an easier way of participating, our personal information never leaves my server, plus it's more fun to have notes posted as feeds where everyone can interact.
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HowTo Geek ☛ UGREEN's New Entry-Level NAS Devices Can Replace Your Google Photos Subscription
After successfully breaking into the home server market with its NASync devices in 2024, UGREEN is now offering its first ARM-powered NAS boxes—the NASync DH2300 and NASync DH4300. These products offer extreme power efficiency but won't work with x86 server applications, so they'll mainly appeal to casual users who just want an easy-to-use photos or files server.
The two-bay NASync DH2300 is powered by an 8-core Rockchip RK3576 processor (2.2 GHz), plus 4GB of LPDDR4X RAM and a 32GB system drive. It's also got a Gigabit Ethernet port, HDMI output, a USB-C port, plus a pair of USB 3.2 Type-A ports for external drives or other accessories. UGREEN opted for an unusual top-down "lidded" design, presumably to reduce the NAS' footprint or to make drive installation easier. You can store up to 60TB of data in the DH2300 with a pair of 30TB drives, but you'll probably end up mirroring your drives to prevent data loss, so the maximum usable storage for most customers will end up being 30TB.