- If you're not already familiar,
the reef-pi is a really neat open source aquarium
or terrarium controller
that runs on a little Raspberry Pi computer like this one.
In building my reef-pi,
the most messy part of it, by far,
is the numerous little connections that are needed
to control the outlets on my American DJ Power Strip,
which is connected to,
using a standard 9-pin serial connector,
the little oblong kind.
Hi, guys and girls, I'm ReefMan
and this video is all about
using the Kasa Smart Wi-Fi Power Strip,
this power strip, with the reef-pi.
This power strip makes things a lot easier,
it's totally wireless
and it runs on your home's Wi-Fi network.
No more having to Dremel out a weird oblong-shaped hole,
this is way easier, it's wireless.
But are there any drawbacks you might wanna know about?
So as of version 3.0,
the reef-pi supports several models
of the TP-Link Kasa Smart outlet line.
It supports the HS103, which is just a single plug,
the HS105 which is also just a single plug,
and the HS110 which is another single outlet,
but that also monitors the power used,
and this one, the HS300, which has both power monitoring
and six controllable outlets.
I think most of you are gonna opt for the HS300,
and that's what I'll set up here.
So the HS300 has three USB ports.
So, in theory, you could even run your reef-pi from it
using one of these USB ports,
but as I need a higher voltage source
to run a dimmable light,
that wouldn't really make sense that my reef pi,
and, no, I wouldn't have a single-plug
and so it's not worth it to do it that way for me,
but maybe it would be for you.
One interesting thing that you get for free
with the HS300 and also the HS110
is the ability to track how much power each actual outlet
and the item plugged into it, is using.
TP-Link makes a pretty nice app, you can see it here,
it runs on Android and iOS,
and it monitors all of the outlets.
This gives you a lot more information
than even many commercial aquarium controllers,
and the app works alongside the reef-pi
so you can use the reef-pi for some ports
and the app for others,
like your paper shredder, if you want.
Once you've set up your outlets
and you can control them from the app,
then you're ready to integrate it with your reef-pi.
You'll need to go into your home's Wi-Fi configuration,
find the little outlet strip,
find out what the IP address of it is.
While you're in there, I'd also suggest setting it up
to use a static IP address,
just to ensure that that IP is not gonna change
which would lock your outlets
in whatever state they happen to be in
when that change happened.
Once you have the IP address of your strip,
just go over to your reef-pi's Configuration tab,
and then go to the Drivers tab under that.
Click the plus button, add a new driver,
and from the drop-down of items
select the model of the Kasa Smart device
that you'll be using.
Give it a useful name, I called mine HS300,
and enter the IP address that the strip is using.
Follow the hint that's there though,
you'll need to ensure you have the port number at the end,
it's always gonna be :9999.
Hit save, and that's pretty much it,
you've made the connection, now you're ready to go.
So you can go over to the Connectors tab
and then create outlet connectors
for all of the plugs that are on your power strip.
Now these are gonna be off by one,
they start at zero, like you might expect
if you're a programmer, but on the power strip,
you know, it's not for programmers,
and they're printed, starting from one.
It's just something to be aware of
when you see outlet zero, it's actually identified as one
in the app and on the device.
After you've done that,
you can leave the Configuration page
and add your equipment that's connected to each plug,
just like you would with any other power device.
You'll also be able to create timers, macros
and all sorts of things like that,
to control the states of those plugs.
I did have to reload my reef-pi's configuration
before things actually started working
after I set up those timers,
so keep that in mind if you see some strange behavior,
you might just need to reload the configuration.
There is one drawback that I can see,
and it's set at this totally real time.
The reef-pi needs to be able to send a TCP request
over your home Wi-Fi, to turn an outlet on,
and then a whole nother request needs to be sent
to turn it off, there's no storage
of the schedule on the power strip itself.
Now I'm sure you can think of a time
when your home Wi-Fi wasn't working,
not just no internet, which wouldn't break it, but no Wi-Fi.
In times like that,
well, you've frozen the state of all the outlets.
I'd probably avoid using this
for things which are sort of critical
to the stability of your tank
and which turn need to turn on and off often,
and missing a change there might cause problems.
Maybe like a dosing pump
might be something I would think about.
If a dosing pump sticks on,
you're quickly gonna have issues.
Maybe a heater could also cause issues,
but a lot of heaters have internal,
sort of, thermometers and and temperature controls,
so you can use the internal control
to provide a second level of control
in case your controller sticks on.
But that's just something to keep in mind,
and, you know, I'm sure there are many people out there
who are using these
for all their devices without any issues,
but it is a possibility.
Now since this is a wireless power strip,
you can actually control many different tanks
with just one reef-pi,
and all without running wires between them.
Now you are gonna miss out on things
like temperature, pH, and that sort of thing,
important stuff for a reef tank,
but if all you need is on-off control
for a vivarium or an orchidarium, something like that,
then I think that's a good option.
So I hope you enjoyed the video,
think about subscribing
if you're not already a subscriber to my channel.
Have a great day, be kind to each other,
and I will see you next time, bye.