The more I dig into the world of HomeAssistant, the more I keep falling down a deep rabbit hole! Lately, after increasing the number of “smart” devices installed in our house, I started looking more into surface mounted dashboards, in order to control the madness!
A first successful attempt was to mount a Raspberry Pi 4 (with a PoE HAT) on the wall, behind a larger touch screen, all encased in a simple translucent case (there is an LED strip mounted inside, for mood lighting at night!)
The next logical step was to fill a gaping hole on my desk with a similar concept. Enter DeskPi project!
The idea was simple, a smaller touchscreen, a raspberry pi and a way to mount the final product in a decent way on my desk.
I started searching on Aliexpress for touchscreens, to avoid the extra charges I had on the display for the entry hall, which came from Amazon.
Since I was happy with the brand, I stuck with Waveshare, and found a great option: Waveshare 7.9inch IPS Capacitive Touch LCD (Affiliate Link)
Before splurging on it, I wanted to model the final product, to get a better idea of how big it was going to be on my desk, how to orient the screen, and how to make sure all Pi ports were going to be accessible easily (side note – I plan on using this setup also to flash ESPHome code on ESP boards, not just as a fancy display!).
With my surprise, I found that Waveshare offers 3D detailed models of all their products, so that gave me a super easy starting point with the project. So naturally next I started looking for a 3D model of a Raspberry Pi 5 and voila, internet came to the rescue once more! I discovered the existence of GrabCAD, an amazing resource for 3D models of any sort of objects, including my Pi5.
Thanks to these two models I had the bulk of my project in Shapr3D in no time!
Almost too easy! With the main electronics now in place, I could easily trace them, in order to create a back casing that was going to be suitable for self-standing on my desk, at a good angle to be visible and easy to interact with.
It took a few iterations, as some of the port on the Pi were not 100% millimetres accurate in the 3D model, but overall being able to have these models made the process so much easier!
This was the final result: simple, functional and most of all, a perfect snug fit of all the components. It’s always extremely satisfying when a 3D printed component comes together with a real life object and it just snaps in place (there are 4 M3 screws just in case, but they are overkill, the fit is just…chef kiss).
The final step I took before fully committing to the design, was to use one of Shapr3D greatest function: the ability to view your 3D model in AR, making it super easy to validate your idea in the real world!
Look at it, so lifelike!
With that final check, it was print time!
Few months ago I got a Bambu Lab P1S to replace my Creality Ender 3, what an upgrade!! The print is fairly quick (~2.5 hours), and fairly material efficient.
(I really need to update my 3D printing workflow post…basically it’s all changed!!)
A small support removal later, we have the DeskPi ready to rock and roll!
Just perfect!
If you want to replicate the same, you can grab the 3D file for the casing on MakerWorld.
So, here it is then, project DeskPi in all its glory!
As you can see, I’m running a very simple and dedicated HomeAssistant dashboard on this device, allowing me to manage the entities in my home office and keeping me up to date on upcoming meetings!
All in all, it was a very fun and affordable project, the highlight being how flexible HomeAssistant is, but also how fun is to go from idea on (digital) paper to physical reality thanks to 3D printing!