No, this is not an ad..I was just grasping straws for a title This morning a somewhat unexpected package arrived for me at the local tobacconist.Lots of bits and pieces from Apollo Automation – an American company I stumbled upon back in 2024 just as I was getting fanatical about LD2410 radar modules.
They have a number of devices they make based on that and similar presence-sensing chips – and to date aside from custom-3d-printed cases are googd but which never look quite as good as mass-production cases, I have the say I think their Air-1, MTR-1 and Apollo R Pro-1 devices are among the most exciting sensing devices I’ve ever come across.I’ve a shed-load of reviews including one on a really neat Christmas tree toy they sent me back in 2025.I said this wasn’t an ad but… I know… but I really like these guys.
Which brings me to my next point – how come I received here im sunny Spain, without any issues, DHL-WORLD-POLICE notices or unbelievably OTT Fedex emails, this package marked “Observaciones – Free Circulation within EU” from a USA company when anything that comes from China is treated as suspected terrorism? I could go on endlessly but I won’t for fear of losing you – to the point… I received today a package of bits (above) including an ESPHome Starter Kit, CAST-1, Apollo Breakout Board and 3.5mm audio/aux cable.At the time of writing I have no clue about any of this stuff… but read on… it is fair to say the last thing I need after my recent blogging work on ESPHome is an ESPHome starter kit – but hey – why not.Great excuse to write about basics.
I was wondering what that large board on the left above was all about when I just happened to turn it over.It turns out it’s not one board but several, including one with a bunch of pretty lights around the outside, reminiscent of the Christmas tree present they sent me last year.Okay, well, anything with lights on it, I’m up for, so I’ll rip this apart and show you the individual bits.
The large board has 10 LEDs on it, a buzzer, and a connector.It actually says the LED and buzzer module are 5, there’s a board with nothing but two connectors, then there’s a board with a button and a connector on it and finally, an AHT module, which is I2C at address 0x38.This has a connector and an AHT chip on it, and precious little else.
Supplied with the kit are three leads, one of which is apparently a spare, to connect the various pieces together.The heart of all of this is an ESP32-C6 Mini 1 with a USB connector, a couple of buttons, and three general connectors on it, which will attach to the rest.I’m guessing all of this because, as usual, I’ll leave the instructions as a last resort, but I haven’t used an ESP C6 yet, so this could be interesting.
Anyway, it’s all documented on a link which is on the main board: ohf.2/esphome/starterkit.I’m not sure what the OHF.2 was all about, but I’ve included the link to the starter kit.The link above describes that AHT module, which is, as you might expect, temperature and humidity.
Rather than blather on for ages here, I’m going to point you to the relevant pages.Apollo have done a cracking job of explaining all of this.Meanwhile, I’m dying to try out that LED/buzzer module as I’m something of a sucker for flashing lights, the first thing I ever did commercially (when I was working on what used to be called a video jukebox) was to create the wall-mount control unit.
My use of LEDs in the pub-wall-mounted remote grabbed more interest than all the electronics and technology combined.Everybody loved the flashing lights.Then I was sent off to Tokyo to support the sales team and you can imagine what I remember from that trip.
But I digress.Meanwhile I’m sitting here putting together the ESP32-C6, Light/buzzer module and the IR sensor – I THINK it’s impossible to assemble this the wrong way round.Time will tell.
Done – all I need now is a piece of code to flash the lights… could it be that easy? See in that link at the end where it says “next – first steps”… Nope – I failed – but hey – this is the age of chatGPT – so off I went to chatGPT and simply asked “Where in the esphome website is the example using the Apollo ESPHOME Starter Kit to flash the Apollo lights on the esp23-C6?” AND… the Apollo Starter Kit page – and so then back to my ESPHOME installation inside Home Assistant (as in “all roads lead to Home Assistant”) – New Project – you get a choice of an emty ESPHOME project or straight to – as one of many options – the Apollo Starter kit.Hard to go wrong, really.About the only way you could go wrong is to not understand how to find a Spaer USB port to connect to initially… SO I’m going to blindly hit SELECT on that starter kit… and plug the SP32 board into my PC USB spare port using the Windows button followed by DEVICE Manager to find which port I’ve just added.
COM29 as it happens.I’ve done NOTHING and there it is – assuming I have a secrets page in ESPHOME which I do – for my WiFi..it’s also assuming I’m paranoind and want API encryption – so that section that starts API: is coming out – I’ll just leave in the one line “api:” At this point I’ll hit SAVE then INSTALL – PLUG INO THIS COMPUTER – which isn’t my Home Assistant machine – it’s the PC who’s browser talks to Home Assistant and who’s serial port I’m using for the Apollo board.
Wish me luck….COMPILING FIRMWARE is utterly automated and to make the basic ESPHOME generic setup for this board takes maybe 2 minutes on my average PC.Now it asks to OPEN THE USB Flasher and will want to know which COM port I found in DEVICE Manager… I did that – and had what seemed like a working board but who could tell – at lest now there’s no need for the serial connection – updates by WiFi from now on – so I went back to the configuration and added the RGB LED + buzzer module just by dropping it in… and with USB disconnected, I connected up the LED board using one of the supplied ribbon cables to one of the two connectors on the ESP board (either connector will do) – plugged the board in – ran INSTALL (“over the network” option) in ESPHOME – and a couple of minutes later… I spotted on the WebUI that appeared at the board address – RGB LEDS – I hit the ON button..
and… So next I checked out the white block that looked like it might be a colour control….note the change of lead – first time the board crashed – it occurred to me that maybe those 10 LEDs were too much for my no-longer-needed PC serial port and so moved to a standard USB charger… OK that’s pretty… and now – the nice plastic stand they provided with the starter kit… and now – back to the ESPHOME PROJECT PAGE – SHOW ADVANCED SETTINGS – you know what’s coming next… I want a rainbow… It can’t be THAT easy – really – all I did was select addressable rainbow from the list and ESPHOME dropped another line into the code… I started another compile..as I type this, the LEDS have gone dead… (off by default – of course – and the code is uploading) – GOOD GRIEF – there’s now a dropdown box – what does it contain? WHEEE – I LOVE IT.
My favourite – RAINBOW.I guess I could add as many items to the dropbox as I want – just by dropping them in- there’s even a WLED option but that’s more than a 2-second story… Enough – this is so much fun for so little work… but pub calls…
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