Shekhar Vaidya writes about utilizing a $15 ESP32 and a small OLED screen to display live home server stats (CPU, RAM, disk, and load) without requiring an open dashboard or phone app. He selected the Komodo monitoring service for its 5-second refresh rate over Beszel's richer but slower 60-second data, and the project took several days of troubleshooting after a wiring error fried the original display.
- The home server is a repurposed Dell Latitude laptop running Debian with 20+ self-hosted services
- A superadmin API key and secret are stored in plain text on the ESP32
- The display is not a replacement for monitoring tools; it serves as a glanceable trigger to investigate further
- The home server is a repurposed Dell Latitude laptop running Debian with 20+ self-hosted services
- A superadmin API key and secret are stored in plain text on the ESP32
- The display is not a replacement for monitoring tools; it serves as a glanceable trigger to investigate further
