Another box that arrived for me this week contains much more than meets the eye. The Apollo Cast-1 is a rather boring looking 3D printed box with 1 USB-C connector, 3.5mm socket (lead provided – 4 cores inside). It also has a pair of 0.1 inch plugs…
They didn’t ask me to provide this link – but it looks very handy so here it is.
The advertising blurb says “the Apollo Cast-1 plugs into your non-smart speakers, amplifiers and AV receivers with a 3.5mm cable and allows them to connect to ESPHome and Music Assistant (via SendSpin).
Armed with that headline (from the internet), nothing came in the packaging, just the CAST-1 unit (boxed) and the 3.5mm lead. The actual shipping box says:
- Plug the device into the power.
- Connect to the Apollo hotspot.
- Open a browser and go to 192.168.4.1.
- Select Wi-Fi and enter the password.
- Check Home Assistant discovers devices.
And that’s it. Sure enough, I plugged the device into the nearest USB supply I had handy – looking at SSIDs available on my phone, I noted “Apollo Cast 1 Hotspot”. I connected the phone to it and in my phone browser (Chrome) went to 192.168.4.1 – and nothing happened – blank white phone screen. Since then I’ve had it working from BLE, but Apollo quickly informed me that 192.168.4.1/setup should work while they figure out why 192.168.4.1 isn’t always on.
I even tried again with my phone TAILSCALE turned off – I should always do that but I keep forgetting.
Next – I tried again, making sure I tried 192.168.4.1 very shortly after powering up Cast-1. Same result. Then Google (AI version) said to try to enter directly via BLE – I turned on the bluetooth of the phone and … sure enough – added to the Home Assistant …
And that also installed Music Assistant and Home Assistant. I had a bit of a wait to find the Music Assistant in my Home Assistant left menu after that. No – so I went to APPS in Home Assistant, looked for Music Assistant and when that appeared, ticked the box that said “show in sidebar”. I then went over the HA sidebar to Music Assistant, which of course didn’t set up any media at first – searched for providers – found “radio browser” – which turned out to have a SHEDLOAD of online radio stations in every language imaginable – found one I liked – and told it to use Cast-1 which was now plugged into one of my speakers with auxilliary input – radio – and. No Ethernet connection as the Cast-1 runs over WiFi (although it seems you can optionally get an Ethernet version).
Simple – now to add any source of music I can find.
OH I LOVE IT – You need one of these…all I need now is an equalizer…ChatGPT to the rescue?
