I’m actually pretty surprised how bad the intercom ecosystem is these days.

Why aren’t there more ‘semi dumb’ Ethernet or wifi products that just let you announce that dinner is ready? It doesn’t need to be a fully ruggedised commercial system like this one or a fully integrated cloud managed solution like ring.

The cheap no name wireless ones can’t handle comms between rooms, let alone across a house.

The security implications aren’t insurmountable - you could use pairing codes if there are multiple on the network.

I’ve accepted that it’s a niche market, and that the only solution is to use Asterix with a some cheapo voip phones.

Was always wanting to do something like this before they swapped ours out for a SaaS+hardware butterfly mx thing.

Those Doorkings have had to get replaced at so many buildings in Seattle now that criminals figured out how easy they were to override.

I had the same problem and I've searched for ready made solutions for over an year before I found a guy that reverse-engineers and builds ready-made boards to install in my intercom for less than 30 euro.

I'm unsure if I should post the link or not as it's specific to Romania, but I love how janky the buids are: https://www.olx.ro/d/oferta/automatizare-interfon-electra-cu...

Fun. I did this recently with mine. There's now a discreet USB cable running down from behind it...

Related, I'm still upset at the lies told by landlords regarding phone number privacy in buzz-in intercoms. I've been told multiple times at multiple apartment buildings, "don't worry, while the system will call your phone when someone taps your entry code, your phone number won't be revealed". And then you sign the lease, get a delivery from Instacart in your new place, and find that your 'private' number is blasted out loud, heard a whole city block away, in a loud-ass DTMF tone sequence.

BS.

Frank's guests just need to get the Doorking 16120 default key and start letting themselves in.

Edit: undergrad shenanigans from ten years ago:

Our university student-run electronics lab had an issue: technically anyone with a student card was allowed on premises at any given time, but the department only gave us a small set of keys that we had to share with the rest of the student associations. Obviously we needed a solution.

We did some snooping and found that the request-to-exit button wire was running on a cable tray alongside all the other wiring and plumbing, as the lab was in the basement. We picked a suitably dark, inconspicuous spot and wired up a Raspberry Pi driving a transistor and in turn a relay which we then wired in parallel with that button. Users could then connect to the local lab wifi and then SSH into the device. Login shell was replaced with a script that pulsed the GPIO line for half a second and subsequently caused the door to open.

We never got caught and apparently all the evidence was destroyed when the building was renovated a few years later.

Confessing to felonies, in writing, under one’s real name is wild.

Here’s hoping nobody decides to bother them about this. I’m not a lawyer but this appears to this layperson at the very least a CFAA violation by accessing the router and resetting its root password, as well as possibly criminal mischief as well as whatever stealing AC power is.

You couldn’t pay me to do a writeup like this, and I’d be wearing gloves the whole time.

I use a Ring Intercom Audio for a similar use. Works surprisingly well, I wish someone would clone the hardware and make an open version so Jeff didn't listen in every time someone rings my doorbell or buzz himself in whenever he wants.

No native apple home - homebridge handles that.

I did similar in my apartment in Amsterdam but a little more low-tech. I soldered the relay on an Esp8266 directly to the unlock button on the intercom PCB in my apartment. Worked flawlessly for years