New User Trying to select the right board(s) or "kit". Mac, Home Assistant, IoT, RPi4 etc.

Hello…

New to this (but not electronics, computers or programming).

I wanted to start with the best board(s) and ideally a pre-packaged kit (if it exists) with some lessons and projects built in and then expand upon it.

I am a Mac user and I also work with RPi4, Home Assistant, Iot, etc. So ultimately I think they should be somewhat compatible with them.

As far as HA I read a little about ESPhome and Firmata as far as ways to communicate with HA. Not sure which boards support them though. To start I think more along the lines of due it all type boards for dev purposes and then possibly slim it down and specific purpose builds if needed later.

I see the Inventors Kits (RedBoard or Arduino Uno), which looks like includes a good amount of sensors and server and motors.

Would one of those be a good starting point and possibly upgrade to a different/better board later (compatible with the other items in the kit)?

I have been reading on here and adafruit and other places to learn as much as possible and the more I read the more confusing its getting. lol

Anyway I hope this makes sense.

Thank you so much in advance!

Geo

I’m leaning towards the common Sparkfun Inventors Kit v4.1 with RedBoard Quicc to test the waters with all those well documented projects.

Then try to hook it up to Home Assistant and/or figure out what new microcontroller board to get and experiment with those projects and Home Assistant.