You've got a Donato PoE Module. Let's get it running.

The Donato PoE Module is a professional smart-home controller built around an ESP32 with wired Ethernet. It takes a single PoE+ network cable and gives you four high-current outputs, an addressable-LED data line, and several general-purpose I/O pins — all controllable from your browser or Home Assistant.

• Powered entirely over Ethernet — no wall adapter. It needs an 802.3at PoE+ source (Step 2).
• Wired, not Wi-Fi — a LAN8720 Ethernet PHY, so no Wi-Fi setup and no 2.4 GHz dropouts.
• Ships pre-flashed with ESPHome firmware — it comes up and joins your network on its own.
• Four outputs at ~2 A each on the J3 screw terminal for lights, relays, locks, motors (Step 4).

In a hurry? The whole flow is: get a PoE+ switch → plug in → wire your load → control it in the browser → (optionally) add it to Home Assistant.

The module draws up to 25.5 W (PoE Class 4) and is powered only through its Ethernet cable. That means it needs IEEE 802.3at "PoE+". Ordinary 802.3af PoE tops out near 13 W at the device — not enough: the board may fail to boot or brown out. You need one 802.3at source.

Option A — a small PoE+ switch (powers this plus future devices)

Option B — a single-port PoE+ injector (cheapest, just this board)

Already have a regular (non-PoE) router or switch and only one module to power? A single-port 802.3at PoE+ injector is the cheapest correct answer. It sits inline: existing port → injector DATA-IN, then injector PoE-OUT → cable → module. Buy one explicitly rated IEEE 802.3at, 30 W, gigabit — e.g. TP-Link TL-PoE160S, EnGenius EPA5006GAT, or Tripp Lite NPOE-30W-1G. Avoid 15.4 W / 802.3af-only injectors (e.g. TL-PoE150S).

• Per-port vs total budget are different numbers — a big total budget can still cap each port. Confirm your port does 30 W.
• Not every port is a PoE port — on the 5/8-port units, usually only 4 ports supply power. Use a labeled PoE port.
• Prefer named lines (TP-Link SG/Omada, Netgear GS, Ubiquiti UniFi). Cheap unbranded "PoE+" gear sometimes overstates its capability.

With your PoE+ source ready, connecting the module is the whole installation:

1. Run an Ethernet cable from a PoE+ port (or the injector's PoE-OUT) to the module's RJ45 jack.
2. The board powers up immediately. Remember — no LED will light; that's normal.
3. It negotiates PoE+, brings up Ethernet, and pulls a DHCP address from your network automatically. No configuration needed.
4. Find its IP address so you can reach it (next step). Three easy ways below.

Finding the board's IP address

• Your router's device/DHCP list — look for a host named pdpm-g-xxxxxx (the last characters are part of its MAC).
• By name (mDNS) — try http://pdpm-g-xxxxxx.local in a browser if your network supports mDNS/Bonjour.
• Home Assistant — it auto-discovers the board (see Step 6), which shows the IP too.

J3 is the 11-position screw terminal where you connect your loads and signals. Counting from pin 1 — the end closest to the Ethernet (RJ45) port — the pins fall into four groups: power, an LED-data line, level-shifted 5 V I/O, and four high-current switch outputs.

What to expect on each pin — voltage & polarity

• Power pins 1 & 3 → positive out. A steady +12 V (pin 1) and +5 V (pin 3), measured against GND. They source power to the + side of your load.
• Pin 2 → GND (0 V). The common negative / return for everything you wire.
• Outputs 8–11 (Q1–Q4 · HIO12/13/14/33) → the negative side. Wire your load's − here. There's no fixed voltage to measure: when ON the pin is pulled to ~0 V (ground); when OFF it's open/floating. The board switches the ground side, never the positive.
• Data pin 4 (HDIN) → 5 V output. Sends the addressable-LED data signal out (output only).
• I/O pins 5–7 (HIO16/HIO2/HIO15) → 5 V, input and output. Bidirectional — read a 5 V sensor/switch, or drive a 5 V signal. They idle near 5 V until something pulls them low.

A worked example — switching a 12 V light

To switch a 12 V load on output HIO13 (pin 9): connect +12V (pin 1) to the load's +, and the load's − to HIO13 (pin 9). When you turn HIO13 ON (from the web UI or Home Assistant), the board completes the circuit to ground and the light comes on. The outputs are low-side switches — they switch the negative/ground side, not the positive.

Examples — what you can connect

You don't need any extra software to control the module. Every board runs a small built-in web server — just open its address in a browser:

1. In any browser, go to http://<board-ip> (the address you found in Step 3).
2. When prompted, log in with username admin and password pdpm-g.
3. You'll see a live control panel — flip the switches and the outputs respond instantly.

From that page you can, with zero setup:

• Toggle all four outputs (HIO12, HIO13, HIO14, HIO33) on and off.
• See PoE+ Detected, the input states, system status, and uptime.
• Read the board's IP address and firmware version, and restart it.

The browser page is great for direct control — but to unlock what the module can really do, add it to Home Assistant. It's the recommended home for the board and it's free and open-source. Because the module already speaks ESPHome, Home Assistant auto-discovers it.

1. In Home Assistant, go to Settings → Devices & Services.
2. Look for "ESPHome — PDPM-G …" under Discovered, and click Configure. (If it doesn't appear, add it manually: Add Integration → ESPHome → Host: the board's IP, Port: 6053.)
3. When asked, paste the board's API encryption key — you'll reuse this same key any time you update the firmware, so keep it handy:
   🔑

   API encryption key:
   FK0lk39GchrQjqxxgpom/vOFX1Go3iyw5/sjkA39xvA=
4. Done — every output, input, and sensor appears in Home Assistant automatically.

Once it's in Home Assistant you get the things the bare web page can't do:

Your board ships running the ESPHome base image — the right choice for Home Assistant. But the firmware is yours to change. There are three paths, from easiest to most advanced.

A · Update or reconfigure (stay on ESPHome) — over the air, no cables

This is the everyday way to tweak a board that's already online: add sensors, change names/IP, or update the firmware version — all wirelessly, with the board installed.

1. In Home Assistant, install the ESPHome Device Builder add-on (Settings → Add-ons → Add-on Store). It's the standard dashboard for editing and updating ESPHome devices.
2. Open it, adopt your board, and edit its YAML config — add sensors, rename pins, change the IP. Keep the same API encryption key & OTA password so Home Assistant keeps treating it as the same device.
3. Click Install → Wirelessly. It compiles and flashes over the air using the board's OTA password — no cables, the board stays installed. (Comfortable on the command line? esphome run your-board.yaml does the same thing.)
4. ~30 seconds later it reboots, rejoins the network, and reappears in Home Assistant. Confirm PoE+ Detected is still ON.

B · Switch personality — ESPHome ↔ WLED

Want the board to become a WLED addressable-LED controller (driving a strip on the HDIN data line), or switch back to ESPHome? Here's how:

1. To WLED: use the official web installer at install.wled.me (Chrome/Edge). It flashes over USB — follow the power & BOOT-button safety steps in C below first. Then finish setup in WLED's own web UI and point its LED output at the HDIN line (J3 pin 4).
2. Back to ESPHome: reflash the ESPHome image — over the air once it's reachable (path A) or via the recovery reflash (C) — then re-adopt it in Home Assistant.
3. After it reboots (~30 s): a WLED board appears at its own web UI; an ESPHome board re-appears in Home Assistant.

C · Recovery reflash (advanced) — USB + the BOOT button

Only needed if the board is unreachable (a bad config, interrupted OTA, or you want a clean wipe). This uses a USB-to-serial adapter and the on-board BOOT button. You'll first need to locate the board's serial/programming header and its BOOT and RESET buttons (marked on the board silkscreen). If you're not comfortable identifying them, reach out before risking the board — and read the safety notes first.

1. Disconnect PoE. Power the board from its documented bench source; connect only GND/TX/RX/EN from the adapter.
2. Enter download mode: hold BOOT (pulls GPIO0 low), tap RESET/EN, then release BOOT.
3. In Chrome or Edge (Web Serial only works there), open a web flasher (ESP Web Tools / esptool-js), or run esptool locally.
4. Write the full merged factory image at offset 0x0:
   # full firmware.factory.bin = bootloader + partitions + app esptool.py --chip esp32 --port /dev/ttyUSB0 --baud 460800 \ write_flash -z 0x0 firmware.factory.bin
5. Power-cycle out of download mode, reconnect PoE+, and confirm it's back online.

Bonus — Bluetooth & other wireless (advanced)

The board networks over its wired connection, but the ESP32's full 2.4 GHz radio is still onboard — and because Ethernet doesn't use that radio, it's completely free for wireless add-ons. Enable any of these in firmware:

• Bluetooth LE — the easiest and most useful: run the board as a Home Assistant Bluetooth proxy (relay nearby BLE sensors over the wired link), read BLE sensors directly, or act as a beacon. Add ESPHome's bluetooth_proxy / esp32_ble_tracker.
• ESP-NOW — Espressif's router-free, peer-to-peer link over the 2.4 GHz radio. Handy for talking to battery-powered sensor nodes or other ESP boards without touching your network.
• Wi-Fi — present and usable (a fallback link or a setup access-point), though the whole point of this board is that you don't need it. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth share the one radio, so they take turns.
• Bluetooth Classic — also supported, but its stack is RAM-hungry on this chip; BLE is the practical choice alongside Ethernet.