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Frank Dillinger posted:As soon as you turn it on, someone, somewhere is watching you and pleasuring themselves. drat
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Apr 15, 2018 04:31
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Anyone have Comcast Xfinity Home service? Does it integrate at all with stuff like Hue and Arlo? I'm having difficulty finding information. Their website doesn't list Arlo but they have press releases that say integration is available. In order to avoid seeing my cable bill double I had to agree to their Quad Play service which comes with home security and then I was forced to pay for installation and schedule them to come out even though I have no interest in home security. Comcast apparently purchased Stringify, which I am using to integrate my Arlo with my Hue so maybe I can make this work depending on how well it integrates with my current setup. Why on why does no one offer decent internet besides Comcast.
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Apr 15, 2018 12:38
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Krispy Wafer posted:Why on why does no one offer decent internet besides Comcast. ATT has symmetrical gigabit fiber for 80/90$ a month. I've had little issue with in the 4 months I've had it despite ATT in general being horrendous. If I ever do have to call in I know I'm going to have a bad time. RCN has cable gigabit (1G down 20mb up) for about 70 a month. I had initial issues with them, had to have techs out 5 times. Every time they told me there was nothing wrong but the last time I just magically stopped having issues. It was fine after that for more than a year. I had more issues with Comcast than either of these suppliers.
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Apr 15, 2018 13:54
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PBS posted:ATT has symmetrical gigabit fiber for 80/90$ a month. I've had little issue with in the 4 months I've had it despite ATT in general being horrendous. If I ever do have to call in I know I'm going to have a bad time. I'm still solidly in AT&T copper U-Verse territory which maxes out at 50mb but probably means 7. Also I used to work for them and hate everything they stand for with the heat of a thousand suns. Still probably would have gone for them over Comcast had they offered gigabit fiber. I've had 4 years of really cheap service and we have TiVo DVR's so Comcast is our best option, I'm just not happy being roped into another service I couldn't turn down that happens to include a $600 early termination fee if AT&T ever decides to lay some fiber by my house. 
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Apr 15, 2018 14:16
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Krispy Wafer posted:I'm still solidly in AT&T copper U-Verse territory which maxes out at 50mb but probably means 7. Also I used to work for them and hate everything they stand for with the heat of a thousand suns. Still probably would have gone for them over Comcast had they offered gigabit fiber. Yeah I managed to take on ATT without a contract, so if I do have issues I can get out pretty easily. It's costing me an extra 10$/mo, but I'd have been paying that after a year anyway.
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Apr 15, 2018 15:04
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Woot has new Nest-E thermostats available for $110.
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Apr 18, 2018 18:36
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My local utility has a $75 rebate too, which is a heck of a deal!
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Apr 18, 2018 18:38
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Binary Badger posted:I just got a WyzeCam V2 I got three. For $20, product has the goods. Edit for more info: I bought one to try it out. After 2 days, i ordered 2 more. Its not outdoor rated, but i live in a moderate climate, and for $20, i can handle buying more if they fail. All in, im out about $100 for three, $60 for cams, $10 for shipping, $30 for 3 micro sd cards. The cameras have free cloud, but its only 12 second clips. Pretty good for basic security, but def get the micro sd card for continuous recording. Sound quality is not great, but at least it has some. I could distinguish the ups truck driving up, but you can barely tell what people are saying when competing against other random outdoor noises. The video quality and night vision of the V2 is pretty great. Like Binary Badger, im cheap, and didnt want to spend $ on monthly cloud. Im very pleased so far. My worr is theyll go under or get gobbled up by a competitor who starts charging. Cornjob fucked around with this message at 06:44 on Apr 19, 2018 |
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Apr 18, 2018 20:42
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I have a reasonably small apartment and don't want to gently caress with wiring. Thinking IKEA Trådfri + home assistant might work well? I don't really need insanely advanced stuff.
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Apr 20, 2018 12:12
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Wibla posted:I have a reasonably small apartment and don't want to gently caress with wiring. Thinking IKEA Trådfri + home assistant might work well? I don't really need insanely advanced stuff. I started with Hue bulbs and Home assistant in a reasonably small apartment and it worked fine. I've since expanded a lot but just lights and HA seems like a good starting point. If you're used to switches for lights moving to phone / web browser might be a bit strange (since with smart bulbs the switch should always be 'on' and you control the bulbs instead). Ikea probably has some remote type switches or you can integrate with a voice assistant to alleviate this.
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Apr 20, 2018 17:54
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Ledif posted:I started with Hue bulbs and Home assistant in a reasonably small apartment and it worked fine. I've since expanded a lot but just lights and HA seems like a good starting point. If you're used to switches for lights moving to phone / web browser might be a bit strange (since with smart bulbs the switch should always be 'on' and you control the bulbs instead). Ikea probably has some remote type switches or you can integrate with a voice assistant to alleviate this. They have these switches that can be wall mounted: https://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/20303317/ I'm getting at least one of those + the gateway and a PIR sensor (for the hallway). But I'm good with using an app for the most part. I don't generally turn my lights on/off a whole lot during the day, it's mainly for convenience. Using home assistant to do some planned actions ++
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Apr 20, 2018 18:10
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So I'm building a new house and looking into both home security and automation and even though I'm an IT guy I'm just overwhelmed with where to start. I have 3 months to research everything, so does anyone know of a good place with solid information about all the different ecosystems and options out there? Google is just flooded with referral websites and bullshit review sites. I'm not sure about things like competing standards, interoperability, which devices to go with. It's all intimidating. My inital thoughts: Ecosystem: How to decide between using Google vs. Amazon Alexa or even Apple - we use both google and Amazon services, moreso Amazon. We have iPhones and iPads as well. Leaning towards Echo Dots around the house at this point. My wife is also enamored with Samsung appliances (much to my dismay) and we'll probably be getting a SmartHub refrigerator and higher end Samsung washer/dryers with connectivity. She's way too excited about the possibility of getting an alert on her phone when a load of laundry is done washing, so does that bring SmartThings into the mix? Security - Local company offers a Honeywell Lyric system that looks nice. Another offers an IQ2 based system. Both have some automation integration possibilities. Wife wants Skybell HD at the front door or a Ring. I think the picture is better on the Skybell. I personally don't want a monitored security solution, so unmonitored is fine with me. Goals - Nothing insane really, I'm looking for some automation, and if things integrated it would be great. Don't want to deal with 4 or 5 apps and disparate systems. A garage door control and sensor would be nice, some control over lighting in the house, integration with the wireless thermostats, stuff like that. I'm hoping someone can point me to a solid resource that isn't a website full of referral links for whoever is paying the most this week or offer general advice on where to start.
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Apr 20, 2018 18:14
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Wibla posted:They have these switches that can be wall mounted: https://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/20303317/ I'm getting at least one of those + the gateway and a PIR sensor (for the hallway). I have Hues in pretty much every light socket in my house but I can't imagine having them without having some sort of voice control ready on day one. A Google Home Mini is like $30 and works extremely well.
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Apr 20, 2018 18:15
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skipdogg posted:So I'm building a new house and looking into both home security and automation and even though I'm an IT guy I'm just overwhelmed with where to start. I have 3 months to research everything, so does anyone know of a good place with solid information about all the different ecosystems and options out there? Google is just flooded with referral websites and bullshit review sites. From my understanding the Samsung appliance stuff is all standalone, no smartthings required. That said, the quality on the Samsung appliances is pretty hit or miss, that's a situation where the extended warranty is probably worthwhile, especially considering how expensive the "smart" appliances are. If you want "security in a box" that you don't have to screw with too much you could certainly look at Nest Secure + Nest Hello door bell, although it's not super cheap. There is a subsidized version with TMobile cell backhaul if you're already a TMobile customer. That would also let you roll in thermostat control, etc. into a single app. That does push you more towards the Google ecosystem, but you could certainly check off the rest of your boxes with lighting control, garage door, etc. There's a bunch of other appliance vendors on the "works with Nest" page that might also be worth looking at: https://workswith.nest.com/collection/appliances-we-love Maneki Neko fucked around with this message at 20:12 on Apr 20, 2018 |
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Apr 20, 2018 20:10
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Cornjob posted:I got three. For $20, product has the goods. I'm still wondering how they're making money, maybe the camera only costs pennies to make?! quote:but def get the micro sd card for continuous recording. Protip: upgrade the firmware as soon as you get it connected. Once you upgrade, power off, then power back on again; the camera remembers your network (if you set it up right) and connects automatically. Camera would not recognize the SD card until I did this. Decided to move over the 128 GB microSD I was using on my Switch to the camera; it recognizes all storage if you format as MBR / exFAT. quote:Sound quality is not great, but at least it has some. I could distinguish the ups truck driving up, but you can barely tell what people are saying when competing against other random outdoor noises. Yeah that probably has to do with its indoor rating, they probably don't have enough CPU speed / installed custom chipset on this thing to do any noise reduction or filtering. quote:Like Binary Badger, im cheap, and didnt want to spend $ on monthly cloud. Im very pleased so far. My worr is theyll go under or get gobbled up by a competitor who starts charging. Is it wrong to be cheap if you can get a good deal like this?  Maybe they're making money on enterprise setups?! Yeah, I hope they don't go under or it's $20 out the window, unless an ex-pat Wyze programmer jailbreaks the thing to become a direct connect client.. I'd get a V3 if it had 5 GHz WiFi.. A few other notes on it: It has to be constantly plugged into a USB wall wart, but it's semi-unobtrusive and about the size of Apple's included USB charger included with iPhones.. it has the same specs, 5V @ 1A, you could probably use Apple's in a pinch.. The included power cable is only 5 ft. long, but 16 and 25 ft. power cables are available on Amazon. My cats can tell when its night vision is active, somehow. It only automatically records 12-15 second videos every 5 minutes; once it records and sends an alert to your phone, I guess you're expected to launch your app and start manually recording onto the SD card, because the camera has a 'cool down' period inserted after each auto-sensed recording, which seems ridiculous to me, but I guess it's how they can afford to rent 14-day AWS cloud services for everyone who buys one.. Binary Badger fucked around with this message at 04:02 on Apr 21, 2018 |
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Apr 21, 2018 01:31
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They aren't making money. They are OEMing the hardware from Xiaomi and selling it under Xiaomi's price point. With custom firmware and AWS for the cloud they aren't. It looks like their plan is to target the low end camera space and differentiate themselves by having a marketing skill and some actual budget. Likely you'll see add-ons like additional storage along with slightly better cameras at a slightly higher price point with these cameras acting as a loss leader for a while. Generally their competition for price would be stuff like Foscam, Xiaomi, and EZ-Viz which is Hikvision's home brand on one hand. And Nest, Netgear, and Evercam who has Anker as a partner would be competing at higher price points but with better marketing experience. Xiaomi might have an agreement to keep them out of China which is a big market for them but that could change. Hikvision has the deep pockets to basically dump cameras into the market and crush them. Neither of those companies or Foscam have any clue about marketing. The three that compete with them on marketing are supported by companies with much deeper pockets and a base design that lets them do significant improvements to motion detection and analytics. Wyze is bettering the other companies can't move as quickly to squash them. And no, you won't see Wyze in the enterprise space beyond a few one offs here. It's architecture is more friendly to internet connections than Nest's is but it doesn't really offer the basic requirements you tend to see for even smaller business. Like vandal resistance. Having said that, I'm sure some dipshit MSP will throw a bunch of these up at some poor bastard's company.
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Apr 21, 2018 02:16
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Oh, and testing on cats seems to indicate that they can see some near-IR light sources. Generally security camera IR lights are 850 nm, but weirdly enough Xiaomi sometimes uses 940 nm.
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Apr 21, 2018 02:20
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Thanks for the industry insight, guess we'll see what happens. BTW, Wyze says right up front that their camera has four 850 nm infrared LEDs.
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Apr 21, 2018 03:59
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Moving into a newly built house in the next few months. First order of business is going to be automating all the lighting. I'm in the UK, which limits my options with regards to smart switches due to how our lighting is wired up (no 3rd wire behind the switches). I'm currently eyeing up LightwaveRF(https://lightwaverf.com/generation2) as this supports our wiring and lets us have "smart" switches and also physical switches. Does anyone have any experience with this system that they care to share?
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Apr 23, 2018 11:05
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Lutron Caseta also doesn't need a neutral wire. I'm using their dimmer switches everywhere and love em.
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Apr 24, 2018 04:48
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Anyone here got there air conditioning connected to one of the various smart home ecosystems? I have my Sonos and lights on Alexa and would like to explore the options for Aircon. This seems like a dumb question but I can't figure out if I'd need a different smart Aircon remote for each Aircon unit...?
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Apr 24, 2018 11:03
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Moey posted:Lutron Caseta also doesn't need a neutral wire. I'm using their dimmer switches everywhere and love em. I don't think they'll fit into a standard UK wall socket though, whereas the LightwaveRF ones look like they should just be a drop-in replacement.
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Apr 24, 2018 15:13
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Quizzlefish posted:Anyone here got there air conditioning connected to one of the various smart home ecosystems? I have my Sonos and lights on Alexa and would like to explore the options for Aircon. Yes, both nest and ecobee are extremely popular for smart home people. You need one for each thermostat you currently have.
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Apr 24, 2018 15:43
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Thermopyle posted:Yes, both nest and ecobee are extremely popular for smart home people. I'm assuming he's talking about window units or ductless, etc. that don't use a conventional thermostat, that correct Quizzlefish?
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Apr 24, 2018 16:42
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Slash posted:I don't think they'll fit into a standard UK wall socket though, whereas the LightwaveRF ones look like they should just be a drop-in replacement. Ahhhh, yes yes.
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Apr 24, 2018 16:50
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Maneki Neko posted:I'm assuming he's talking about window units or ductless, etc. that don't use a conventional thermostat, that correct Quizzlefish? Oh yes, that makes sense.
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Apr 24, 2018 17:13
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Quizzlefish posted:Anyone here got there air conditioning connected to one of the various smart home ecosystems? I have my Sonos and lights on Alexa and would like to explore the options for Aircon.
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Apr 24, 2018 18:48
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I'm new to air con as I've recently moved country (from the UK to Singapore). Each of my units is built in to the wall but they are each controlled separately with an IR remote control. I'm not sure of the jargon so not sure which bit of advice is relevant? I don't have a central thermostat but can set the temp for each device. There are also no visible plugs sockets or wires for the units so smart plugs are out. Sorry if it's unclear, can share a pic if it helps.
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Apr 25, 2018 12:17
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Quizzlefish posted:I'm new to air con as I've recently moved country (from the UK to Singapore). Each of my units is built in to the wall but they are each controlled separately with an IR remote control. I'm not sure of the jargon so not sure which bit of advice is relevant? These are called "split ductless" or "ductless mini-split" air conditioning units. I would also like to know if there's a way to control them through home automation. I doubt it, unless something like a Logitech Harmony Hub can use their IR codes.
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Apr 25, 2018 13:07
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You can get IR emitters for Raspberry Pi use, which might work.
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Apr 25, 2018 13:10
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I'm sure it's *possible* but you're going to have to get into programming IR sequences, which will take some doing. I think Harmony stuff can learn any IR sequences you fire at them, so theoretically, you could set the AC as an arbitrary device of some sort and have it learn those sequences with, say, volume up and down being temperature up and down.
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Apr 25, 2018 13:27
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https://www.ambiclimate.com/ This looks like maybe it would work? But would I need 4 of em? Kinda pricey
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Apr 25, 2018 14:19
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Erwin posted:These are called "split ductless" or "ductless mini-split" air conditioning units. I would also like to know if there's a way to control them through home automation. I doubt it, unless something like a Logitech Harmony Hub can use their IR codes. Depends on the unit and your location. The Samsungs that accept a wired controller can be adapted to drat near anything through optional adapters Samsung sells. If you just want a smart Nest/Ecobee/whatever thermostat, and you're in North America, there's a "Thermostat Adapter" for use with standard 24V thermostats. If you're more hardcore, there are a half-dozen other adapters for various commercial/high-end residential automation interfaces. Obviously you can't control fan swing or speed from your Nest/Ecobee, so it's the cleanest solution with a ducted cartridge (which doesn't support those controls anyway), but you can live that Smash TV two-controller life with a wall unit and still have all your features. fake-edit: Samsung's adapters are all made by a company called Cyclogic, which may offer adapters for other systems.
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Apr 25, 2018 17:13
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I would not be surprised at all if a harmony could control them and then you can automate the harmony via various nerdly ways Maybe not for you...
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Apr 25, 2018 17:30
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I'm looking at buying the Ring cameras. You get a 10% discount on devices if you have a Ring protect plan, but you can't sign up for the plan without having a device.
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Apr 25, 2018 18:53
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Endless Mike posted:I'm sure it's *possible* but you're going to have to get into programming IR sequences, which will take some doing. I think Harmony stuff can learn any IR sequences you fire at them, so theoretically, you could set the AC as an arbitrary device of some sort and have it learn those sequences with, say, volume up and down being temperature up and down. Rigging an IR receiver and transmitter to a Pi and controlling it all with LIRC is pretty easy: https://www.hackster.io/austin-stanton/creating-a-raspberry-pi-universal-remote-with-lirc-2fd581 That guide shows how to record IR codes and play them back based on CLI commands. Making your automation system of choice run arbitrary commands on a Raspberry Pi is an exercise left to the reader, but that's a pretty common thing to do in DIY automation so it should be well documented with any of the mainstream options. If you don't feel like soldering this seems to be basically the same hardware implemented as an assembled product https://www.tindie.com/products/irdroid/irdroid-rpi-infrared-transceiver-for-raspberry-pi/ Add either that or the DIY setup to a Pi 0W and you have a cheap networked arbitrary IR signal transceiver which can be placed basically anywhere you can find power.
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Apr 25, 2018 19:39
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FogHelmut posted:I'm looking at buying the Ring cameras. You get a 10% discount on devices if you have a Ring protect plan, but you can't sign up for the plan without having a device. I would look at SkyBell HD as well is you mostly just want a doorbell camera: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1345556-REG/honeywell_dbcam_trim_skybell_slim_video_doorbell.html They have that slim type for door trim at $200 a pop, and normal round doorbells for $170 They work just like Ring, but they don't charge any monthly fees. You get a rolling week of motion/doorbell footage and can check in live at any time. The entire doorbell is actually made in the USA (!) and they have stateside phone support. I've been using mine for 6 months now and it does what it says on the tin, you can toggle motion alerts and check out the video over your phone, or just talk to people when the doorbell rings. There were a few app bugs I had to iron out but I don't think the alternatives would have been a better value.
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Apr 25, 2018 19:47
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Zero VGS posted:I would look at SkyBell HD as well is you mostly just want a doorbell camera: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1345556-REG/honeywell_dbcam_trim_skybell_slim_video_doorbell.html I'm actually thinking about getting the Ring Spotlight cameras, as my door and doorbell are not located in such a way that would provide adequate camera coverage. My front door is on the side of my house, and the doorbell is on the side of that. Without redoing everything, its not a great position, and even if I did move it, the door is in a little cove kinda thing so you'd only see who was directly in front of the door. Also I have a fence and a gate, deliveries rarely make it to my front door and are often left on either side of the gate.  And there have been a lot of car break ins in town lately, and I'd like to cover my cars. I was going with ring because they seem to work pretty well, and I'd be using one of their Protect Plans. I kinda just want a plug and play setup, I'm not really interested in fishing wires or running a camera DVR/server. FogHelmut fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Apr 25, 2018 |
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Apr 25, 2018 20:26
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FogHelmut posted:I'm actually thinking about getting the Ring Spotlight cameras, as my door and doorbell are not located in such a way that would provide adequate camera coverage. My front door is on the side of my house, and the doorbell is on the side of that. Without redoing everything, its not a great position, and even if I did move it, the door is in a little cove kinda thing so you'd only see who was directly in front of the door. Also I have a fence and a gate, deliveries rarely make it to my front door and are often left on either side of the gate. That makes more sense in your use-case... might want to look at Nest as well. I think the monthly rates are about the same, but if I recall correctly, Nest will record every second 24/7 where Ring still only does motion-trip/doorbell-press recordings. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.
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Apr 25, 2018 20:34
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Zero VGS posted:That makes more sense in your use-case... might want to look at Nest as well. I think the monthly rates are about the same, but if I recall correctly, Nest will record every second 24/7 where Ring still only does motion-trip/doorbell-press recordings. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. I believe the Nest Aware is priced per camera. Where with Ring you can have infinite cameras for $100 per year.
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Apr 25, 2018 20:44
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