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cr0y posted:Is HomeAssistant still the go-to if I want to roll my own smart home solution? And in the same vein are there any companies that are sort of like a One-Stop shop for different HA friendly devices? I'm really having trouble sorting through what is a decent device and what is just an endlessly rebadged gizmo from China. I still have a fairly small and simple setup, but Aqara seems to be pretty decent. Their mini switches have been no hassle compared to others I've used and the door and motion sensors I have have been perfect. E: Home Assistant running on a Raspberry Pi with a Sonoff USB zigbee dongle.
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Jul 29, 2022 02:30
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I've seen a few endorsements of Ring: is that the recommended option for a basic security system? Our new construction house was pre-wired with a pretty dated looking Honeywell Home system. It includes a control board in the basement, one control panel upstairs and one downstairs.... 4 wired motion sensors, and what I assume is an alarm siren. Pictures here: https://imgur.com/a/9sGcQNR I could get it hooked up using a service like ADT, but I assume that is going to be overpriced and mediocre? Am I better off getting Ring equipment installed and tossing the wired stuff? I don't have super specific requirements, but would prefer to be able to control and monitor the system via an app and I like that Ring let's you pick and choose components.
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Aug 1, 2022 17:21
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caluki posted:I've seen a few endorsements of Ring: is that the recommended option for a basic security system? Our new construction house was pre-wired with a pretty dated looking Honeywell Home system. It includes a control board in the basement, one control panel upstairs and one downstairs.... 4 wired motion sensors, and what I assume is an alarm siren. Pictures here: https://imgur.com/a/9sGcQNR ADT will replace your old equipment with theirs. They have a monitoring fee. Ring and Nest and all of the other cloud services are capable, but you pay a monthly fee and Ring will give all of your footage to the cops if the cops ask for it. You can opt out but they still give it to them. I don't really have a recommendation since the 1980s system is in the house here and unused (and broken) so I roll my own cameras but there's nothing for intruder detection at the moment.
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Aug 1, 2022 20:01
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caluki posted:I've seen a few endorsements of Ring: is that the recommended option for a basic security system? Our new construction house was pre-wired with a pretty dated looking Honeywell Home system. It includes a control board in the basement, one control panel upstairs and one downstairs.... 4 wired motion sensors, and what I assume is an alarm siren. Pictures here: https://imgur.com/a/9sGcQNR That’s a Honeywell (Resideo, now) Vista 20p. It is basically the best system you could hope for. If you don’t want to pay ADT prices, shop alarm.com for a cheaper provider. If you don’t want to pay at all, I highly recommend Envisalink. It’s a 4 wire install and will send you free push messages any time your home alarm status changes. You can control the alarm remotely and also can pay Envisalink for the same type of monitoring as ADT or the vendors on alarm.com can provide.
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Aug 1, 2022 20:33
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bobfather posted:That’s a Honeywell (Resideo, now) Vista 20p. It is basically the best system you could hope for. Interesting -- I had assumed it was fairly obsolete, but if it's a decent system then i'll probably keep it. Are incredibly long contracts the industry standard, or is that just ADT? I'm inclined to try out an alarm.com provider if I can find one that's reasonably priced, but if it's going to require a multi-year contract then Envisalink is tempting.
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Aug 2, 2022 03:02
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Pretty sure alarms systems are incredibly standardized unless you have an obviously proprietary system. Like, everyone in my father's community is plugged into a centralized dispatch for their neighborhood, you don't have ADT, you link your system to the private security, you just do, there is absolutely no reason not to. Even our home system, which is an incredibly basic DSC something or another, we were vacating the house for a week for floor refinishing and decided to upgrade to a LTE remote control system. We aren't under contract, they just came over, bolted a new cell receiver into the system in like 30 minutes and told us we can now program new PINS into our 10 year old panel over LTE.
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Aug 2, 2022 05:15
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caluki posted:I've seen a few endorsements of Ring: is that the recommended option for a basic security system? Our new construction house was pre-wired with a pretty dated looking Honeywell Home system. It includes a control board in the basement, one control panel upstairs and one downstairs.... 4 wired motion sensors, and what I assume is an alarm siren. Pictures here: https://imgur.com/a/9sGcQNR you can reuse the sensors, there is a board where you can wire the old sensors to and do self monitoring. i think you could do a 3rd party service thats like 4 bucks a month but i cant remember all the details. should be easily findable on reddit. caluki posted:Interesting -- I had assumed it was fairly obsolete, but if it's a decent system then i'll probably keep it. Are incredibly long contracts the industry standard, or is that just ADT? I'm inclined to try out an alarm.com provider if I can find one that's reasonably priced, but if it's going to require a multi-year contract then Envisalink is tempting. Its not all services, i have ring alarm, i got grandfathered in on an old plan for about 5 years i think, 100/year with at&t wireless back up. now it is 200/year which might be cheaper than adt but i am not locked into a contract. their ring's stuff is all zwave, and i use ring-mqtt to integrate it to home assistant. I travel a lot so if i see some fuckery happening on the cameras i can trigger the alarm manually or let the sensors do the work and the popo will show up promptly 4 hours later. RoboBoogie fucked around with this message at 16:23 on Aug 2, 2022 |
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Aug 2, 2022 16:19
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Anyone have any tips on how to select a camera? As in, how do I figure out what sort of camera to put where? Basically, how do I choose between a bullet style and a dome style? In particular, the couple spots I'm looking at are corners under soffits, so I'm assuming that's dome camera territory? They're relatively close to the ground (8-12 ft), and are going to be looking down-ish rather than trying to capture long distances.
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Aug 2, 2022 22:11
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In general a dome camera will have optics designed for a wider view of the area immediately around the camera where a bullet will have a narrower focus. Technically it's just a physical shape though, so you can't necessarily assume anything and should always look at the specs. Figure out what sort of field of view you want each camera to cover and work from there.
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Aug 2, 2022 22:55
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DaveSauce posted:Anyone have any tips on how to select a camera? As in, how do I figure out what sort of camera to put where? ipcamtalk has a ton of good info on their website/forum about camera placement, types of cameras, lens and sensor sizes, etc.
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Aug 2, 2022 23:03
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Anyone know of a Zigbee tilt sensor (garage door)? There seems to be one that's out of stock for god knows how long. I could go ZWavePlus, but I don't really have anything in that area of the house with zwave, and I fear I'd have to get other things in the mesh for it to reach.
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Aug 5, 2022 16:20
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Gerdalti posted:Anyone know of a Zigbee tilt sensor (garage door)? There seems to be one that's out of stock for god knows how long. I don't know how much you enjoy tinkering but I can imagine using a normal door or window open/close sensor and attaching it to the frame of the garage door rails, with the other side of that piece mounted near the bottom of the garage door such that they meet when it is fully closed. If you're more technical I can imagine a very simple arduino solution with a position sensor but you'd have to run power to it.
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Aug 5, 2022 17:03
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VelociBacon posted:I don't know how much you enjoy tinkering but I can imagine using a normal door or window open/close sensor and attaching it to the frame of the garage door rails, with the other side of that piece mounted near the bottom of the garage door such that they meet when it is fully closed. This is what Linus did at his new house recently https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooEfsWZo4-g
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Aug 5, 2022 17:19
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I literally just put an Abode door/window sensor on a hinge:  Only downside is it goes through my security system, which is annoying because it yells at me if I try to arm the system and the door isn't closed. It's not set to trigger the alarm, however the system gripes at you if ANY door is open while arming, so you have to confirm it. One issue I ran in to is that the magnet is kinda strong and doesn't like to release (sticks to the metal frame), so I added a nut to give it more mass and it works fine. The screw in general is helpful to adjust the make/break position (ideally you want it to break ASAP, so when it's closed you want to adjust it as far as you can while still making the switch... IIRC there's washers on the back side [edit: I checked, no washers, just the screw head pushing it off]). If you need more weight, just get a longer screw. The concept should work for any wireless door/window sensor of your choice. edit: VelociBacon posted:I don't know how much you enjoy tinkering but I can imagine using a normal door or window open/close sensor and attaching it to the frame of the garage door rails, with the other side of that piece mounted near the bottom of the garage door such that they meet when it is fully closed. This is ultimately a better solution, but more involved since there isn't usually a ready made place to put the stationary side. Probably can't stick it to the rails very well (mine are curved), so you'd need a bracket of somesort. On the ground would be ideal, but then you'd want something weatherproof, and then there's the risk of running over it or damaging it with tools and whatnot. Industrial doors do this, but they have purpose-built sensors that are weatherproof, low profile, and built like a tank with a shape that you can easily roll over. DaveSauce fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Aug 5, 2022 |
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Aug 5, 2022 17:43
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Trying to replace a physical 3-way switch (that controls a Hue bulb, so I need it always-on) with a Hue dimmer remote. IIRC from replacing 3/4-ways with Lutron Caseta Picos, I just wire nut line/load/traveler all together, right?
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Aug 5, 2022 21:17
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Good ideas on standard door sensors, that's probably what I'll do.
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Aug 6, 2022 16:54
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Any goons have experience with engraving or etching lutron/decora face plates at all?
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Aug 7, 2022 22:31
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We live in and older house with no neutral, Lutron Caseta has worked wonderfully, all our lights have Caseta dimmers BUT the rooms with ceiling fans. It was very important to me that our house more or less operated just as well as a non-"smarthome" as one so I used Sonoff fan controllers in the three rooms with ceiling fans. It worked, well enough, we had both manual and automated fan and light control but the protective cover over the light switch and controlling the light with the fan controller always felt like a cludge. Also I really wanted dimming, as I said, literally every other light in our house dims and it is a function that we love and use often. And I mean every light, our shower light has a Caseta dimmer that we use often. Went ahead and sprung for 9 Hue Bulbs and 4 Lutron Auroras and am so pleased. Setup was a little tricky, maybe I need to go back into the app, but it seems like Hue won't let you group bulbs and a single device, there is no reason I would want to independently dim lights in a fan and the instructions to pair the Auroras seems to be wrong, I ended up just loving with it until it went into pairing mode. That said, it works wonderfully, exactly what we wanted, normal enough light dimmer that functions exactly as expected. Three Olives fucked around with this message at 00:00 on Aug 22, 2022 |
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Aug 21, 2022 22:23
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Did you consider Hue dimmers? I use them for our kitchen, which has Hue BR30s and a couple downlights. Just wired the line and load together behind the plate.
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Aug 22, 2022 18:17
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Fans is a combo light/fan, so just line and load to the fans and switches on the fan to control the light and the fan. Fan controller controlled both with the switch locked, but I wanted dimmer control too, fan controller did not have any dimming function.
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Aug 22, 2022 23:52
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Not sure if this is the best thread to ask in but I’m stumped and can’t find where else to ask. I installed a wired Google Nest doorbell and it periodically makes a ding dong noise when it’s not being pressed and I can’t figure out why. Can’t find anything in the settings to silence noises from the doorbell itself either. The notes it plays are an F sharp and A flat in succession. I would probably guess it’s due to movement but I can’t find any way to confirm elsewhere. Any ideas? e: hell with it, I just disabled the camera while I’m home. Louisgod fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Aug 25, 2022 |
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Aug 24, 2022 22:25
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Gyshall posted:Any goons have experience with engraving or etching lutron/decora face plates at all? I'm familiar. What's your question?
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Aug 24, 2022 22:33
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I have HomeAssitant and the HomeKit integration is going strong... one way. I can list Z-wave and Zigbee devices from HA in HomeKit and control via Siri. But I can't seem to get HomeKit native devices to show up in HA... am I missing something? I have a Schlage lock and Garage door opener that are attached HomeKit and I'd really like HA-native controls and automations. So far I've tried to re-set the integration, futz with the inclusion/exclusion mode and categories (I have the Cover and Lock categories selected, which according to the docs should cover these). Any ideas?
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Aug 30, 2022 02:14
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You need to set up the HomeKit controller in HA and have the HomeKit native devices associated to that. The baseline HomeKit integration presents HA as a HomeKit bridge; then your native devices, paired to the controller, will be shared back to Siri/Home via the HomeKit integration. https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/homekit_controller/
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Aug 30, 2022 03:45
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Thank you! That worked for my garage door. I’m going to mess with the lock tomorrow.
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Aug 30, 2022 04:17
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I'm looking to setup a LED Matrix Display outside my office door. I have a WS2812B matrix that's 11x44 leds. I have a bunch of ESP8266's. While wled would be my primary led strip driver, it can't do words (at least I don't think it can). My goal is to have this display things like "In a meeting" or "busy" or "Out of Office". I'm going to use an Aqara Cube as the driver (it'll sit on my desk and I can flip it to the side to trigger the display). What I'm struggling with as a non-programmer, is a way to display text on the LED Matrix. Are there any popular projects out there that could do that and work through Home Assistant?
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Sep 3, 2022 15:39
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I installed a Leviton Scene Controller and the non-power buttons appear in HomeKit as single events with no state or toggle aspect. Is there a way to have one button turn a light on if it's off and off if it's on using just HomeKit, shortcuts, and automation, or would I need a third party tool for that?
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Sep 4, 2022 21:57
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Hey thread. I live in an apartment with my wife and dog. We're thinking about trying to set up a simple security system that'll alert us if one of the outside doors opens and maybe include video features for identification purposes. The apartment is set up so the main entrance/exit is in the living room. Also in the living room is a sliding door that opens to a 2nd story balcony. While it's difficult to climb up to, it wouldn't be impossible, so we'd like to have a sensor on that door as well. We lock that door in the winter, but we tend to leave it cracked open in the summer. I figure it'd be best if the camera was motion sensitive, just to capture video if someone's walking through the place, but I'd like to gate it behind the door sensors going off, or else we'll get constant clips of our dog walking around the place. I'd like to skip any monthly fees, or pay-for-service type stuff if possible, but it would be nice to be able to get at least an alert text, and maybe a video feed, if possible, if the sensors go off. I have literally no idea how much this stuff should cost or what sort of quality I should be expecting or looking for. Educate me on this, please and thanks.
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Sep 10, 2022 18:46
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https://simplisafe.com/
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Sep 10, 2022 18:54
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I should've mentioned, while the wife doesn't give a single care about it, I'm one of those people that's not really comfortable with the whole "Internet Of Things", "Smart Everything", having stuff dial into unknown servers to deliver whatever data it can to who knows whom, who knows where, sorta people. Like, yeah, I get it, if I want a text when someone breaks in, then there's likely a company collecting data on whatever they're allowed to get their hands on, but are there any more... I guess homebrew solutions that don't involve an outside company monitoring everything that's said and done within the place?
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Sep 10, 2022 20:07
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That's some rather important information. I and many others here roll our own with: https://www.home-assistant.io/ and https://blueirissoftware.com/ No, there is no recipe. Back up several 10s of pages in the thread and start reading. Start experimenting with this stuff. If you don't like this as a hobby you need to choose: get over your IoT/cloud issue (I suggest you do NOT choose this path) or drop the entire idea.
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Sep 10, 2022 20:51
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Motronic posted:That's some rather important information. Yeah, that's my bad, thank you for understanding. Got any idea of roughly how many 10s of pages back I should go? 20? 40? ...80? As for aptitude, I'm an industrial mechanic who's dabbled in both building and coding for Arduino, has specced, bought, and built multiple computers, and does not have any qualms about working with hand and power tools to do whatever needs to be done. Any advice on setups or specific components that I should look for would be appreciated, as well as anything else I might've missed. I'll check out those two links after I have dinner.
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Sep 10, 2022 22:20
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neogeo0823 posted:Yeah, that's my bad, thank you for understanding. Poke around on this guy's channel, he does some good intro videos that'll get you started: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheHookUp. I hate the cloudy internet of things as well, but for apartment ingress/egress stuff (I have a camera pointed at the entry door to watch for apartment people that may come in without us being there) it's kinda nice to not need to find a place for a server.
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Sep 12, 2022 16:05
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Does anyone have a recommendation for a sprinkler controller that integrates with Home Assistant? I have a standard Hunter unit with 9 irrigation zones:  Although I realize I have no idea what the red/white/blue part that goes to the upper right inside is.
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Sep 13, 2022 03:23
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Hed posted:Does anyone have a recommendation for a sprinkler controller that integrates with Home Assistant? The red white blue is 24V power, it looks like.
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Sep 13, 2022 13:48
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Second time I've had a power and/or internet outage since setting up a couple of Ring devices, and these things are not liking reconnecting to the wifi when it comes back up. The floodlight is doing the same as last time where I can start the process then it fails to join the wifi (that it still has saved) and I'll probably have to long hold the button to factory reset like last time, and it wants me to hit the button on the back of the doorbell..which is now mounted with the security screw. And cutting power to mount that is what broke the floodlight connection last time. So instead of  fixing it all I'm just gonna complain here. (Single 2.4ghz wifi network that bunch of other devices are using fine and pretty darn close from TP-Link AX50 router to both devices that has shown great connectivity once they're on there, 5ghz antenna/network is disabled.) Ugh.
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Sep 13, 2022 19:13
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That’s weird, I’ve never had any connection issues with my 5 ring cams. My router upgrades firmware every 4-6 weeks too.
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Sep 13, 2022 19:28
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I would like to buy a lightbulb I can control with my phone and set schedules for. It needs to be dimmable and it would be cool if it does different colors. I don't have any automation setup in my house and I don't have any desire to get started with that. Afaict if I buy a Philips Hue bulb then by itself I can control it with bluetooth and the ability to program schedules is somewhat limited. Is that correct? If I want more control I have to buy and set up some Hue Bridge thing? Or it looks like if I buy a Tplink Tapo bulb it should connect to wifi and do what I want without anything extra. And they are waaaay cheaper. Can some one point me in the right direction? Thank you.
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Sep 15, 2022 09:50
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Philips does have new bulbs that can do both Bluetooth and Zigbee, but their older Hue bulbs are Zigbee only, so be careful which ones you get. You would either need the Hue Bridge, or some other Zigbee hub to talk to those. The problem with only controlling it with your phone is that the schedules would only work when your phone is nearby, so that's probably not what you want. Tamba fucked around with this message at 10:27 on Sep 15, 2022 |
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Sep 15, 2022 10:24
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I don't necessarily love LIFX lights but they run pretty independently of a hub so that's an option at least. With no network of course you do need to be within range to actively control them (well, if IFTT and the lights are both behaving correctly sometimes you can use that for out of house control) but they'll run a schedule and such on their own. Also they are Apple Home compatible so if you ever feel like going that direction with an Apple TV as a hub in the future that is open to you. If anything the big problem I have with them is they are too independent. They just are not very responsive to direct control and sometimes they completely ignore control or lose connection to wifi and the only solution is to either wait until they feel like responding again or to reset them which is a very long process. Well also they're expensive; at least Hue goes on sale sometimes (and if you just want regular white lights Hue can be pretty affordable), LIFX is always full price.
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Sep 15, 2022 11:32
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