Any experiences with the Apollo Automation R-PRO-1 PoE motion and presence sensor

Hardware
1

Thinking of getting a bunch of these new PoE presence and motion sensors from Apollo Automation.

I know that are now partnered with Home Assistant, but the product is new, and it’s not cheap. My goal is to get a PoE switch and to run these over ethernet to try to reduce the number of battery-operated motion sensors. Also, these things look great in the ceiling, and I have access to just about every room.

But it’s a big expense. Hoping to get some feedback as to how easily they installed, configured, detect, post-purchase service etc.

Thanks so much.

2

Hey neighbor… I can’t speak to the R PRO-1 but I do have a few of the MTR-1 units which also use the LD2450 sensors and they are great. Set up is easy and HA picked them up immediately.

A word of caution for the ceiling mount option though is that they have a sensor angle of 60o. So if you have 8 foot ceilings the footprint on the floor is approx. 9ish feet (check my math), the edge of which will only catch your feet. These are best set up in a corner where they can capture the whole room.

3

I have one R-PRO-1, but it’s not the PoE version. For reference, I also have some Apollo MSR-1s and MSR-2s.

I found the LD2450 in the R-PRO-1 to be unsuitable for presence detection. Presence often stayed detected even after everyone had left the room.

I added the LD2412 and found that to be quite good for presence detection. I like it better than the LD2410 in the MSRs because it has more distance gates with less distance between them, making it easier to tune for my environment. My room is fairly small with a ceiling fan in the center, so it is a challenge to get sensors tuned correctly to ignore the fan but still trigger on presence.

As for Apollo, I haven’t had to interact with them much, but they have quite an active Discord server and it seems employees are on there answering questions. I do love that all their firmware is in GitHub, so I can fork and tweak it as I want.

4

Thanks for your answers. I’m a bit leery about the angle and coverage with these sensors on a ceiling. But I do like their PoE ceiling mount.

5

I’ve had them for about a week now. I have some initial comments. I should mention I use ceiling mount on the R Pro-1 and power and data over ethernet. I bought it because of the ethernet so I could wire cleanly through my ceilings.

In terms of support, it’s basically “read the documentation” or “here’s a picture”. They assume you haven’t read it and don’t seem interested in taking you seriously. Not impressed.

In terms of product design and build quality, I think it’s pretty good if you are relying on wifi. Not so good on ethernet if you have a ceiling mount. Their proprietary module sits un-aided in the plastic ceiling mount, sitting on the bottom only held in by the plastic cover which it sits on and that holds pretty securely at the bottom of the mount. But with ethernet, it’s almost impossible to get the module to sit straight. The weight of the cable, even if it’s directly above, twists and rotates the module sideways. Part of the problem is that you have to really manhandle the think to get it in the hole due to the two springs and tight fit. So even if you have the ethernet cable perfectly dangling right over the jack, it’s very very hard to get the module level. And you can’t really check the orientation because if you take the bottom cover out, nothing supports the module and it falls through, supported by the cable.

I also had big big trouble using the HLK Radar tool which is their preferred method for setting up your 2450 zones. I’m using the latest version of the HLK tool, I have a modern android phone, my bluetooth never has a problem. I’ve got bluetooth turned on the 2450 chip, And while it finds it during the scan, it is so laggy and slow and even closes up at times that it’s impossible to work with, even for one zone which was my use case. Maybe their bluetooth antenna is terrible. I don’t know.

Screenshot_2026-03-24-12-02-58-922_com.hlk.hlkradartool
Screenshot_2026-03-24-12-02-58-922_com.hlk.hlkradartool1220×2712 132 KB

So some pluses and some minuses. I would not recommend it for ethernet configured ceiling mounted installations.

6

I just got a few of these and I'm really struggling to calibrate them too. That app has so much potential, but its unstable connection drives me crazy!

7

I've got 7 of the R Pro 1's integrated into Home Assistant. They all are ceiling mounted with the ceiling mount kit. I have the 2412 as well as the 2450. They are all connected via ethernet for both power and data.

First, I will say I really like them. Hats off to Apollo for finally addressing the cable issue for those of us who have open ceilings, pot lights, ways to access everywhere. The ceiling mounts are fantastic. flush, almost invisible.

Delivery to Canada has been great as they have a depot in Toronto which is where I'm located.

Here's my problem. Not really a problem, more of a use case warning to others who want to ceiling mount. My ceiling mount works great, but I don't need individual (more than 1) target recognition, I don't need to tell if a target is moving towards or away, I don't need multiple zones in a room.

If you do, the ceiling mount 2450 is not idea. It's almost a waste of money. Trying to have zones being accurately set when the chip is really for wall/table mount is very difficult. I do set up a single detect zone for the 2450, but it's really just a backup for the 2412.

The rooms I'm covering are generally small. Landing on a staircase, top and bottom. Bathroom. Shower. Enclosed toilet. The 2412 is a rock-solid chip that is good at movement detection and still detection. The 2450 helps in the 2 larger rooms I have, and having 8 foot ceilings helps. But for small spaces, you will want to rely on the 2412 in the UI settings.

The 2450 has another well-known problem. It drops out. It misses still targets. And for me that was causing me to have issues where lights would drop out because the 2450 said clear but the 2412 still showed a target. It's also very hard to calibrate, dots on the custom card jump around, don't move smoothly as you walk. I can't believe people actually use it reliably.

So be aware of its limitations. At some point HLK or someone will come up with a better chip, or maybe something designed more for a ceiling mount. I'm wondering, and if anyone from Apollo monitors here, what would happen if I took out the 2450 in a few of them and just left in the 2412. Why would I do that? Power consumption.

Justin was responsive in listening to me about the fitting of the board mount into the ceiling mount and they made a small change to the manufacturing.

In terms of support, I'm not really happy. I don't like Discord. It's made for Geeks. And the person who moderates the Discord has pretty much ghosted me because I need more hand-holding at the start than just "check the documentation."

But overall, if you can live with the limitations for room size for ceiling mount, these are a great product.