Let me start off saying I’m here more because I’m lost than because I know what I’m looking for. I’m hoping I can get some answers from people who are using home assistant with limitlessLEDs. Literally my goal is to just do a cheaper version of the Hue system (sunrise scene in the morning, dimming with movies, visualizations with music, etc). I would just go with Hue but the prices for bulbs to expand the system are just crazy. So I see limitlessLEDs are quite cheap, I could get a Pi if need be, and I’m still at a fairly low cost.
I’m kind of confused though by how Home Assistant works, and what it would take to do the things I want. I’m not a programmer, at all. I imagine the schedules wouldn’t be too hard, although I saw another thread on here where they couldn’t get lights to switch to white. For my sunrise for example I’d want it to increase brightness from 5:30am to 6am every morning, while also transitioning from red-orange-yellow-white. I know general schedules are possible but I’m unsure if it can do the above.
Then if it can do that, are there easy ways to do the whole music visualization sync, and other useful things like dimming lights during shows/movies? Basically is there code written for that stuff, or would it be quite complicated for a non-programmer? For info I use a roku 3 and generally use Plex, Netflix, etc.
I apologize if this is a very basic question. I’m totally new to all this and am struggling for where to go for info…limitlessLED direct, RPi boards, Home Assistant. Basically I don’t know which of these pieces really determines what I can accomplish. It appears to me it’s all in the hands of Home Assistant as the LED’s have the capability to do what they’re told and the Pi is just a server.
Insight would be greatly appreciated. If there’s a better cheap alternative, or if the answer is that I simply need to buy Hue to accomplish what I want, that’s ok as well. My understanding is I could use both Hue and LimitlessLED for example through Home Assistant if I ever decided to expand.
Thanks so much! So I’ve tried reading through the examples, the various pages on the site, and some youtube videos as well. Can you explain what it means that it’s not programming? All the examples I saw, to me, looked like standard text coding. Or is it that the code is basically already written and you just need to fill in your own variables, or something like that?
Basically that ties in to my question of… ok, so I physically can dim during shows and movies. But is that standard code I can find here or through the app, or will it take a fair bit of knowledge on my end? My setup is a standard non-smart receiver, standard TV, and a Roku 3. Is it capable with that setup? Does it tie into the software? I watched a YouTube video and I believe he had it somehow set to dim the lights when the physical show started.
As far as sync colors to music. Is that a limit of the app, or bulbs? For example I know there are a few different apps that allow this with Hue and LIFX. I think I’ve understood some work through using the phone’s mic, while others feed the music through it’s own app and pull the info that way. Is that simply out of the scope of Home Assistant or is it an issue with the limitlessLEDs?
Thanks again… these answers really help to start getting a grasp on what direction I need to go.
A configuration file is different from code. They might look alike superficially though. But yes, if you want to use Home Assistant, you can expect to type a lot of lines into a text file. The documentation provides the format for each thing you might want to configure, and examples of what is possible.
You can use Home Assistant to produce automations (see the Getting Started page) like the one you’re talking about (IF the media player is playing, THEN dim the light). For your situation, you’ll need to detect if the Roku is playing - and Home Assistant can’t do that yet. The good news is that capability is currently in development, so it will soon. In the video you watched, a different media player was used, which is currently supported.
For color sync to music: The bulbs could be programmed to do this, but it is fairly out-of-scope for Home Assistant.
I get what you mean. In regards to the Roku comment (good news that it’s in the works!)… I see Plex is supported. But not through Roku? Could I do the above if the media was started from my Plex on desktop? What about using Chromecast? I have that as well (just never use it anymore).
I have actually just purchased the Hue starter pack after much back and forth (thanks in part to your answers). I figure this way it’ll be easier for me to familiarize myself with the lights and see how I really like them before going all out with Pi, etc. And I can still learn Home Assistant with them. Then I think at that point once I learn to use the program, integrating a Pi and the limitlessLED’s will be a simple addition. A question… is there any reason that it would cause confusion or issues when controlling the lights from two separate sources? For example if I set up schedules or whatever through Home Assistant, but then also used one of the available 3rd party apps for music sync. Will that break my connections, or is that all good?