Presence detection Sensor - which one can you recommend

Hardware
1

Hi guys,

Images currently happy with my KNX Installation but recognise now: I forgot to place some presence detection sensor (Not motion sensors as these are not sensitive)

Now I think to use another wireless standard like Z-Wave or Homematic (totally open on this) to solve this :slight_smile:

Any recommendations from you would help. It should be as small as possible and battery powered.

Thanks a lot,

Flo

2

What is a presence detection sensor and how does it differ from a motion sensor?
What do you mean with “… motion sensors are not sensitive”?

3

A Presence detection sensor is recognising the tiniest movements. E.g. when you’re typing on a keyboard. A Motionsensor will not “see” this movements but the presence sensor does.

Or you’re laying on your couch. A motionsensor recognises your movement only when you move. A presence sensor recognises the movement of your stomach when you breath.

4

I read that article, thanks for the information. I still don’t get the difference,for me it sounds like a presence detector is just a ultra sensitive motion detector.

I checked out the presence sensors from the article they work with infrared like most of the motion sensors and they are way too expensive, 70 euro (piccola) or 240 Euros (auro) for one sensor!!!

What would be your use case for this? Do you have currently any situations, in which the light turns off when it should not? I feel like lots of situations where this would be needed, could be solved differently.

5

The reason for the pricing is because these are KNX Sensors which are usually a little more expensive.

My usecases for these could be:

  • the light on my desk is switching off when I’m not in the room.
  • the Display of my wallswitches are only turn on when I’m on the room
  • notification that the windows are open when nobody’s is in the room anylonger

So there are plenty of use cases which are needing a high sensitive motion sensor.

6

Ah okay, I understand the high pricing.

Have you ever seen such a sensor live? It’s hard for me to believe, that a motion sensor would be able to detect when I type something on my keyboard or my belly moving when I’m breathing. For this to work the sensor would need to be put in a very specific place and angle due to the way the infrared motion detection works. But I’d be happy to be proved otherwise.

For your scenarios room detection via BLE could be an option. The BLE tags send a signal every second, some even more frequent. I currently have a Raspberry Pi Zero W in each room, which detect the signal of the BLE tags and the strength of the signal. The software room assistant on the Pis will then determine in which room the tag is, based on the signal strength. You can cut a hole in your slippers and put the BLE tags in there or find some other way to have it always on you.

7

This Idea is brilliant! As we’re an Apple household I could work with iBeacons :slight_smile:

Just need to figure out if these are working with HA :slight_smile: