Should I get a deconz zigbee dongle?

I HATE the current landscape of (lack of good) Zigbee interoperability :frowning:

I currently have a HA setup that contains (among other devices) the following Zigbee based items:

  • Xiaomi sensors (temp, movement, door/window, and buttons) with xiaomi hub
  • Hue lights with philips bridge
  • Soon to include ikea bulbs and dimmers (love those rotary dimmers!) but not with tradfri hub
    ** I tried to add an Ikea tradfri bulb to my Hue bridge but it seems to be an old version and will not pair.
    ** I have paired a tradfri rotary dimmer with the hue bridge and also with some of my bulbs - works great but not visible to HA - its a peer to peer pairing between the dimmer and bulbs.

I am seriously considering to replace the hubs with one deconz usb dongle.

  • one point of control
  • no IOT devices (hubs) talking to the cloud (although I can and do block these)
  • less power etc

My big question is ā€” is it worth the cost of the device (not huge) and the effort to re-do my HA configuration?
Everything is working pretty well (except above caveats) and ā€œif it ainā€™t brokeā€ā€¦
Are there any benefits to deconz that I didnt see? (maybe it adds additional features to sensors I already have?)

I canā€™t answer your question fully as I am still figuring this stuff out myself.

Deconz advantages:

  • Xiaomi sensors can be made more reliable as a mesh network can be created between your lights and sensors. Maybe this is possible with the existing Xiaomi gateway and Hue hub if you put them on the same channel?
  • I really like where the software is heading and their vision. I am sure I will want some weirder Zigbee devices working so I would have had to purchase a hub anyway.
  • Reduced attack surface as you arenā€™t using multiple hubs. Hopefully Deconz will be kept updated by the manufacturerā€¦
  • What exactly is the Xiaomi hub doing? No one knows unless you are sitting watching the traffic all the time. Personally it wasnā€™t a huge deal but did push me towards Deconz.
  • My Xiaomi device had random problems in HA and I had no errorā€™s to debug. I gave up on fixing them in the end.
  • Deconz devs are really responsive.
  • Less hubs are always good. You have a single point of failure. Less finger crossing when updating HA.

Deconz disadvantages:

  • Deconz is basically two parts. The rest API and Phoscon. Phoscon is awesome. Its similar to the MiHome app as it allows you to add sensors quickly and easily. You then have these sensors added in the web UI and they are automatically imported into HA once you establish the connection. This isnā€™t without a catchā€¦ Deconz only supports a limited number of sensors via Phoscon, other Zigbee devices must be added via the REST API. The devs have mentioned they are developing a generic sensor for phoscon. This would be a game changer as you could easily create a new sensor for a device even if its not supported by Phoscon (ETA unknown). Via Phoscon I have connected the Aqara door/window sensor and Aqara temp sensors. I havenā€™t found a list of Phoscon supported sensors but its easy enough to find them via the web UI. You should check if your devices are supported officially.
  • Bye bye third party apps. I hope you are ready to replicate the functionality you have in HA. I do miss some of the Hue apps on Androidā€¦
  • A docker image isnā€™t officially provided by the devs. Joch is doing awesome work with his build but it does involve some work aroundā€™s.
  • The pairing process sucks! You need to be at very close range with the Deconz device (conbee / rasbee). If you have a stationary server have fun dragging lamps / extension cords around your house like I did.
  • Not fully open sourceā€¦ limits development unfortunately.

Overall I am happy with it but my previous setup had issues. I also like to do things perfectly despite the unnecessary effort :rofl:

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Thanks for this input! Really appreciate you took the time for that amount of detail.
I have been watching the ā€œconverged zigbeeā€ space for quite some time given the frustrations in the multi-hub environment.
For me deconz looks to be the leader (against ZiGate, ZHA native support etc - no negatives to those projects!) but I think that I will continue to sit on the fence for a while longerā€¦

No problem mate happy to help. Yea this Zigbee stuff is all very new. It will be interesting to see where it goes.

You can save the money for more sensors!

I can only recommend one deconz docker, and that is @marthocoo https://github.com/marthoc/docker-deconz

He has taken the best pieces of different previous deconz dockers and built a great complete container.

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I disagree with need to be very close to the antenna for pairing. In my experience so far this is only true for Ikeas wireless dimmer. I never moved a single light from their place in my house when migrating from Hue bridge to deconz and it worked great.

It could be that the placement of your antenna is not in an advantageous position. I needed to get an USB extension cord to get my conbee away from my computer to make it work properly.

Thanks for the input!
Iā€™ve been watching the hassio addon discussions with interest!

Since @hijinx already has a hue hub the bulb needs to be factory reset. You may be able to do this within the Hue app but it didnā€™t work for me. A hue dimmer switch can apparently be used to do a reset but OP didnā€™t mention owning one.

Based on those assumptions it must be reset via touchlink. This requires the bulb to be < 1m from the deconz device.

I will have to look into that docker image. Thanks.

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Aah true. I used a hue dimmer to reset the lights

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