Hello I’m completely new to HA but have been tasked with getting home automation setup in a house with many different devices. Currently there are 11 different apps running the home and I don’t think that’s all. I purchased an HA green which will arrive tomorrow but I’m not sure what add-on hardware I need to get started. In addition to the HA green I purchased a SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus Gateway, Universal Zigbee USB Gateway with Antenna. I wanted to purchase the HA USB antenna device (can’t seem to find the name) but understand they may have a hardware defect and are nearly impossible to find.
I’m looking for some words of encouragement as I just tried a popular closed-source system and am a bit disappointed. I’m hoping HA will have the magic I need to get this project done.
I would say don’t go big bang and try to get everything working and perfect in the first days or weeks.
Start with a few basics, once the basic work like having the integrations added and a few basic automation, then go to build further on that.
I started with adding my Nanoleaf’s as I had horrible problems with getting them to work with Alexa (been fixed since) a few years later I have 39 Integration doing anything and everything around the house.
I think you’re on the right track. HA can bring some order to your mess of apps, protocols and (probably) cloud servers. Maybe you can eliminate some of those dependencies as you move forward.
Scroll through the topics here in this forum. Of course people mostly post when they have a problem. That doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with HA as such. But it does show how, the more complex your system, the more work you have keeping everything running. Things are always changing. Things change in HA, in the vendor’s cloud and of course as we tinker and add functionality. Keeping the number of “things” to support to a minimum will make your life easier.
I’m not really clear on what you bought. Are you saying you have two Zigbee coordinators, one attached to the HA device and one LAN connected? That may be overkill. Zigbee devices will build their own mesh network, and you shouldn’t have to play network administrator for them. Usually just one coordinator is all you want.
Good luck, and don’t hesitate to ask specific questions here. We’ve got a lot of talented people here, who are willing to help if they can.
Sounds as if you already have a lot of hardware - you may not need much more. Start looking for matching integrations. There’s a searchable list here:
If you need help getting your head round the terminology, these are quite helpful:
To echo @CaptTom - you can only have one coordinator in a Zigbee network. If you have Zigbee devices, the mains powered ones should automatically act as routers that relay messages from the sensors to the coordinator.
Thank you all for the incredibly insightful comments! A bit more about what’s going on…
I’m an IT professional with 20+ years of experience with computer hardware, networking, cloud migrations, etc. Very little experience other than with Alexa when it comes to home automation.
I have a IT client/business owner who purchased a new (very large) home with a variety of “smart” devices but currently he’s having to navigate multiple apps and configurations. He consulted a C4 dealer who provided a hefty proposal and a disclaimer about difficulties integrating. I began researching and gave a proposal to use Homey Pro as the central processor and Alexa as the primary interface. Don’t know if that was right but that’s what I did. Come to find out Homey Pro despite how great it may be doesn’t seem to support the handful of “smart” devices I have laying around my house so my concern became the difficulty I would likely have with my client’s home. That’s what brought me to HA.
The HA green arrives today but from what I can tell doesn’t have any internal radios or ability to connect to anything other than I’m guessing WIFI devices which are part of the network HA is connected to via ethernet.
I have a tight timeline to get this project going and am trying to learn as much as I can before I have to make some things work.
In the first phase of the project I’m looking for this:
Control of Lutron Caseta, Ecobee and Carrier Thermostats, Window shades - currently controlled by MyLink (somfysystems) and HTD for home audio. Goal will be met once able to give basic voice commands to control lighting levels in various areas of the house, temperature, window shades and in-room audio. My goal is to be able to say “Alexa Good Morning” or “Alexa I’m home” and have routines make a variety of adjustments.
There’s definitely more he wants but these are the biggies. Hope I haven’t bitten off more than I can chew but given my current weight, apparently I can chew a lot
I was going to purchase the Home Assistant Connect ZBT-1 but looks like it’s unavailable so in the interest of getting this project going I ordered the Sonoff.
The HA Green arrives today so I will get it connected to the network and accessible via HA app. Will go from there.
And Zigbee router devices every three or four meters. Almost everything AC powered will act as a Zigbee router. I have one or two of these in every room of the house which provides for a very robust Zigbee network.
My advice is going to be very different. This is coming from a 25year IT vet in IT ops.
Start setting your client expectations NOW.
If you’re new to HA. You will quickly find that while a LOT of yojr IT knowledge transfers you need to do a lot of out of the box thinking. And things don’t necessarily work the way you expect.
Zigbee and ZWave for instance. Not hub and spoke no matter how much it LOOKS LIKE hub and spoke. Heed the warnings about range and number of routing devices.
You will have to fiddle with EVERYTHING
Do everything you can to prevent your client from just ‘dropping things in he network’ compatibility (expectations v reality) are going to be yojr nightmare. Especially if your clients expectations are it just works.
Do it I your own network first and then his. (I read the part about your short timeline - this one’s gonna bite you fast)
We’re still 10+ years away from a fully plug and play experience.
Yij will learn to hate Alexa and Google and how closed thier ecosystems are. Especially if your goal is voice.
Theres a reason your Control4 quotes ‘seemed’ high. And I think you’re about to find out. I will NOT run someone else’s IoT setup for a reason. I hope your experience turns out better than my expectations. But hey if you want to be able to do a lot of consulting hours and yojr client has a blank check?
All that said I firmly believe it’s the best system for this kind of stuff. Just I’m worried that you may. Have set yourself up for failure. So set expectations early and often
I am not intimately familiar with the Green since I built my own Home Assistant server on an Intel NUC.
But- START SIMPLE. Home Assistant is the big kid’s pool. Your system will grow organically as will your knowledge of the system and some of its weirdness.
Don’t hesitate to ask for help here. Most of what I’ve learned is from this forum. Today I have over 100 devices around my house, and it’s still growing. (Today I am adding a Bluetooth device).
Be aware, if you ask ten Home Assistant users for “how to do this”, you will likely get ten different answers. And they will all be correct.
Subscribe to the Nabu Casa cloud. It gives you an Alexa connection and remote control of your Home Assistant dashboard. And it supports the project.
When a device package says “XYZ Hub Required”, they are lying. Yes a hub is required but the dongles we plug into our Home Assistant server computer are all you need.
This is personal- unless you absolutely cannot live without color control, don’t waste your money on smart lights. Other than color, there is nothing that a smart switch and a dumb LED light can’t do cheaper.
Nothing in your list is particularly challenging. But finish one before moving on to the next task. Also, look at the list of integrations to see is any of your devices are already there.
And if Drew or I answer we’re Always wrong, so… What’s the score then
5 different, unique, right
2 dead wrong
2 right but no longer supporabke
1 educatted wish?
Some vendors run a closed setup with encrypted communication directly to cloud servers.
Such setups are extremely hard to “break” into and they can generally not be incorporated into HA or any other third party system unless the vendor decide to do so.
Ok, your first mistake is right here. You took on a promise you don’t know how to make good on. Don’t worry too much - we’re here to help you, but keep in mind you may not be able to achieve 100% of your customer’s expectations.
This is your second mistake. Despite your inexperience, you promised a deadline. The only thing deadlines are good for is the whooshing sound they make as they fly by (RIP Douglas Adams). Again, we’re here to help you achieve those, even if they’re delivered a couple of months too late.
Break it down into individual components in a separate post and describe each communication protocol each one uses. Go back & edit whatever you have resolved. Caseta & Ecobee are familiar integrations, therefore you might have supported integrations out of the box. Carrier & Somfy might be a bit trickier, but I’m sure these are handled through HACS if no native integration exists.
Yes, you probably have, but then again, a fair few among us have stepped into this very deep shitmudhole. Most of us are lucky enough to be their own customers, so we didn’t immediately dive into the deep end. Again, never promise something you’re unsure you’ll be able to deliver, especially with a deadline.
Use that experience in your favour. Start small with an MVP, then apply continuous delivery as you gain confidence on your ability to maintain the system you promised.
