Back a few years ago when I bought my house, I decided I wanted to add some smarts to it. When I had the alarm installed (sorry Leo, not Simplisafe but a local regular alarm company) I had them install a Zwave compatible system. The only things I’ve added to it are my two heat thermostats, two locks, and a single plug. If it matters, I have a Honeywell Tuxedo Wifi (the old one, not the new one released last year that does Zwave Plus).
The following year, I had central air conditioning installed. This is composed of two ductless systems. One unit utilizes Honeywell Redlink (if I were to buy the gateway), the other does not have any native support. However Honeywell does sell a wall unit that acts as a “universal remote” for split systems that hooks into Honeywell Home. Redlink requires Honeywell Total Connect Comfort. So for now, I have no remote access to control the AC.
In the time since, I have added Google Home devices around the house. I have a MyQ garage controller. I have a Harmony Hub for my living room TV/surround sound. I have a Roku TV in my office, and Verizon Fios. All of this is integrated with Google.
In my ideal world, I’d love to have everything integrated with Google. Unfortunately, the Tuxedo doesn’t integrate yet with Google, plus I’d need to pay for additional service from the alarm company. The air conditioners require two different Honeywell control planes.
I’m considering getting a Smartthings unit to become the master device. I think it can integrate with most of my stuff, plus Google. Then I would join the Tux to it as a slave.
Anyone have any thoughts on this? Is there a better system to look into?
Samsung spun the brand off. That, to me, is not a good sign for longevity. A friend is currently trying to replace some lights that were controlled by a previous SmartThings controller that they’re no long supporting.
I really liked the idea of the alarm system holding the Z-wave, with most of the devices that way it could all be part of the house. Once I have to sign up for additional services, and link them, once the house goes, I need to remember to unlink everything.
I use a mixture of home assistant and smarthings and I agree that smarthings might not be long for this word. The whole industry is probably going to evolve this year with the evolution of chip into matter https://buildwithmatter.com/ . Listen to this week’s TWiG for some more info from Stacey about this.
Home assistant works with almost everything but can be quite tricky to set up (as can smarthings if you are trying to get it to work with non native devices). Home assistant integrates with Google but this is a paid for extra if you’re not comfortable opening your home assistant up to the internet.
What makes Smartthings look appealing is that it integrates with the other services I need (for the most part) to fully integrate everything into a single interface. But, if its not long for the world…
If it does everything you need them maybe buying a used one from eBay might make is easier to accept that it might not be around forever. It does integrate well with Google home.