I’m looking for some good zigbee or thread wall dimmers for some hall lights, and I’d rather not use wifi if I can avoid it. The only thing I’ve been able to find on Amazon has been the Embrighten switches. Any suggestions?
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Leviton Zwave. They work great and should go fine with matter.
I really like the Zooz Z-wave ones. Had no problems with mine.
I’ve been using these as well - they gave more configuration options than the ones I previously used and are less expensive, too. I highly recommend them if you have a Z-Wave setup.
I also have a few Zooz Z-wave dimmers and a scene controller. Zero issues in about a year or two of use.
I use Lutron. But they use a proprietary protocol (with local control however)
Lutron is great if you have an old home like I do because of the wall mountable remotes. I’ve added lamp dimmers and 3 way switches in multiple spots in my house where I’d otherwise have to do a bunch of rewiring. The bummer about them is that since the buttons are flat they can be hard to find in the dark.
There’s a new line of Caseta switches which actually look good and are traditional.
Can’t be bothered to replace mine and barely use them anyway. Just use HA and automations for the most part
I use leviton z wave and haven’t had issues.
I’m thinking of buying Candeo, what do you guys think?
YoSmart/YoLink also has a smart dimmer for $30. Those use a 900Mhz frequency to communicate and the hubs are usually $25 or they add about $10 ina a bundle.
The normal Hubs have Ethernet. The “voice” hubs are wifi only (to connect to your network, still 900MHz to talk to their devices).
I initially started using them because they were cheaper than Z-Wave (at the time) and the smaller sensors (leak, door/window, temp, etc) use normal AAA batteries.
Up voted for this. I have a bunch of Yolink products. It all works seamlessly. I’ve got motion lights setup. I have my bathroom exhaust fan set to turn on at a specific humidity level. I’ve got their door locks, garage door opener. Hell, I’ve got the float switch set to tell me when my dogs need more water.
They have so many products and they all work together very well. It truly feels like a smart home now and it’s all the same brand so I don’t have to worry about compatibility problems or using a third party software. I do have them linked to home assistant for the few things I have from other brands. But I can’t reccomend Yolink enough
I just ripped out my insteon system and replaced it with Caseta. I wanted the “device-to-device” response speed.
It doesn’t work unless you want those MadKatz looking remotes on your wall. The two button remotes send all linked devices to full power, so I process them in Home Assistant. Home assistant is fast enough to process the commands, but the lutton protocol doesn’t have any sort of acknowledgement on the wireless side, it just keeps on blasting for 1.4 seconds. Good for reliability, awful for latency… So for 1.4 seconds after an action, the hub waits for the first device to stop transmitting before it sends commands to the rest of the devices.
I’m going to try some “scene” remotes and maybe get it to be acceptably quick but there are still limitations.
ZigBee is so good, they made thread. Z-wave is so good, there are 4 versions. Matter over thread is what I wanted but that’s vaporware for now. Considering what I know now, I would probably have gone with esphome or tasmota dimmers. I was worried about them mucking up my wifi, but they’re the only things I have on 2.4 and the scene controllers and garage controllers have been solid.
This is good to know, I have a whole home Insteon setup now, will probably have to replace it at some point since they went under…
I replaced a few switches with a Zooz Z-Wave switch. It’s fast enough but it’s paired with ZigBee lights, so I have to use a #HomeAssistant automation to sync up the dimming. Not ideal so I didn’t replace any more switches yet.
The wifi ones they sell at Costco, but re-flashed with Tasmota
How difficult is it to reflash these devices to Tasmora? Do you have to crack it open? Do you have too wire it into the wall first?
The Feit ones, right? And what exactly is Tasmota?
The ‘platform’ for the FEIT ones at costco are really well built. They make the Insteon units look like they were a one off hobby project. That’s the part that has the power circuitry, screw terminals, etc. The wifi module used to be ESP based but they switched about a year ago to a newer BK723 chip, these can be reflashed with a ‘OpenBeken’, which is a newer project that has similar functionality to Tasmota but for these newer chips.
The only downside I’ve seen with these is OpenBeken is not as mature and the units ‘hang’ now and then requiring a power cycle (like 2-4 weeks). I have some of the older ESP based units that are otherwise identical and they never hang, this has been getting better with upgrades so likely will eventually be fixed.
If you are OK with soldering you can buy the ESP controller modules on Amazon for about $1 each and just replace them and run stock Tasmota (you have to unsolder the module to reflash it either way, so its not a big deal to just put a different one on). The module pinout and electrical interface are identical.
Inovelli
i love my innoveli switches
Ooh those look interesting. Pricey though.
They really are the best though.
Do NOT use enbrighten zigbee dimmers if you have LED lights. I installed a half dozen with Halo LED cans and they make the lights flicker at best and not dim at all at worst. And when I say flicker I mean like strobe light flickering. I had other dimmers installed before that were new but not smart and didn’t have any issues.
All my stuff is wifi based so I can’t really help with that, sorry.