It seems that there are a lot of things to consider before even buying the first smart device. How would you start when you would start over?
Are there any good beginner guides that helped you?
Important points for me are
- privacy (everything should be local, no Alexa-Karens in my home)
- use of open source/free software
- a good variety of smart things I can use (I don’t want to be tied Apple-like to only one company)
Is there a golden way to build a smart home with these factors in mind?
I got into “home automation” during the initial rush. Everything was dependent on its own hub or cloud service. After using some of them, especially the voice controlled ones, I got interested in what all they can see/collect. I quickly dropped everything and have been in a dumb house for a few years.
What I’ve realized I need is cameras to watch my pets and a dumb keypad door lock to let people in when I’m not home.
What I want again is a thermostat I can control from my phone. I haven’t found one that doesn’t need cloud services.
If I wanted to get everything “smart” again I would isolate everything to its own VLAN with no internet access for the whole VLAN. I would have an electrician fix my no neutral drop situation and get wifi switches not bulbs. I would add temperature sensors in each room. Custom build a camera system server. Add network access to my Honeywell security system.
Yep, having just moved and trying to setup the new/same network in the new house. Most of the new house is already fully led or had many bulbs on one circuit. Thus I need switches.
Other thing, save the instructions. I bought a new hub for the new house. Getting stuff to pair with the new hub was a disaster and I’m still using the old hub. Unpairing instructions would have helped a lot.
I am in the stage of completely stripping and rennovating my new house.
Here in belgium, pushbutton switches are becoming standard now instead of circuit-breaking switches. Every switch ia routed to the control board and every light circuit also with nothing in-between. Super handy for wiring and tracing wires. The only thing is, with electrical devices increasing in price so much, it is 20-40€ for a single
Since I am rewiring every single bit of wiring in my house, I am putting in a KNX system. A 16 channel smart switch output plus 32 channel binary input is almost the same price now as the “dumb” switches. They are potentialess, so nobody ever has to deal with shocking themselves on light switches like I did as a kid by being stupid.
Definitely recommend KNX and actually putting wires everywhere instead of wireless