I've seen Visonic recommended quite a bit but wondering if anyone has any experience with Centralite? I found them since they had a small zigbee outlet. Part of me wants to go zwave as it sounds more reliable, but I can't ignore the size benefit of zigbee
I'm just looking to solidify on one type as I realized my mix of the few I have now leave me very annoyed on the battery type front, lol. Avoiding xiaomi as I'm trying to stick to zigbee/zwave standards.
Oh, I'll add I'm looking at Centralite since they seemed super responsive. They replied to my question about their mini outlet being a zigbee repeater or not (they said it is) within an hour or two? Kinda want to support that service, lol
Centralite makes a whole lot of products for other brands/companies/manufacturers such as SmartThings, Iris, Sylvania, etc. I do not have any of their contact sensors, but the leak sensor (Iris version) and motion sensor (Sylvania version) are rock solid. Thats not to say that other brands are not.
The rest of my leak sensors are Waxman and Xiaomi, and my contact sensors are Xiaomi. The Xiaomi are really affordable and now that I have a few Trådfri outlets in place repeating them (and that's important because most outlets will not repeat Xiaomi devices), they are very stable.
Yeah, I'm starting to find that out more (re Centralite being a major OEM). And I didn't know Tradfri (but I think the US only has bulbs right now?) would repeat Xiaomi... good to know. Though, I think I'd still lean toward sticking with a standard when I can.
Fair enough. The US and Canada IKEA locations have the Trådfri outlets. I have two (Canada) and a few people in the US bought some and ran their own tests with XBee and XCTU as well, confirming on a network map that they do work as repeaters for the Xiaomi devices. I never had too many problems with them because I live in a small house and most of my devices are not far from the hub, but a few that I had farthest from the hub, and on occasion a few that were very close to the hub would drop off.
Since adding the IKEA Trådfri outlets, everything has been stable. They are also repeating my Centralite devices and my Sengled bulbs, so they seem to generally good repeaters. Not strong radios, but they're so inexpensive, it makes sense to just buy enough to cover your entire home. I only have two and my house is covered. I only have about 1200 Sq/ft
Anyway, while I firmly believe in the Xiaomi for the design, beautifully small size and fantastic prices to save my budget for more interesting purchases, you cannot go wrong with Centralite it seems. Generally quite reliable products.
Hrm, I'll have to recheck my local IKEA again. They claim it is in stock (I looked a few weeks back, but maybe they weren't prominently displayed). I wonder if the control button also can be seen by hubitat as a generic button....
But do you have a recommended source for Xiaomi buttons? They didn't seem that much cheaper ($12 vs $15-20 for what I originally listed) since I'm not buying a ton. But I may reconsider my stance as the size is a huge point on why I'm looking at zigbee in the first place.
I actually just ran some test with the button it is not usable so don’t even bother with that. Xiaomi buttons on the other hand can do five presses and a hold. One of my favorite devices they make.
Gearbest is one of the top sources for Xiaomi. They have a deal and get them direct. Prices should be much lower in the US, those sound like Canadian prices I would pay with 10day shipping.
Oh I see what you're looking at. The thing about Gearbest is they'll list the same thing multiple times and one will be on sale and the rest wont. But it's the same thing. So I looked at my past orders and the door/window sensors I have are all the "Original" Xiaomi Aqara. They look slightly different then the ones I see on their site. Nicer looking in my opinion actually. I paid $9 US for each "On Sale".
Here's a link to the new version also "On Sale". Xiaomi devices are always much smaller than they look in the photo. I'm shocked when I open the box of one of their products I've never ordered before. Every-single-time. I've only bought a few of their devices that were not on a so called "Sale".
If you can get Centralite that cheap than you probably should. The lowest cost I can get for a Z-Wave or Zigbee door/window sensor is $40 CAD. So you can see why $12 CAD for a really tiny and reliable sensor is appealing to me.
Also, keep in mind that if you're looking at SmartThings sensors today, a few people have commented that they are not made by Centralite anymore. I don't know who makes them and I have not searched for reports on compatibility with HE
THe centralites are actually $20us, but the visonics are $15. But that discount link makes Aqara attractive if the Tradfri plugs work well (I didn't want to get into the Xbee stuff).
I actually do have a sensor, so I'm familiar with it, but it was a bit finicky setting up. The non-standard thing was really my hold up.
