HE & Kasa, Aqara, HomeKit, GA, homebridge, HA, etc?

[nicholasharvey00]

Hey everyone,

I’ve finally made the commitment to go all in on HE after moving from Android to iOS and hating how many apps I need to do everything.

I’m a bit overwhelmed at the moment and not sure where to start, what’s worth keeping, and what’s worth replacing. Any advice?

Kasa RGB light strips & dimmable switches
MyQ garage door opener
Chromecast via Sony Bravia TVs
Aqara temp and humidity sensor (zigbee)
Aqara motion sensor (zigbee)
Aqara water sensor (zigbee)
Hunter simpleconnect fans (doubt this exists)

The goal is to reduce the amount of apps I need to turn stuff on and off, and to start automating the every day things I do with the help of the sensors.

And, hopefully, find a way to get all of the devices into HomeKit and Google Home so my wife and I can control them from our phones.

Any advice on where to get started? I’m feeling so lost!!

Ty in advance!

[sburke781]

For Kasa, Dave's Kasa app / drivers is your solution (I assume, I don't use their RGB strips):

[RELEASE] TP-Link/Kasa Plug, Switch, and Bulb integration

Version 6.3.1 Update. Color Bulbs only. Fixed issue with Hubitat Dashboard "color bulb" tile where setting color temperature to zero when a color is set causes the Color Temp slider to disappear. Fixed method setColorTemperature to properly range the set color temperature. Fixed method updatBulbData to not reset attribute Color Temperature if the value from the device is 0. New version 6.3.0 with following changes: Attributes: connection(LAN/CLOUD) and commsError(true/false), Added and d…

And welcome to the Community

[djgutheinz]

@sburke781

For Kasa, Dave's Kasa app / drivers is your solution (I assume, I don't use their RGB strips)

Definite support for the dimming switch. Read the instructions on gitHub for installation. (gitHub location at top of the thread above.)

RGB Light Strip: Works as a Color Bulb.

[sburke781]

There's also a built in Chromecast app that offers the basics for controlling a device. Looking at Bryan's Chromecast Helper, he mentions that there is a new setting as of 2.2.8.141 to keep the connection alive, which had been a problem in the past, so worth looking at that when setting it up (reminder to myself as well... ).

[sburke781]

@dman2306 's MyQ integration may be what you need for your garage door... But best for him to confirm this...

Updated MyQ Lite Application Official Thread

A few months ago MyQ changed their API breaking existing Hubitat integrations. I was able to get the SmartThings version ported over to HE. If you're looking for it, you can find the latest code at GitHub - dcmeglio/hubitat-myq: Integrate SmartThings with MyQ

[sburke781]

For your Aqara devices you may need to look at these Community drivers, however I don't believe they are supported anymore by the developer, or at least have only limited support.

[Release] Xiaomi / Aqara / Opple Drivers with Presence!

NOTE: Although Xiaomi / Aqara devices are used by many users with great success, Xiaomi / Aqara Zigbee devices are NOT officially supported on HE. Why new drivers? Xiaomi / Aqara drivers was something I wanted to write my own version of. Since @veeceeoh isn't here to support his I thought I'd release mine. I have published drivers for most types of Zigbee devices from Xiaomi / Aqara, if any are missing it's probably because I don't have the specific device. With this said, a big thank you goes t…

[gavincampbell]

@nicholasharvey00

The goal is to reduce the amount of apps I need to turn stuff on and off, and to start automating the every day things I do with the help of the sensors.

And, hopefully, find a way to get all of the devices into HomeKit and Google Home so my wife and I can control them from our phones.

Use the hubitat dashboards to pull them all into one interface and control them. Then just pin the dashboard to your homescreen and it will feel like a native app. Then you won't need separate apps for all the devices.

You have a lot of wifi devices. Not sure how many of the kasa switches (which I believe all runn of wifi) you have, but if you have issues with them you may have to look into ensuring your wifi is strong. I had wifi switches before and ended up switching them all out for zwave switches. Started being a pain as the numbers grew.

MyQ integration has to poll the servers to get open/close status. I try to reduce any polling like that on my hub as its just extra cpu utilization that adds up as you add more and more. You can reduce that by using zwave tilt sensors like the ecolinks so it only has to contact the myq servers to update its token and execute the open/close commands. You only really need to worry about this type of thing though if you start to have issues with cpu etc on the hub. But keep it in mind.

With the Aqara stuff be careful. If you have issues with them dropping off it could be a repeater (which it doesn't look like you have) or distance/interference. If you have to add repeaters keep in mind not all play nice with aqaura. The Ikea repeaters are great though.

[rocketwiz]

@sburke781

however I don't believe they are supported anymore by the developer, or at least have only limited support.

Mine are still working (with 99% reliability - occasionally I do get a dropout) with these drivers but have not upgraded to 2.2.8 yet although I don't expect anything to change.

[sburke781]

Yeah I wasn't saying that with any personal experience, only trying to relay what I found.

[rocketwiz]

@gavincampbell

The Ikea repeaters are great though.

Yep (this includes their plugs too). Avoid ST plugs though.

PS. the ikea repeaters have fairly poor range though. In a couple of spots I've substituted them with CC2530/2591 units which are way more powerful.

@sburke781

only trying to relay what I found.

No worries. Unfortunately you are right that they have no support from markus anymore so these [RELEASE] Xiaomi Aqara Mijia Sensors and Switches Driver? from @chirpy would be a better bet.

[sburke781]

Plus one for the Ikea repeaters from me as well, I have them dotted around the house and bulbs and sensors seem to gravitate towards those more than the Samsung plugs I have in the same location. Even tried turning the HE hub off yesterday to try and get them to associate with what I thought were the more powerful repeaters, but they still chose the Ikea's.

[sburke781]

Does look like they have moved the repeater back into the power plug part of the device, which is a shame, the one's I have atm seem to have the repeater in an attachment to this, allowing you to plus the repeater into a USB socket if you want, not that I have done that yet.

[rocketwiz]

I don't believe so, I think the images on the Aust site have omitted showing this as the assembly instructions on the site still show a 2 piece repeater.

[sburke781]

I'll find out soon enough, just ordered one

[rocketwiz]

I'll probably order one of the tiny Tuya zigbee repeaters from Aliexpress for testing as @aaiyar says they work great (and are super small - smaller than a flash drive).

[aaiyar]

@rocketwiz

says they work great

So far they have been terrific. Better than the Tradfri USB repeaters.