Inovelli Blue mmWave switches shipping update

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Got an email this AM from Inovelli about their new mmWave switches...excerpt:

I have some great news. The Blue Series (Zigbee) mmWave switches are being loaded onto an airplane and are being delivered to one of our warehouses out in California where they will be fulfilling orders.

I sent the labels to the manufacturer last night and have arranged receiving with the warehouse.

Here are the highlights:
• We are shipping all Indiegogo orders first
• Most of the Inovelli.com orders will also be shipped. I think there is a cutoff around October 2025 for the first batch (more on that below)
• Remaining orders will start shipping at the beginning of December when the second batch arrives
• Z-Wave orders will arrive at the beginning of December and all orders will be shipped then
• If you ordered color paddles, those will ship separately as they are coming with the second batch

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Price is reasonable:

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Been saving 60 years for this... :wink:

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That is a pretty cool device. The animated LED that color matches the lights isn't something I've seen before.

Price isn't bad if you consider it fills in for several devices at once, but outside of a new installation, I just can't see tossing my current mmWave sensor (which also does illuminance) and my Zwave Dimmer just to use this device, which costs about the same as three devices at $99.

Should a current dimmer or sensor die on me, I might just try it at that point. I have some switch boxes, though, that wouldn't be good placement for a mmWave sensor for the room.

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That would be the main issue, I think, since you can't place it where you want it, needs to be in an existing switch box. In some rooms it could work for me as part of several sensors working together...(which I typically do).

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I think that's why I am waiting for the Aqara FP300 reviews to pop up.
Battery and 2 years life.

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That battery powered device uses PIR primarily. It's not using mmwave 24/7.

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Yeah, I saw it's a hybrid.
But the elude to the same functionality. I'm curious about the real world testing.
They say only 20 ft of detection range in one pre-release review I saw so that's not great.

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This mmwave switch is a great idea in places where it's ideal. Kitchen, bathrooms, stairs, entryway. If you use their switches these fit right in.

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The spec sheet for sensor used by Inovelli also appears to be approximately 20 ft and 120 degrees (left-to-right). I have not seen an official spec for the switch, nor substantial real-world reviews. So, actual performance may prove better or worse.

There was early speculation around having a grid of detection zones. It appears that the delivered product will have one zone. Between the detection range and capabilities, I may be down to one modest application in my house. Even for that, I will wait to see a few folks do in-depth reviews before opening the box.

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These are really interesting but; I have four presence sensors, none are in a space where an available switch location would work. Two ideal locations are a walk in closet and walk in pantry. Both of those have dumb, perfectly performing, Lutron $19 motion sensor switches. Lights on instantly and always off five minutes after no activity.

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Received my notice and can't wait I have already marked where they are going to be installed.

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We all know Inovelli provides its own custom drivers packed with features.

​With that in mind, I'm curious: how many of you would still find it helpful to have a basic, built-in driver for this device?

  • A built-in driver is still useful.
  • It's redundant.
  • ​I don't have a preference.
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I will likely use the Inovelli driver, but it can be nice to have a fall-back option, and for those that prefer built-in drivers, it’s nice to have. :blush:

I’m looking forward to receiving mine! I just hope that…

  1. They will ship from Canada to avoid duties
  2. I can resolve the issue I’m having with some of their other zigbee switches crashing, likely due to some quirk in my zigbee setup that I have yet to resolve…

Update: Looks like my crashing issue has been resolved! Thanks to Bobby for some great guidance, and Eric M. from Inovelli for sharing a new firmware file to fix the culprit.

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Even though I clicked "It's redundant", I should note that this is a weakly held position right now. @Sebastien's view could easily sway me towards "is still useful".

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If there's no Hubitat built-in driver, and the Inovelli driver has not been installed, what will be the installation experience be? I assume the built-in Inovelli Zigbee switch / dimmer driver will be selected?

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The blessing and the curse with Inovelli devices (recently anyway) is that they have a bazillion possible parameters to mess with.

Which is great for detailed configurability, but even for me (as someone who generally likes that), their amount of parameters is getting to the point of being off-putting -- it's just so dang much to set up, track, and care-&-feed for over time.

So to my point... Yes, I would love a more basic driver. Unfortunately, I think every Inovelli user here has a different idea of what that "basic" driver should include, so then we're kinda back to square 1 again.

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I like the control Inovelli drivers have provided. I can see both ways since some folks only want basic device functionality.

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At the risk of opening a can of worms, do you think zigbee or zwave would be better for having one mmWave switch turn on another mmWave switch? My understanding is that the faster zigbee bindings are preferable over the slightly slower zwave associations?

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I'd say Zigbee. The bindings work great and the last Blue Zigbee switch is a monster repeater, hopefully this one is the same, only wish I'd of bought more when the price was lower

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