feeling a bit lazy today in doing the legwork on researching an accompanying additional hub for my HE, so I thought to ask the experts here instead
Can anyone recommed the best fit to go with my HE in terms of getting a very cheap additional Zigbee hub?
Currently I have all my devices (incl badly repeating zigbee bulbs) on my HE and I want to set things right in the cheapest way possible.
I have a mix of devices and would want to move the lights off the HE, but I also have Aqara devices to think of.
Devices: Aqara motion sensors, Aqara E1 curtain drivers, Tuya dimmers (using specific HE drivers), Tuya scene switch (using specific HE drivers), Gledopto RGB bulbs, Gledopto RGB dimmers, Ikea bulbs, Broadlink RM pro and RM minis, Zemismart ZM35 roller blinds.
Ideally I don't want to deal with MQTT integrations or standing up a HA device, just looking for something cheap and easy which plays nice with HE out of the box.
Want to maintain my offline ability as much as possible and keep HE as the main control for everything.
Many thanks in advance for any advice and insights!!!
Your screwed with those Aqara devices. HA would do the trick, just pass them to Hubitat then. Maybe Alexa with built in Zigbee could deal with them then use virtual switches.
How did your project go?
With the exception of Aqara E1 blinds that I am not sure whether will work with HE or not, everything else from your list should be already supported by custom drivers.
I’m not sure your definition of “cheap”, but the best bang for your buck, that will not break the bank is Home Assistant with a ConBee 2 Zigbee USB controller and Zigbee2MQTT. Although Z2M isn’t a requirement, it opens up more devices with better configurability for each. Plus you’ll get access to just about everything else under the sun that HA supports, without needing to use YAML for complex automations.
I have dozens of Aqara devices that are 100% reliable, passing their state back to Hubitat with Home Assistant Device Bridge. I do my automation with Hubitat Basic Rules and Rule Machine. This very stable setup is not at all difficult to maintain.
