New here, and wanted some quick advice before diving in!

🛎️ Get Help
1

Hey all!

So just received my HE today and was really excited to get started. I'm like many here that I have read and switching over from Wink (their server went down 3 times in the last month and I got fed up).

After reading through for hours I:

a: discovered I am very much a novice at this.

and

b: feel like I bit off more than I can chew.

So wanted to get some opinions on my best way of getting started.

I currently am running about 50% of my lights via Philips Hue and the other 50% with Lutron dimmer switches. I just discovered I will now need the Bridge Pro so ordered that along with another dimmer switch to replace my Wink Relay with.

I have a couple of other ZigBee lights, but think I will replace them with Hue Bulbs (cheaper than two more Lutron dimmer switches).

Should I wait to get started until I receive the new Hub and switch and just start from scratch?

Besides that I don't have a lot, just a Schlage door lock that sounds some what of a pain to connect.

Also a few Zwave door sensors and motion sensors that once I figure out how to get them reset I imagine will pair fine.

Lastly I have some Nest cameras, a Ring doorbell, and a couple Harmony Hubs, will any of these work with the HE (or have any benefit)?

I mainly run my house off of Alexa commands, have one in almost every room, but want to make it more automated.

Sorry for the long endless rant, but if anyone can help me out, or just throw some ideas that would be awesome!

Thanks!

2

I wouldn't wait.

The Hubitat Hue integration is great, and you can start by playing with Simple Lighting and Rule Machine by automating lights.

Keeping the Hue system while adding the Lutron Pro is not a bad thing by any stretch.

After you get the Hue on, you might try picking up a Samsung Smart Things motion sensor or two--$20 each, pretty much anyplace that sells them, Best Buy, Amazon, Microcenter, wherever. They're cheap and easy to use, and you can add motion lighting to your repetoire!

After that, the NEST has a Community Integration (NST Manager I think) and there are several threads about Harmony integration. I can't speak to their utility, while I have both, I haven't integrated either...I do mostly lighting automation, and TTS notifications I'm afraid.

I absolutely love my stairwell lighting automations and evening lightups of exterior and interior lighting though!

Welcome to the community, and Good Luck!

Scott

3

I have integrated my Ring Doorbell by using it to trigger an Alexa Routine (using the Ring skill for Alexa). This routine then 'turns on' a Hubitat virtual switch/motion device (using the Hubitat skill for Alexa) and a virtual switch/motion driver that I wrote. This driver, when turned "on" by the Alexa routine, will also cause a Motion Event on Hubitat. The virtual switch/motion device then automatically deactivates so it is ready for the next Ring Motion event. This integration has been extremely reliable and fast.

As for the Logitech Harmony Hubs, you're also in luck. You can use my Logitech Harmony Hub Driver to integrate these with Hubitat. Each Harmony Activity will appear as a Hubitat Switch device. This integration is 100% local on your LAN - no cloud integration required.

4

It seems many look at Home Automation like a task that must be addressed. I think you'll enjoy the process if you keep it light (pun intended), and set small goals to accomplish in stages.

Starting with your Hue Bridge, add the Hue Integration app and play around with the lighting apps, then move on to building simple rules to learn the basics of Rule Machine. Understanding the concept and how they connect functionality like building blocks will keep this fun, so you'll feel challenged when things do not go as planned (because they inevitably won't), and it will better prepare you to come up with unique ways to achieve your goals.

1 Like
5

Hey!!! Got mine today too! Hue added right up! Still playing around.

4 Likes
6

I'm also new, moving from Stringify. I just jumped right in and tried things. It works great and as someone else said above, the process of learning is fun. I've been especially amazed to get some user-maintained apps and driver's working first go in my case for tp-link (works locally and so is super quick and reliable) and Sensibo (which is also great but seems slow at times because I believe it still uses their server in the Cloud). Still have a quite a few devices and lots of previous flows to migrate but enjoying using Hubitat a lot and the opportunities to explore it more. It is incredible value for money, even shipping it in from overseas as I had to. Only issues I've had so far are a Samsung presence sensor not working after initially connecting nicely, and an Aeotec 6 sensor not connecting at all (wrong z-wave frequency I guess since I've bought things all over the world at different times). I intend to check out HubConnect to see if I can keep it running via my SmartThings hub instead. Enjoy!

1 Like
7

Thank you for all the replies and help!

So far I have been for the most part enjoying this change over.

I got Hue easily, as well as all of my simple zwave devices (a couple contact sensors and a motion sensor).

Set up a cool dashboard with SharpTools and really loving that!

But my big issue is my Schlage lock!

I keep keeping it to connect, but never will work. Finally got it to do a few commands, but now nothing!

What am I doing wrong, or is this an ongoing issue?

Super easy connection with Wink, so I'm confused by this???

Thanks!

1 Like
8

This topic was automatically closed 365 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.