New here, IKEA suggestions

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1

Hi HE community.
I have a HE on the way, should land within a few days, and I can't wait. :blush:
I have about 30 IKEA Trådfri bulbs, outlets, buttons and more installed in my home, all connected to the IKEA gateway. My question is, is there an easy way to connect them all via the gateway or do I have to go over all of them manually?
What is the best/easiest way to go about this?
I have watched, I think, all Hubitat videos on YouTube and can't find one regarding this subject.

Thanks
Kasper

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There is no direct integration with the Ikea gateway today. Ikea doesn't publish any API/info to do this in a supported way.

So you would have to move them if you want them to work in HE.

Now, I recommend/prefer keeping lighting devices OFF my HE hub, as light bulbs are notoriously bad Zigbee repeaters, and can cause issues with non-bulb Zigbee devices in some cases. That isn't an issue specific to HE, either, it is true of zigbee bulbs used in any mixed zigbee environment.

I would consider picking up a cheap/used Philips Hue hub, moving the Ikea bulbs to there, and then integrating the Hue hub to HE. The outlets and buttons should be fine directly on the HE hub (disclaimer: I have Ikea outlets on my hub, but have never tried any of the buttons - you may need to verify they are supported).

That said, you can also add them directly to HE, and hope for the best in terms of bulb/non-bulb interaction.

Or you could buy a 2nd HE hub and isolate all bulbs to a single hub/single zigbee network and use the other hub for non-bulb Zigbee.

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3

Wow thanks for the fast reply.
I have a HUE bridge and a few HUE bulps but didn't bother moving all my IKEA bulps, but from what u say, now I have to :blush:.
I think most of my IKEA devices will link up with the Hue bridge, so no worries there.

Thanks again
Kasper

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4

The suggestion is a good one.. put all those bulbs on their own Zigbee network (number) so that they simply cannot route for some other network. Hue is a good device for creating that "Zigbee bulbs" network. Then put all your non-bulb Zigbee device directly paired to Hubitat Hub.

You will have two Zigbee networks to manage, And will need to make sure each mesh is working. But that investment early will save you many hours of late night grief.

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5

All your bulbs will provided that they are on a firmware version greater than 1.2. Since you've had them on the Tradfri hub, they should be up to date on firmware.

Switches and signal repeaters will attach easily to the HE hub.

If you have any dimmers or remotes, those will not work with either system and you'll need to replace them.

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Damn. No way to connect my 2 dimmers and 2 buttons?

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Nope. No way currently. That could change in a future version of HE's firmware of course.

@mike.maxwell Any plans on the board for supporting Ikea dimmers and button remotes?

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The steering wheel controller is a full stop no go, major platform changes required here.
The hockey puck spinney controller widget could be integrated, however the only deterministic output from the thing is a button or two, its also very very chatty, and in my opinion not very useful, so I've done nothing more with it.

I don't know what the other two devices mentioned are.

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This one.

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Yeah, you can get that to work (as an outlet), but the button remote is not able to be paired at all.

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But the outlet can't be paired with HUE, so I would have to pair it directly with HE right?

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The button remote is part of what Ikea calls the "outlet control kit" (it's just a button with the outlet).

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Correct. Outlets and repeaters can be paired directly with HE. The bulbs (ALL of them), should go on your Hue bridge. You'll thank yourself later for that as the bulbs do really well on the Hue Bridge.

I have 18 Ikea bulbs on my Hue bridge right now.

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I use the button to control a whole group of bulps.
Will it be integrated further down the line u think?

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Probably not. However, you could get yourself any number of other button remotes that will work with HE. There are tons of them on Amazon that are both cheap AND work well. Check the device compatibility wiki for some recommendations. I think there are over 20 different button devices supported.

https://docs.hubitat.com/index.php?title=List_of_Supported_Devices

You could also get an Amazon Alexa or Google Home and voice control them (if you don't already have one of those devices). Personally, in my house, we rarely ever touch a button or a switch and just use motion sensors and/or voice commands to do everything.

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Great thanks for the link.
I have both Alexa and GH in my house, but sometimes it's nice to have a button to press. The wife is still not that happy with either voice assistants and keep turning off the lights the old fashioned way to my frustration.. :wink: She needs buttons!

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LOL... Ok, here's what you do... Get a rolled up newspaper and ... no wait. Bad idea. :wink:

I'd just get a couple (or more) button remotes from Amazon. I've had good luck with these (I have 4 of them around the house and they only cost $14.49/each): https://www.amazon.com/SYLVANIA-LIGHTIFY-Wireless-SmartThings-Assistant/dp/B0196M620Y/ref=asc_df_B0196M620Y/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=198064502357&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=15669002304282192876&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1021118&hvtargid=pla-348303386142&psc=1

The other thing you can do is get some of the Philips Hue dimmer remotes. They are a bit pricier (~$25 each), but they can be paired to either the Hue bridge or the HE hub and work really well. ( https://www.amazon.com/Philips-Dimmer-Switch-Installation-Free-Exclusively/dp/B076MGKTGS/ref=sr_1_3?crid=2V02NERBT6BDW&keywords=philips+hue+dimmer&qid=1555691555&s=hi&sprefix=philips+hue+dimmer%2Ctools%2C138&sr=1-3)

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How about the IKEA motion detector, will it pair with HUE or HE?

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I agree with keeping bulbs separate, but I’ve found Ikea bulbs to be the ones that buck that trend. I’ve 13 GU10s, 4 E14s, 4 TRÅDFRI dimmer units with 8 spotlights and several LED strips off them.

I’ve also modified a driver for the pucks, which simply makes them switches, clockwise on, anti off, and they work very well. Had the odd one which takes a couple of twists but not that annoying, but they are very touchy.

I’ve had no issues with my Zigbee network, and have way more Zigbee devices than z-wave. And all connected directly to HE.

Great devices!!

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Motion I believe will pair, but no driver atm. Not sure you could get it to work as they normally pair directly to their bulbs.