I am a huge Christmas fan. I have nearly completed my indoor and outdoor Christmas decorations. I would like to hear how others deploy smart plugs for seasonal decorations. In the past, I have used both z-wave and zigbee plugs at random, realizing that after Christmas, I either remove those plugs and store them with the decorations, or I have to move those plugs back to their "original" location within my home mesh. If I store those "additional" plugs, then it disrupts my home smart plug/repeater layout, adding dead nodes to my device listings. I don't really NEED all of these extra plugs around the house once the decorations come down. I could use ALL wifi plugs, making it easy to remove and store those plugs without disrupting my Hubitat environment/mesh. So, how do others manage this dilemma?
How about a long range z-wave plug, like the ZEN04? The theory would be that since it only talks to the hub, the mesh won't be disturbed.
The plugs I use (a mixture of Z Wave and Zigbee) tend to be in locations where they will/might be used for other devices. For that reason they stay in place. As they're included in rules to turn them on/off, after Christmas I just tick the box to disable those rules.
I have something like a 20 outlet (yes, it looks scary) "surge protector" in my basement that I plug most of them back into once I am done with Christmas. That keeps them on the overall mesh. All my outdoor outlets are Z-Wave (of various generations) if I recall. All my indoor ones are ZigBee (almost all Peanut Plugs still).
I did try a Z-Wave in-wall outlet at one spot on the house when I added a new set of exterior outlets. But it tripped the GFCI it is tied to almost every time it switched. So I have just left it in constant on with the plan that SOMEDAY I will just remove it entirely and put regular outlets there instead.
Excellent idea. Thanks.
Matter over Wifi plugs (similar to ZWave LR) - Its a direct link from hub to device, no mesh involved, and it really doesn't care if the endpoint device is up or down (other than a few potential rule errors) and I have a hub variable that controls all the "seasonal" rules, that's enabled/disabled by a virtual switch (some prefer modes, but that's up to you)
I ditched my z-wave (outdoor) and zigbee (indoor) outlets used for Christmas lighting this year and replaced all of them with long-range zwave devices.
IMO, mesh networks suck and I will avoid buying another mesh device if at all possible.
This! I use both Tapo and Kasa Matter via WiFi plugs for my holiday decorations. When not in use, they just get stored with their respective decoration. Hubitat sees them as disconnected when not in use, but it takes less than a minute for them to show as active when re-activated. No meshes to worry about, and virtual switches to control the rules.
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