I know there is the bulb vs switch argument in the forums. I tend to prefer switches everywhere, except for lamps.
However, I have a multipurpose room that is used for watching movies, approximately (7) BR30 recessed lights on one circuit/switch. When watching movies, i would want a subset of them off between viewer and screen, with others at the minimum dim. When not watching movies, i would prefer all of the bulbs to be synced at the same level. I'm planning to use the Inovelli red dimmer, but don't see any smart bulbs on their app list. I know i won't need all 7 to be smart, but does anyone have experience in implementing this? Which bulbs did you use? EDIT: Any other scene/feature recommendations to use with the Inovelli red dimmer to accomplish this?
Doing this with 2 red series dimmers in smart bulb mode. 3 Sylvania BR30 RGBW bulbs, and 2 sylvania RGBW recessed lights. It works almost instantly for on/off. I haven't done any scenes yet or coordinated dimming or color changes.
I think people are using the "mirror me" HE app for syncing bulbs, so you can search for that term
Or you can establish some different groups with Zigbee messaging turned on... that's what I am doing for my den lights. Have "recessed lights", "table lamps" and then "den lights" groups.
Zigbee, all the way. These are the newer revision of Sylvania/Ledvance/Osram (FCC ID DZO-LDV-AETHER). using ZHA, not ZLL . They're not Zigbee 3.0 but they behave well on my mesh. I have six other lights I need to include and configure with button controller 5.1
EDIT- The bulbs do not have to be zigbee to work with the Red series. Any bulb that can connect to or interface with HE can work. Even Lifx which are wifi. The trick is the inovelli switch supplies constant power to the bulbs via it's "smart bulb" mode, while the button actions from the Red series switches, are what triggers the lights, via a rule.
I don't have the box any longer, and that number doesn't show on Amazon(USA) search. I seriously doubt any of the older ones are around. Just make sure the listing is zigbee, as I see sylvania making the dumb move to bluetooth/wifi
The price has skyrocketed, I paid 9 per bulb, but still way better than Hue which is 50.00 for a lightbulb.
You can also try craigslist/FB marketplace/Offer Up, ebay, mercari etc.
I'm using the Red Series switches, not the dimmer. You don't want to dim the smart bulbs. I know you can set the dimmer to mimic a switch but it isn't the same thing but it will likely work OK with smart bulbs.
So what I do is disable the local control on the switch. This way tapping the on/off on the switch doesn't do anything except send an event to the HE. I can then use HE to control the smart lights.
My lights are mostly controlled by motion sensors. I use the switches to set scenes and override settings. My most complex setup is my exterior lights. Some come on automatically at sunset and they all come on full when a motion sensor is triggered. They work great as security lights. Then on the Inovelli switch if I tap on once they override the motion sensors and stay on all the time. This is used for working outside and not worrying about the motion sensors turning the lights off on me. Two on taps turns on a blue/green scene and three on taps turns on an orange/yellow scene. A single tap on the off button resets the override and switches back to the nightlight/security setting.
I ended up doing this in a custom app but it could also be done in Rule Machine if you like dealing with all the drop down menus.
So in short, the switch/dimmer doesn't do anything and has the load on all the time. HE responds to the button presses and sets the lights as desired.
EDIT: I'm using both Sylvania and Sengled Zigbee bulbs inside and out with this setup. Both A20 and BR30. I do have the Zibgee lighting on a dedicated hub just because the Sylvanias are horrible repeaters for non-bulb devices. The Sengleds don't act as repeaters so should be more reliable.
