I got the hub on Friday and was excited to set it up immediately. It took over an hour to remove the devices from smarthings and add them to hubitat. I then created many of the automations I had working in smartthings using rule machine and all was ok-ish. Response times were definitely faster than with smartthings and being a tinkerer I was happy. But I soon ran into a couple problems that eventually sent me back to smartthings.
Firstly I have a iris keypad that worked great with smartthings. I was happy it was listed as supported by hubitat and seemed to work great except for one thing. When arming and disarming the lights on the iris keypad would stay on unless I triggered its motion sensor then they would go out. It was annoying, especially because I knew my wife wouldn't remember to do it (the batteries drained from 80% to 20% since Friday because of this) but I pressed on with hubitat nonetheless.
The second issue and deal breaker for me was that all my bulbs are sengled classics and with smartthings if someone turned the physical light switch off or on, it would reflect in the smartthings app immediately so my automations would work but with hubitat that was not happening. I have an automation that turns off my kids room lights if there's no motion in the room for 8 minutes. That automation checks 2 conditions - the motion sensor being inactive, and the lights being on. If someone used the physical switch to turn the lights on, hubitat can't tell that the lights are on and thus my automation wouldn't run.
This 2 things plus the lack of a good app with a nice GUI just turned me off so I removed all devices from hubitat this morning and went back to smarthings. Yes some things will happen a bit slower than with hubitat, but I can live with that.
I always try to help but this time I would say good luck, you should try to ask here first before moving everything back to ST, the keypad issue is true, I noticed it on mine, for the bulbs I believe with a rule you can get what you are looking, for the app, HE will not have an app like ST, if you want something fancy to turn on your lights then you must create dashboards, use Sharptools or HousePanel.
The local processing is way much better than an app or GUI, just think if your cloud goes down when you need it, it will let you turn on lights, or if you are out of home your automation will run?
It's not that it gets status from the bulbs too fast or slow, it's that it doesn't get it at all if the physical switch is what's used. If lights are turned on using Google home but turned off with the physical switch, hubitat still sees it as being on.
I used the Google Home app as my dashboard as the dashboard in hubitat is way too rudimentary looking. The hardware is great, the idea is great but it just needs some polishing that's all. Not hating on the device at all because I see it's potential but for right now, it's not for me.
You have enough, don’t be greedy, give other people a chance to get a new hub at reduced price.
This being said, IMO only giving HE four days is really not enough time to totally drop a product over those things, especially when you don’t give support or the community a chance to maybe help work through them with you. I use a tablet to access the GUI when I need to, it’s nice to see and get all the options on screen, but with the few things I have set just working I don’t really need to be in the GUI much. I can wait for the App to come out.
I think @srwhite and all the issues he had is the perfect example that this platform and community is going overcome small and big things to become something hard to beat.
I am a fairly busy person, and while I do love to fiddle as my wife calls it, I really don't have much time to dedicate to doing much or it. I wasn't really unhappy with smartthings but I always wanted something that processed locally so I gave hubitat a try. Hardware is great, idea behind it is great as I said but the interface is important too that's all I'm saying.
My wife can open smartthings and at a glance see what's on or off. Hubitat is not necessarily as wide friendly lol
Fully understand, this stuff is all preference and ease of use to one’s particular situation. I have no idea how to relate ST to HE because I have only used HE.
I think you could solved the wife situation in the meantime with a dashboard though.
The interface, dashboards, and lack of App could use some tender love and care. But these ARE things the HE team is working on as somewhat priorities specifically because users asked for them.
Again, because I never used another HA platform I can’t say for certainty that ST wouldn’t respond to community and users requests the same way. But, I have a feeling based on being on the forums and using HE since middle of last year, that this is one of the PROs for HE in comparison.
I just think sending it back after four days without attempting to see if those two issues could be fixed by someone in the community or the HE team is a bit much. I think quite of few people run both instead still to some degree for specific things. But that is my opinion and since you were good with ST, your choice makes sense.
I did check and the keypad issue seems to be one that's been around for a long time with no resolution. Same for the bulb situation. But again, the main reason I returned it is because I was attempting to solve a problem I didn't have (smartthings did everything I needed) and introduced problems I didn't have before (keypad, bulb & wife issue).
Again, I'll say the idea is great, the hardware looks and functions great but it's just not for me right now.
@toyanucci are you saying that on Smartthings, removing physical power and restoring it caused a Sengled bulb to properly change its status in SmartThings? Are you using the ST official device handler or a custom one? If custom, can you please share a link to it?
Completely agreee. It's not even enough time to give support a chance to investigate either of the two issues the OP reported.
Exactly. The community and ultimately the devs worked through the issues, and soon everyone will enjoy the results of that effort.
We are all busy. It all comes down to the level of commitment one wants to make. I spent weeks moving 400 devices back and forth between SmartThings and Hubitat while working with the devs to tweak things. That was a commitment I made.
You obviously are looking for a completely functional, OOB home automation system requiring little to no tweaking. Hubitat isn't that. I would also argue neither is SmartThings. I'm sure it wasn't in the beginning for you either. It just happens that right now your current device selection performs differently in ST than in HE. Again nothing wrong with your choice to go back, you have to use whats best for your situation.
I went back to SmartThings, but returned a couple weeks later.
This is a typical example of the average boa i have been referring a couple of times.
Hubitat is not YET ready for the average Joe.
Its quite unfair for the OP as he is being placed, at some degree, on the line of fire just because he is not a power user neither has intententions to be.
He is a prime example of the gross market and this post should be simply taken as a voice of the customer.
I wish luck to the OP and hope that when the platform is more mature HE is willing to return.
In all honesty I think we're all looking for a completely functional system requiring little to no tweaking, but that doesn't yet exist on any home automation platform that requires anything beyond the basics of turning a light on or off with a motion sensor.
Again, I'm not disparaging hubitat and yes, the 2 issues I mentioned are relatively minor in the grand scheme of things but the UI is not. That's a very big deal. While smartthings always had a decent UI, since switching back today I decided to use the new app and not the classic and I was pleasantly surprised with the new look and functionality. Tinkerers can delve deeper with the ide and groovy etc but for basic use and wife approved functionality, the regular UI is there. Hubitat doesn't yet have that non basic UI. I'm sure I'll be back, but for now, smartthings is doing what I need.
LOL. While I'm not a power user, I wouldn't consider myself an average Joe at all. I've configured many systems based on a variety of platforms but right now, I'm not not able to commit the time and negative wife energy it will take to spend weeks on this. That's all.
I was just about to say I don’t think it even takes a power user to HE for the most part. I am no way an HA or HeE power user, other things yes, but not HA as this is my first dive into this stuff.
That being said, if someone has something else like ST already set up and working the way they want, the reasons to change might not out way it.
Especially with limited time and wanting to keep quality of life high.
I don’t think anyone was getting the pitchforks out either though like the OP was attacking HE.
I still can't process this, why your wife needs an UI? My wife has what she needs, a nice dashboard to turn on and off things(SharpTools). When I was a ST user my wife had a nice dashboard to turn on and off things(ActionTiles). Why more than that? She don't even know how wifi works.
