Home automation recommendations

[spsneo]

hello everyone

I am looking to implement home automation - lighting, curtain, vrv etc. What are your recommendations with respect to wired vs wireless?
In wired knx vs closed ecosystems?

 

[paxauquabriba-4876]

dont fix what's not broken

this is united states of india where mass successful products lack parts and service ;
hence, the juice is not worth the squeeze unless its a hooby or pet project of yours

if not then go ahead if u got money to throw away and attarct unncesaary tension to be at the mercy of people that will service and handle maintenance.

i would say spend the time & money that you will waste on automation into a family trip and stuff to explore nature.

again do what you want and whatvever rocks your boat

 

[panchabhut]

get a maid. works out cheaper in India

 

[gurbina]

I would highly recommend Home Assistant, it's beyond incredible what you can achieve with it. The community is huge and very active.

However be mindful of a few things... First the devices wireless or wired aren't available in India but can be sourced from Dubai, Malaysia, Singapore for very cheap.

The problem is either going to get them, or paying customs...

As for reliability I mostly go for wireless devices for sensors which can easily last a couple of years and are very easy to monitor and change batteries once the time comes. They're tiny, thumb sized and very reliable. Almost anything else will need to be wired whether that's an IR/RF/Bluetooth remote for AC/Fans/Electronics (TV, speakers, radios, whatever) or devices that control the curtain rails, lights, water heater, pumps, etc.

The only major advice is to go for devices you can control locally, as internet connection is beyond abysmal here. Also you won't be at the mercy of 3rd party services/APIs which can change or shut down any time. You need an inverter in India as the frequent power cuts will mess up with your devices and they might reset or break.

I can easily say home automation it's one of the best investments you can make, an entertaining hobby and doesn't take a rocket scientist to do it. You can DIY everything.

As for maintenance at least once or twice a year you'll have to sit down for an hour or two to troubleshoot or update things. Usually devices which are controllable locally won't require any changes so you can go on for a long long time without any updates or changes, even years. I've kept my house fully automated and haven't touched my HA for almost 2 years now aside from an important update for things that have changed and are out of my control such as API changes that were used to control certain devices online or to fetch information such as the weather or APIs to send/receive data externally like messaging/push notifications/emails.

Some great examples of home automation.

Voice control for any device whether AC, fans, lights, etc. Fully control them from temperature changes in AC, fan speed, dimming of lights, colors or lights, turning on TV/Soundbar, playing Netflix, whatever.

To leave your home and automatically have all your lights, AC, fans, etc turn off. Same applies once you come back and each one can be tuned to certain conditions like the garage /door lights to turn on only once you're back home and when you open the door during night hours. Same goes for AC based on temperature outside or inside. This fine tuning is what takes the longest bust once you have it or know what to look out for, it's quick. It can be incredibly personalized to anyone's case or situation to a degree things feel almost like witchcraft.

Walking in or out of rooms and have lights automatically turn on or off. Same for fans or AC, you can even have them turn on based on movement/room presence and temperature outdoors or indoors so they only work when required. This is highly customizable so you can have them behave based on patterns or behaviors like you spend more time in a room during daytime, or a device is more used during certain hours. So from those behaviors or patterns you can basically teach it what to do.

Mood lightning so when you're watching TV the curtains get shut and ambience lightning is turned on. When you pause watching whatever you can have other lights turn on or light to turn brighter.

Run robot vacuum automatically when you've left home for a while during certain specified hours once or multiple times a day or in specific dates. You can even put buttons or just use the dashboard or voice to make the vacuum clean specific areas on demand.

House alarm when you're away so you get notified of unusual behaviors like temperature changes, motion sensors, door sensors, window sensors, smoke sensors, etc. You can pair this with a camera and have push notifications on your phone with a the data and even videos/snaps of the camera on the area where the alarm is triggered. You can have a pan tilt zoom camera even move automatically to capture specific areas based on the alarms.

The sky is the limit pretty much. Nowadays whatever you can think of, can be achieved.

As for the initial setup it might take a while, a few hours at least to set up everything from scratch and a few days to configure to your individual needs/ideas.

 

[cardio_guy]

Good post, and looking for more answers here. Also, we are from a tier 3 town, so these things won't be of great to many of the tech-savvy people here.
1. Mi Vaccum Robo Mop - I have been earlier doing the brooming and cleaning all by myself, this has helped a lot to get rid of the dust.
My home is on the roadside and in a very dusty area, so regular cleaning is needed. This robo mop has helped a lot to do the basic cleaning/mopping/vacuuming. (1+ year, working fine so far)

2. Automatic motion sensor LED lights. I bought this from Amazon, useful in keeping it inside dark areas like cupboards and storage places where there are not enough lights. They are rechargeable like our mobile phones so it is easy to handle. (Close to 1 month, no issues so far)

3. Apart from this, I also have a Mi air purifier and use it regularly, not sure if it actually purifies the air or not, but it works like a fan. It is not automated, though it can be connected to the Mi home app and controlled from there, I usually plug it into the power and turn it ON.

I am looking for some items that can reduce the dust or purify the air because my place is very dusty and we all get dust allergies, coughs, and cold very often.

 

[gurbina]

Good post, and looking for more answers here. Also, we are from a tier 3 town, so these things won't be of great to many of the tech-savvy people here.
1. Mi Vaccum Robo Mop - I have been earlier doing the brooming and cleaning all by myself, this has helped a lot to get rid of the dust.
My home is on the roadside and in a very dusty area, so regular cleaning is needed. This robo mop has helped a lot to do the basic cleaning/mopping/vacuuming. (1+ year, working fine so far)

2. Automatic motion sensor LED lights. I bought this from Amazon, useful in keeping it inside dark areas like cupboards and storage places where there are not enough lights. They are rechargeable like our mobile phones so it is easy to handle. (Close to 1 month, no issues so far)

3. Apart from this, I also have a Mi air purifier and use it regularly, not sure if it actually purifies the air or not, but it works like a fan. It is not automated, though it can be connected to the Mi home app and controlled from there, I usually plug it into the power and turn it ON.

I am looking for some items that can reduce the dust or purify the air because my place is very dusty and we all get dust allergies, coughs, and cold very often.

That's a unwinnable battle in India unless you spend absurds amount of money, time or both.

The best is to invest in a good vacuum with a good HEPA filter. Vacuum whenever you can and do wet dusting. Cheap vacuums won't remove dust or just disperse it around.

Spending 5-10min a day for a quick wet dusting and vacuuming around helps a lot, like a LOT. I have a lot of cats and you can imagine the amount of dust and fur in my house. With air purifiers that move tons of air, the robot vacuum and spending 5-10min a day with a wireless vacuum like the dyson on the corners where the robot vacuum can't reach is really a game changer... People don't even know I have so many cats and get surprised by how clean my house it is.

The robot vacuum is indeed an amazing purchase, it really helps to maintain the dust levels down and you can run it on demand wherever you need it, specially when you step out of our home or room. Without this you'd spend

I'd also suggest to keep windows and doors shut, make sure they create a proper seal. Also get doormats and use them properly, they catch a lot of dirt/dust on any entrance.

 

[cardio_guy]

That's a unwinnable battle in India unless you spend absurds amount of money, time or both.

The best is to invest in a good vacuum with a good HEPA filter. Vacuum whenever you can and do wet dusting. Cheap vacuums won't remove dust or just disperse it around.

Spending 5-10min a day for a quick wet dusting and vacuuming around helps a lot, like a LOT. I have a lot of cats and you can imagine the amount of dust and fur in my house. With air purifiers that move tons of air, the robot vacuum and spending 5-10min a day with a wireless vacuum like the dyson on the corners where the robot vacuum can't reach is really a game changer... People don't even know I have so many cats and get surprised by how clean my house it is.

The robot vacuum is indeed an amazing purchase, it really helps to maintain the dust levels down and you can run it on demand wherever you need it, specially when you step out of our home or room. Without this you'd spend

I'd also suggest to keep windows and doors shut, make sure they create a proper seal. Also get doormats and use them properly, they catch a lot of dirt/dust on any entrance.

Thanks, this is true. Can you please share the model name/number or any link of the wireless Dyson vacuum that you mentioned?
Yes, Robo vacuum cleaners don't reach the corners and as of now, I am doing a manual brooming/wet mopping on alternate days.

 

[paxauquabriba-4876]

Thanks, this is true. Can you please share the model name/number or any link of the wireless Dyson vacuum that you mentioned?
Yes, Robo vacuum cleaners don't reach the corners and as of now, I am doing a manual brooming/wet mopping on alternate days.

dyson is best i know but pricing is what my family cannot personally afford. what's next options in your opinion ?

 

[gurbina]

Any vacuum with good HEPA filter will do the trick. The problem is that here in India there's no good variety of vacuums, you'll see a lot of cheap imports and local brands that barely work at their intended purpose and it can be really frustrating. Let alone any of them using a HEPA filter.

Eureka which you find a lot in Chroma/Reliance are utter garbage, so is Agaro as well... Tried Phillips and while better, it was also a disappointment for the price. None of them are worth it at all, I wouldn't accept them even as a gift because they just don't work. Stick to a broom and mop.
They won't even suck a corn flake or plain dirt from a tile floor, I don't even know how they have the courage to sell such crappy useless products.

Black and decker dry/wet vacuum that is like a barrel worked much better but the filters are a bit bad, it blows a lot of air on the back so you will have lots of dust flying around so better up to open the windows when you do it. Bright side, it can be used as an air blower which can be handy or as a wet vac whenever you have a wet mess. Fairly good pricing.

Tried many vacuums before I gave up and went for Dyson which is like 4-10 times the price of "similar" models available in India which are basically toys for kids, they make sounds but don't do anything...

The problem is that Dyson is extremely overpriced in India but seems to be nearly the only usable option for cordless vacuums (or any vacuum for that matter).
Dyson hasn't the strongest suction or best value, but the rolling brush picks up a lot of debris that other vacuums don't. They're also reliable, very good customer service (if you ever need it) and fairly convenient to use. They're also very long lasting.

I used a few Chinese ones like the Xiaomi/Roidmi ones which are like 1/3 the price which perform extremely well for the price and that would be my go to. But again the problem is like Xiaomi phones they only bring the worst and cheapest models into India and that's only after a long time after they're released elsewhere. If you can get your hands on an import of one of their top models it might be worth it and they perform fairly well.

 

[habibmy]

I would highly recommend Home Assistant, it's beyond incredible what you can achieve with it. The community is huge and very active.

However be mindful of a few things... First the devices wireless or wired aren't available in India but can be sourced from Dubai, Malaysia, Singapore for very cheap.

The problem is either going to get them, or paying customs...

As for reliability I mostly go for wireless devices for sensors which can easily last a couple of years and are very easy to monitor and change batteries once the time comes. They're tiny, thumb sized and very reliable. Almost anything else will need to be wired whether that's an IR/RF/Bluetooth remote for AC/Fans/Electronics (TV, speakers, radios, whatever) or devices that control the curtain rails, lights, water heater, pumps, etc.

The only major advice is to go for devices you can control locally, as internet connection is beyond abysmal here. Also you won't be at the mercy of 3rd party services/APIs which can change or shut down any time. You need an inverter in India as the frequent power cuts will mess up with your devices and they might reset or break.

I can easily say home automation it's one of the best investments you can make, an entertaining hobby and doesn't take a rocket scientist to do it. You can DIY everything.

As for maintenance at least once or twice a year you'll have to sit down for an hour or two to troubleshoot or update things. Usually devices which are controllable locally won't require any changes so you can go on for a long long time without any updates or changes, even years. I've kept my house fully automated and haven't touched my HA for almost 2 years now aside from an important update for things that have changed and are out of my control such as API changes that were used to control certain devices online or to fetch information such as the weather or APIs to send/receive data externally like messaging/push notifications/emails.

Some great examples of home automation.

Voice control for any device whether AC, fans, lights, etc. Fully control them from temperature changes in AC, fan speed, dimming of lights, colors or lights, turning on TV/Soundbar, playing Netflix, whatever.

To leave your home and automatically have all your lights, AC, fans, etc turn off. Same applies once you come back and each one can be tuned to certain conditions like the garage /door lights to turn on only once you're back home and when you open the door during night hours. Same goes for AC based on temperature outside or inside. This fine tuning is what takes the longest bust once you have it or know what to look out for, it's quick. It can be incredibly personalized to anyone's case or situation to a degree things feel almost like witchcraft.

Walking in or out of rooms and have lights automatically turn on or off. Same for fans or AC, you can even have them turn on based on movement/room presence and temperature outdoors or indoors so they only work when required. This is highly customizable so you can have them behave based on patterns or behaviors like you spend more time in a room during daytime, or a device is more used during certain hours. So from those behaviors or patterns you can basically teach it what to do.

Mood lightning so when you're watching TV the curtains get shut and ambience lightning is turned on. When you pause watching whatever you can have other lights turn on or light to turn brighter.

Run robot vacuum automatically when you've left home for a while during certain specified hours once or multiple times a day or in specific dates. You can even put buttons or just use the dashboard or voice to make the vacuum clean specific areas on demand.

House alarm when you're away so you get notified of unusual behaviors like temperature changes, motion sensors, door sensors, window sensors, smoke sensors, etc. You can pair this with a camera and have push notifications on your phone with a the data and even videos/snaps of the camera on the area where the alarm is triggered. You can have a pan tilt zoom camera even move automatically to capture specific areas based on the alarms.

The sky is the limit pretty much. Nowadays whatever you can think of, can be achieved.

As for the initial setup it might take a while, a few hours at least to set up everything from scratch and a few days to configure to your individual needs/ideas.

I forget I had Home Assistant running for years. I am still Home Assistant Apis With telegram bots to control many things in My home. Tasmota and ESPHome works very well with HASS.