My smart home in 2017
I’ve been building out my smart home for the last couple of years, and now HomeKit is finally starting to mature so are the range of devices available.
Goals
- Seamless control and automation of devices through as few apps as possible
- Ease of operation via physical controls without the need to always use an app
- Automation of scenes
- Flexible and expandable over time
- Secure
My collection started about 5 years ago with the purchase of some LightwaveRF switches and sockets. These appealed to me because they allowed smartphone control but also had physical switches which meant that I didn’t have to use my phone to control my lights. Also, if the Internet failed, I could still control things. Over the years, I’ve added more and more devices which resulted in an array of apps to control everything. When Apple announced HomeKit in 2014, I was really excited at the prospect of being able to control everything with one app, but more importantly the ability for things to become really smart, not just convenient.
For that reason, since HomeKit was announced, I’ve made an effort to only buy (where possible) HomeKit compatible devices. This is easier said than done as Apple impose some pretty strict requirements, one of which is to include a proprietary chip for security purposes. This means for older devices, becoming HomeKit compatible isn’t just a software update, but a hardware refresh too.
Whilst I wait for HomeKit devices to becomes available, there’s a great open source platform called HomeBridge which is a NodeJS server to expose non HomeKit compatible devices via a HomeKit bridge. I’ve setup a Raspberry PI running HomeBridge to enable me to control almost all devices via the Home app. Read on to see what I’m using.
Control
Alexa
Whilst Alexa isn’t HomeKit compatible, it does allow control for a number of products that I already have such as Philips Hue, Tado and Lightwave. I currently have a single Echo Dot but rarely use voice as a mechanism to control devices – especially lights as the latency is too high. Instead Alexa is quite useful for setting scenes which control multiple devices.
Home
The Home app that came with iOS10 is the default place for me to get an overview of the status of each device and control scenes and set automation. It isn’t designed to replace every function of 3rd party apps, but does gives enough ‘everyday’ control to avoid having to open multiple apps to get the basics done.
HomeBridge
HomeBridge is HomeKit for the impatient. It’s a NodeJS server that uses a platform of plugins to expose none HomeKit compatible devices to be controlled via Home and other compatible apps.
Security
Keeping my home, it’s contents and my family secure is a top priority for me. I wanted to be able to see (and hear) what was going on when I was away and be informed of any intrusion or disturbances.
Ring
The Ring video doorbell does a couple of things:
- Sends a push notification to connected phones when the doorbell is pressed. You can then have a two way video chat with whoever is at the door.
- Has smart notifications that can detect motion in specific zones at specific times of the day.
With a HomeBridge plugin, I can use both of these events to control automations in the rest of the house. Currently if doorbell is pressed after dusk, the hall lights will automatically come on and if repeated motion is detected between midnight and 6am the hall lights will flash red.
Smanos
I setup a Smanos X500 wireless alarm with door and PIR sensors. I opted for a GSM model that takes a regular SIM card to add the smarts. This functions as a regular standalone alarm, but then when the alarm is triggered will also send an SMS to connected phones with the zones that triggered the alarm. I can also send an SMS command to arm/disarm the system in addition to seeing the status. It also features two way audio so you can listen in to whatever is going on. The system is also fully expandable with a wide range of accessories.
There’s no HomeKit integration, but I’m currently writing a HomeBridge plugin that will send the relevant SMS commands to arm/disarm the system. I’ll then tie these in to the Good Night and Wake Up automations.
Motorola Hubble
So that I can see what’s happening inside of the house, I have a couple of Motorola camera’s dotted around. These were under £50 and are fairly basic, but allow me to get a view of what’s happening in certain rooms when we’re not at home.
Lighting & Power
This is probably the easiest way to get going with a smart home, thanks to the wide adoption of Philips Hue. IKEA have also just announced that they are entering the smart lighting market with a new range of devices. I have a mixture of smart bulbs (Hue) and smart switches (Lightwave) to control all of the lighting in the house.
Philips Hue
Hue is really easy to get started with as you literally can replace a bulb, pair it with a hub and you’re good to go. I’ve limited Hue to floor/table lamps and accent lighting only. Hue is only smart when it receives power, so if it’s in a mains ceiling light and the switch is turned off, you’re left with a very expensive dumb bulb. By pairing Hue lights with a remote control, I’m able to easily control scenes without always needing to use my phone. I tend not to use the colour options with Hue, but I do change the warmth of the light throughout the day. For example, I wake up to an ‘energised’ light in the morning, and go to bed with a more relaxing light.
LightwaveRF
For the mains lighting, I’ve replaced every switch with a LightwaveRF smart dimmer. These optionally communicate with a hub, remote controls and mobile apps. Whilst there’s no native HomeKit support, a great HomeBridge plugin allows full control through the Home app. The only downside (and this is a limitation of the Lightwave tech), is that it’s not possible to read the status of a switch. This means that the status within the Home app doesn’t match the state of the switch all of the time (i.e turn the light on in Home and off with the actual switch, Home will still think it’s on). This is a minor annoyance as an additional tap within the app will get everything in sync again.
I currently have timers setup to turn outside lights on at dusk and off again when I go to bed. When paired with a motion sensor, I can also turn off lights in rooms when no motion has been detected for a specified time.
In addition to the light switches, I also have installed a number of power sockets that work in the same way.
Elgato Eve
I’ve recently purchased a couple of Elgato Eve Energy sockets to control devices where I wanted to monitor the energy usage. These have native HomeKit support as well as a button to control locally. The Eve app allows you to enter an energy price per kWh and then see a breakdown of usage and a projected cost based on usage history.
Heating
I spent quite a long time looking at various smart thermostats that met the requiements I had:
- Multi zone support
- Smart valve support
- Multi-user geo location
- Easy scheduling
- Manual overrides
- Full hot water control
The Tado° system ticks all of these boxes plus aligns to my overall objectives of manual control, with a layer of smarts ontop. The smart valves also allow me to set a specific temperature for a room, whilst heating other rooms (or turning the heat off all together to save energy). Practically, this allows me to set the temperature of my daughters room to a constant 17°, and also only heating the bedroom for an hour before she normally goes to bed. Because each valve has its own thermostat, this ensures that they are all heated evenly.
I’m also able to schedule each zone independently of each other, saving energy by only heating the areas of the house that are in use. You can enter the details from your last bill to show the projected savings from using the system too.
Native HomeKit support is on the way soon via a new hub.
Audio
I’ve recently bought in to the Sonos ecosystem. Previously I’d used AirPlay via a few Airport Express’s plugged in to powered speakers. Whilst this worked great, it was a pretty cumbersome setup. Since moving to my new house, I’ve added Play 1's to each room and a Playbar in the lounge. The sound quality of the Play 1 is unrivalled for the price and size, plus the ability to group zones and stream from a range of services in a single app is great.
Whilst there’s no native HomeKit support, a HomeBridge plugin does allow for basic stop/start and volume control. Apple doesn’t currently support a music type device in HomeKit (that allows you to select a playlist, change track etc), so hopefully when this is added in the future, I’ll be able to automate scenes with specific playlists, i.e Relax mode will dim the lights and start playing Bonobo.
