Home Automation Hub - Motion Lighting

I had a Wink 1 and a Wink 2. Really liked them. Did not need any extra features. Wink is going out of business. I have 18 zigbee lights (Sylvania Osram and Cree), an Ecobee Thermostat, a Z-Wave switch, and some Ecolink door sensors. If you have used the Wink Hubs you can use these. Most annoying Wink feature? When the power goes out and everything comes back up, the Hub would not work without a reboot AFTER the router came up. So if I was away, and the power went out, and I looked at my IP cameras to see that 18 lights are burning at 100%, my hub would not work and I could not turn them off remotely. No good.The Hubitat WORKS after a power outage. Power comes on, modem and router come up, and hubitat works. As it should be. I don't have to reset things. If the power comes back on while I am in bed, I can just keep my eyes closed for a few minutes, then mumble "Alexa, turn on bedtime lights" and all the lights set themselves correctly. SOOOOOO much better then getting up at 3 am and rebooting routers and hubs. Ugh. Bye Wink.AndTHE LACK OF A PHONE APP DOES NOT MATTER. Once set up, Alexa or Google Assistant (GA) are your phone apps. Everything on the Hubitat can be synced to GA and/or Alexa. I control my lights remotely using Alexa whenever necessary. No Worries! You don't need an extra phone app. It is just not a concern.Setup? Not that bad. There is a bit of a learning curve with the browser-based interface. But for most simple smart home setups with some lights, a few plugs, and maybe a lock, it is pretty easy. Just do this:Don't even worry about "apps" in the interface. Not yet. Just "Add devices" from the "Devices" tab. Follow manufactures instructions to put devices into pairing mode and carry your laptop around the house from device to device. (To reset Osram bulbs: On, count to three, Off, count to three, On, count to three, Off, count to three...Do this FIVE times and then leave on and wait 5 seconds and the light will flash (pairing mode). For Cree, do this, counting time: On, Off, 1, 2, On, Off, 1, 2, On, Off, 1, 2, then On. On the THIRD on, the light will flash (pairing mode)).Once all of your devices are paired (up to an hour or two, no matter WHAT hub you get), go to the Apps tab and add the Alexa and/or Google Assistant app. You will have to tell the Alexa/GA apps WHAT devices to control (there is a "Select All" option). Then go to your phone, open the correct app (Alexa or GA) and Discover Devices. Then use Alexa or GA on your phone to set up groups (living room lights) and routines (bed time lights). It is not NEARLY as hard as reviews would lead you to believe. It is tedious to switch hubs. No getting around that. But this is a good hub. Works well. Seems bullet proof. Runs locally on your LAN. Does not go through external servers to work (Wink does/did). Note: Using Alexa or GA to control your home DOES require passing through external Internet servers as these devices only work if they pass through their respective servers. But, if the Internet is down but you have power, you can use your laptop to control your smart home. Otherwise...the hub essentially DOES require the Internet because you are using Internet devices to interact with it.The other app you need to install is the Dashboard app. But you DON'T NEED IT. AT ALL. You can stop your Hubitat setup as soon as your devices are discovered and your smart home apps are activated. The Dashboard gives you a fancy browser-based interface with all of your devices neatly lined up, with icons, so you can click on them to turn them on/off/dim (YOU have to set it up). But you don't really need to do this. Only if you want to poke around with your smart home on your computer. For the average Alexa end-user, just add devices, add Alexa, add All Devices to Alexa, then use Alexa to discover devices. Then Group devices, then set up Routines. Begin telling Alexa to control your home. Done. When you run into a road-block, use YouTube to get help. (Like if a device shows "on" in devices tab, but Alexa has turned it off, you can click "configure" and then "save" and it will likely fix the issue. Got that from YouTube.)It is pretty easy, but I did spend a about 4-6 hours setting everything up, including learning curve, watching a couple of youtube videos, and resetting all of my bulbs and routines. Not that bad. I am REALLY glad I switched. So much more responsive and everything works after a power outage. Just all around better than the Wink.The Rule Machine app is useful. It is basically an ITTT interface. I set up my front porch light as follows "turn light on, 30 mins before sunset. Turn light off, 30 mins after sunrise." I had to do it twice to figure out the interface and what to click on. Took a youtube video and about 15 minutes the first time. But now I have an automated front porch light. Pretty cool. But not necessary. You don't need the Rule Machine app. Or the Dashboard app. Just extras if you want to use them.If you have already set up you...

If you are dipping your toes into home automation & just want turn a couple of smart lights on/off using your voice assistant, then this product is not for you - overkill by far. However, if 1) you've invested in a bunch of z-wave and /or zigby switches, sensors, & door locks, 2) are tired of poor performance & lag times using cloud-based hubs from 'well -known' companies (with sketchy business plans), or 3) desire more flexibility / control for your home automation dreams, then look no further...After refusing to be stiff -armed into signing up for a monthly subscription to maintain functionality of our existing smart hub, we decided to give Hubitat a try and have been extremely pleased. Will try to summarize a few thoughts:PROS- Size (no larger than a man's wallet)- No cloud required (registration enables remote access, else do not need internet for normal hub functionality)- Alexa integration (Alexa skill works great)- Performance (control of devices has gone from a few seconds delay to INSTANT)- Community (vibrant online community is extremely helpful w/ tons of info & advice for almost any scenario you can think of)CONS- LAN only (lack of wi-fi is not a big deal for me, but it may be for others)- Ancient GUI (IOS app & web interface is strange at first...definitely vintage stuff)- Product support (was not able to get responses to basic feature questions /issues...though, see Community PRO above. However, I must say that firmware updates are provided fairly often which is a good thing)- Learning Curve (takes a bit to grok the hubitat way of getting things done & there are definitely a few quirks. I would not recd to friends or family unless you are planning on being their 24/7 tech support)Have had the hubitat up /running for a few months with no real hiccups...it just works. I'm not really a power user & mainly needed a z-wave hub with Alexa support that allows me to manually control various lights & dimmers, plus program devices based on regular schedules & motion activation for certain areas. Adding /removing z-wave devices was a snap compared to other hubs that I've used. Best thing is that our smart home won't go down should Hubitat ever be unable to pay their cloud hosting bill... ;)

I have been a long time SmartThings user, and really like the ability to develop my own drivers and apps. However, I have longed for a home automation hub that runs locally and keeps my data local. Recent ST cloud platform outages have been frustrating. The Hubitat Elevation hub is a great solution, running everything locally while still allowing for local-to-cloud integrations via a secure cloud endpoint server (i.e. no port forwarding required on your router.) It also allows for reuse of existing code with some minor changes. Hubitat Elevation supports a wide variety of Zigbee, Z-Wave, LAN connected, and cloud connected devices/services. The engineering and support team are very responsive as well. Check out the very active and thriving community site.I purchased my Hubitat Elevation hub in late February/ early March when it was initially released. The platform has been evolving rapidly since then, with each firmware release adding support for additional devices and new integrations. I would recommend you join the Hubitat Community and ask if your specific devices are already supported. The Hubitat team definitely listens to their users and adds device support regularly. There are also community developed drivers and apps available for the DIY'rs.

After Wink decided to switch to a subscription model with a one-week notice (bye, bye Wink), I had to find an alternative smart home controller. The Hubitat appealed to me because it can be used without relying on a cloud service.About two hours after receiving it, I had my Hubitat set up with the same lighting controls that the Wink had handled the day before. Everything is back online, and if anything the voice control of my lights through Alexa is significantly more responsive. A few things to mention:(1) The Hubitat is surprisingly small, and must be plugged into your home router with an included Ethernet cable. That means that my Hubitat is in my basement, but it seems to have no problem controlling the lights in my house.(2) You'll need to log into the Hubitat web interface through your own home network in order to configure it. If you don't understand what I just wrote, then the Hubitat is NOT for you. Get a SmartThings hub instead.(3) At the very least you'll want to add the "Alexa Echo Skill", the "Hubitat Dashboard", and the "Simple Automation Rules" apps to your configuration. Doing that will get you the same functionality that Wink provided.(5) Download the Hubitat app to your smartphone, and then you'll be able to use the dashboard to operate your system via iOS or Android.I've really only begun to tap into the potential of this device. It appears (among other things) that I'll be able to use geofencing to activate / deactivate devices when the Hubitat senses that my iPhone has connected to my home network. That will be my next project. But for now I'm extremely happy with the Hubitat, and can recommend it highly to those who are ready to leave the Wink ecosystem.

Coming from Samsung Smart Things, I. was able to port all my rules and sensors off to Hubitat in a few hours. Please be warned that this device is not for beginners who have never setup a smart hub and or have no knowledge of computer programming at all. I came from Samsung because of their recent notice that they were discontinuing their Classic App. I was concerned about my custom Apps no longer working (mostly Webcore). Upon further research I learned that the Hubitat hub does local processing vs cloud processing that the SmartThing does. After reading that I decided to go with a Hubitat regardless if the migration from the Classic App broke webcore or not. The local processing on this unit is basically why I went for it. If you have used SmarThings you would understand how frustrating the latency issues are with the cloud process.That being said, if you a beginner that has never touched a Smart hub before and willing to learn there are documentations out there but it will take you a while to research on how to setup rules and make it work the way you want it to do. As for my experience with basic knowledge of computer programming having used WebCore on Smart Things helped a lot for me, and so porting all my rules and sensors and Hubitat was painless. I would suggest going that route if you would want to learn how to program rules and sensors.