Best home automation controller for wifi and IoT

[mistert]

What do you think about this machine? HP DESKTOP600 MINI G3  
 
Looks nice.  Thinking they are discontinued Skylake CPU computers.  I see them on Ebay for around $300.  
 
For testing you can purchase a Levova Tiny M93 off lease computer for around $100 with 4th generation I-Series CPU, 4-8 Gb of RAM and an SSD or SATA hard drive.   Here just purchased one for a Homeseer user in Ireland.   
 
I purchased a few of these a couple of years ago for family desktop computers.  Paid around $200 then with a MS Windows 10 Pro license.

Pete
 
would I be able to run more than one automation software at a time on this small machines?

 

[pete_c]

would I be able to run more than one automation software at a time on this small machines?
 
Yes.
 
Plenty of horsepower with a 4th generation Intel I-Series CPU and 8-16 Gb of RAM.  My HS3 Pro set up is doing this now for a few years.
 
I am doing Homeseer 3, Home Assistant, MQTT, Node Red and a Windows 7e build (Virtual Box) on an even smaller computer that I am tinkering with.

 

[mistert]

Whatever I said that gave you that impression, it wasn't my intention. It's entirely possible to create an attractive UI with openHAB's HABpanel (see examples here). Mapping a widget's elements in HABpanel is no more onerous than in Home Remote. Both lack complex abstractions so you'll be mapping each individual element of an alarm panel or thermostat or lock.
 
I use the term 'mapping' but another term is 'binding'. For example, you must bind a slider control to, say, a light's brightness parameter. You bind a toggle control to a light's powerstate parameter. To represent a thermostat, you might need to use more than a half-dozen controls and bind each one to a parameter (setpoint temperature, ambient temperature, HVAC operating mode, current HVAC state, humidity, fan mode, fan status, etc). 
 
FWIW, there's no need to do mapping/binding in Home Assistant. It supports complex abstractions of common household devices (thermostats, alarm panels, locks, etc). For example, it detects your Ecobee thermostat and creates a named 'entity' (like climate.ecobee). If your thermostat cannot be automatically detected, you would define it manually, specifying the thermostat's type, its desired entity name, etc. Done. The UI will now automatically render your thermostat entity using a stock thermostat card. If you don't like its appearance or placement you can swap the card for another (perhaps a custom card made by a contributing user), reposition it, move it to a new tab in the UI, etc. No need to re-bind/re-map any UI controls/widgets.
 
 
Once you've installed Home Assistant, the level of effort to create the UI is considerably less than THR. However, in the interests of honesty and transparency, the installation of Home Assistant is a chore compared to THR. Remember, with Home Assistant you're installing and configuring a full-blown home automation system whereas THR is a UI builder.
 
This brings me to the topic of deployment. With THR, you use its designer software to create a UI targeted for a specific device's screen-size and operating system. The result is a file that you place on the target device that is running THR's renderer app.
 
I had created one version of a UI for my Android phone and another for my wife's iPhone. Any changes to the UI required modifying both flavors (Android/iOS) and sending (myself and) my wife a new version of the file (as an email attachment). This is not an uncommon deployment technique (for this kind of application). Nevertheless I didn't find it to be very convenient, especially during the initial phase of the UI when it is subject to frequent nips and tucks.
 
openHAB and Home Assistant render their UIs using web technologies so the target device only needs a (modern) browser. Deployment is only a matter of updating the UI and it, of course, becomes immediately available to all devices.
 
A UI created with THR is designed for a specific screen-size (i.e. screen resolution). The UI produced by OH and HA is designed to resize itself to fit the device's available screen-size. To be precise, based on my experiences many months ago, HABpanel didn't resize its UIs all that well (this may have been improved by now). It over-expanded widgets when there was more screen real-estate available. If you compensated by shrinking the original design, it would look too small when viewed on a smaller screen. So it was sort of resolution-specific. In contrast, Home Assistant does a more eye-pleasing job adapting its cards to the available space. For my purposes, I prefer Home Assistant's adaptability but I can understand why someone might want to create a UI optimized for a very specific screen-size.
 
Current drawbacks in HA's UI are:

• It cannot be based on the logged-in user (there's sort of a workaround for it)
• You can't have more than one active UI design (yet another kludge is available).

 
Perhaps a future version will address these issues.
 
 
I really can't say very much about Allonis because what can one really say by seeing only one or two examples? Unless you have access to many other examples, all I can see is what is shown on their web-site, which isn't very much at all. Maybe I'm not looking in the right place? What they do show is, to be honest, rather simple and easily replicated in THR, OH, or HA (and probably all the others you mentioned, except I've never tried them).
 
I think it's also important to mentioned the issue of price. We are comparing products that vary from zero to hundreds of dollars. We should be lowering our expectations (for feature set and product support) when looking at a free product and raising them when considering a product costing a quarter to a half grand. 

Man  I really appreciate the perspectives you are bring to my thinking. Right now I am very busy, so time to really build stuff either comes from not hitting the gym or not spending as much time as I would like with the family. While I may want something that is significantly more polished and higher end looking having something that works for now , that has a lot of my desired features and require significant less time in building,binding and designing the whole platform is probably what I should be considering.
So now I will separate the list by not only the level of effort needed to get the design and integration off the ground but also what you get for a paid vs free/opensource system.

 

[mistert]

Hey guys I think this question goes in here but if not I can move it.
 
Since 2007 I have been using URC CCP to manage my AV devices and it has done me well. unfortunately I am wanting to achieve a bit more control and feedback of these devices and that has become a challenge.
 
URC CCP does not fully support IP 2 way devices, not even using the MX5000/MX6000 or KP4000. Compound that with he fact that Total Control is not open to the Diy user due to URC updated policies I find my self struggling to find a good replacement for a solid handheld remote that can control all my AV gear but that can also integrate with home automation systems be it opensource or paid commercial.
 
I have turned my attention to The Harmony hub based systems, but unfortunately I was informed by a Harmony Rep that they hubs/(hub extender) does not support Zwave or Zigbee devices. Now maybe that is not an issue if the automation software is the traffic cop managing how a command sent for watching TV not only takes into account the time of day ( Shades/ Blinds engagement), the room lighting which could be using any protocol from WIFI to RA2 and or reducing the volume on the sonos playing outside.
 
I know some of you will say this can be done just use an app or something of this sort and while I am aware that is an option I would like to still use the remote is specially since it am a bit hesitant to integrate an always listening and recording device such as Amazon Echo.
 
Question:
 
Anyone else looking for something like this or dealing with similar challenges?
How and what steps are you taking to blend everything together if that is important to you?
Is there any other Handheld remotes that can provide me with feedback and control?
 
Pete and 123: You guys every try and install a custom interface on a remote such as the Savants or URC LCD ones? Something like THR.

 

[pete_c]

every try and install a custom interface on a remote such as the Savants or URC LCD ones? Something like THR
 
No. 
 
Here today automation runs with little interaction or remote control and for the last few years quit watching it.
 
That said a few years ago did hardware mods to O2 / Openpeak tabletops.  7" Gorilla touchscreens running on an Atom CPU and have a built in DECT chip and Zigbee chip.  Created well ahead of their time.  Cloud connected automation devices circa 2009-2010.  Telcos were selling these and Energy companies were selling these for thermostat / Zigbee stuff.  IE: Cisco rebadged this device for VOIP phones and cloud automation.
 
Pending still is using the DECT chip and Zigbee chip in these devices.
 
Modifications done
 
1 - changed EFI boot rom to a Seabios boot rom
2 - added a battery and RTC
3 - added an SSD drive
 
These came with a Gb and WLAN interface.  I am using 15 of these today.  Some wireless and some POE Gb connected.
 
Homeseer 3 manages these screens running Homeseer touch.  Mostly they are in screen saver mode and used for status.
 
Lately been tinkering with the Amazon Show which I was able to integrate with my RTSP IP cameras and for a bit my Samsung Smartthings hub.
 
For a bit did utilize X10 RF to manage my irrigation start up and shut down or for manual operation. 

 

[bucko]

Question
 
Which home automation software has the best high end looking and user friendly interface? Has anyone here heard of The Home Remote?

I was a certified dealer/programmer for OnControls. At it's demise I decided on Home Remote. It does it all, but at a price. I am still trying to wrap my head around getting it the way I want. 
 
However I blame only myself. HR can do it all! Support is stellar and a large community of support to help out. It is the flagship for all things remote. Just takes patience and understanding to set it up. So I would recommend it highly.

 

[bucko]

Earlier post about Hubitat and Elk. It is the most detailed and complete connection between automation and Elk. 
Installing it into Hubitat is easy and straightforward consisting of 4 drivers and 1 app. Very easy to do and works perfect out of the box. 
 
It is so complete you could write all the rules within Hubitat and not even use ELK rules engine. For myself, with some fairly complex automation, I do still also use ELK rules, but more for a redundancy factor AND should Hubitat go down, I can still remote into the ELK and fire rules manually. Never had to use it, but I like contingency plans available.
 
It is the bomb for porting everything ELK.

 

[mistert]

I was a certified dealer/programmer for OnControls. At it's demise I decided on Home Remote. It does it all, but at a price. I am still trying to wrap my head around getting it the way I want. 
 
However I blame only myself. HR can do it all! Support is stellar and a large community of support to help out. It is the flagship for all things remote. Just takes patience and understanding to set it up. So I would recommend it highly.

So Bucko, having read through some of your blog posting , I seem to have pick up on a theme which is that you pick a focal point  and then you build out your system around that focal point. Once that part is done you then build out your system again using the previous focal point.  a few examples I found was your desire for remote connectivity; your efforts for ui control and last system reliability. That said I must ask you which one come first the chicken or the egg. Did you determine your security needs first build that out and then focus on connectivity, or ui/ security.

Do have you used any other automation platform opensource or paid?

I love the potential that THR holds and I even mentioned to Bill that if the designer aspect was made a bit simpler I am sure many people would be willing to pay more for the software and support, something like a combo between URC CCP ,IRULE and Control4. The learning curve is very steep, it took me 2 weeks to create a background that was stable on a 10in tablet. I don't have a lot of time so I want to find a UI that require some work but maybe not as much as THR.

Currently I have the wife's okay to completley connect the new house, but I have to meet a few criteria, It has the be easy for anyone to manage the systems/ Can not take me years for just the basics to work and must have the look of the higher end system without the cost. As Mentioned in my initial post I did have a full HAI/URC/OMNI/Nuvo/UPB setup going and the thing that I loved the most about onmi was the means of writing lines of code. That was a smooth operation. Is the ELK system similar or do I need to learn a whole new code language?

 

[bucko]

I've learned that everything in the Home Automation world is nothing more than a series of trade offs. I have been playing with this stuff since the X-10 days and watching it evolve into an actual usable process as opposed to a "Jetson's" concept. Meaning tech moves on and as the market takes all this more seriously, products get better and smarter.
 
I built my own system peacemeal first. Didn't care how to tie it all together in the beginning. I used components because of their stand alone ability to do their job #1. Elk is a perfect example. Can't get any better with a home security system. 
 
I then stood back and began to figure out how to get all my different systems  talking and working with each other. Enter home control. Started (and wasted 5 years) with Vera. Not a total waste, more of an extreme learning process. Same with remote controls. SQ Blaster came first, then learning remotes, on to OnControls, and finally THR. 
 
Through evolution, trail and error, AND a lot of $$ later I can say I have about as rock solid of a system I could hope for. Sure, sh%t happens from time to time, but I have all the plates spinning now. The demise of OnControls via corporate greed, got me onto THR.
 
I use THR for operating my whole house audio and video systems. Yes I have some home automation thrown in as well as some controls, but for the most part I use it 100% for entertainment purposes. As for Home Automation and Security, I use Hubitat. That's how I do it. I do not roll everything 100% in THR. It is a tough system to master because it is quite powerful. However, I do not have the patience to tweak and program and design in it so I can watch TV. My THR works great, looks ok, and does it's job with all my entertainment things.
 
But now Hubitat is the go to deal to care of all my automation, lights, switches, security, and other tasks that I don't expose here. 
 
Long story short, after several years I am satisfied with my whole situation and Hubitat was a quantum leap in getting it done. WAF is good, but I'll never live down the $$, time and failures she went through as well, so she is somewhat background criticcal of me. But all the while as she goes about loving how her home does so much for her. Hell, I just got a robot window washer that works nice. Since I am up to 6 stories and pushing 70, I'm done balancing on a ledge to clean windows. Cool stuff! Hmmmm maybe Hubitat can do something with it.
 
What's next? Who knows. It's all gone from my carear to my retirement hobby now. 
 
Long story short, I still think you should use THR to build out all your entertainment things. Not so hard really for that purpose. And support is the bomb. Then use Hubitat for your HA things.
 
Keep it seperate.
 
It's just 2 apps your using for control and life is so much easier. Also for company or visiters let them at your entertainmnet remote till the cows come home. Keep them away from everything else.
 
Works for me. 

 

[tmbrown97]

I skimmed this the best I can.  I recently added in Hubitat, and so far I'm pretty happy with it.  I haven't added in security yet for the new house - I'll most likely go with Elk again because I know it works as "mission critical" for security and things like Water Leak alarms - seeing here that Hubitat does it well helps seal the deal.  I like that it seems to have the right mix of local control with cloud when you want it.
 
There were comments about all the copy/paste stuff - but I had to go through that the other day to get Echo announcements working, and it was a piece of cake. 

 

[bucko]

I skimmed this the best I can.  I recently added in Hubitat, and so far I'm pretty happy with it.  I haven't added in security yet for the new house - I'll most likely go with Elk again because I know it works as "mission critical" for security and things like Water Leak alarms - seeing here that Hubitat does it well helps seal the deal.  I like that it seems to have the right mix of local control with cloud when you want it.
 
There were comments about all the copy/paste stuff - but I had to go through that the other day to get Echo announcements working, and it was a piece of cake. 

Working with Hubitat is not about copy/paste gettign apps and drivers installed. I never copy/paste anything with Hubitat. You simply input the URL of the driver, and it is installed. No copy/paste.
If you get the M1, Hubitat is by far the best, fastest, most secure method talking with ELk.

 

[123]

… It is so complete you could write all the rules within Hubitat and not even use ELK rules engine.
… It is the bomb for porting everything ELK.
… Hubitat is by far the best, fastest, most secure method talking with ELk.

 
Quite the avid endorsement. How many ELK integrations did you research to arrive at this glowing conclusion?
 
 
ELK integrations have been around for over ten years. I can state that with confidence because I developed one for Premise a decade ago. It supports:

1. Areas
2. Zones
3. Outputs
4. PLC Devices (Dimmers and Switches)
5. Keypads
6. Thermostats
7. Temperature Probes
8. Tasks
9. Voice

It also syncs the M1's clock, allows viewing of its logs, and a few more features. However, it's hardly unique because the same can be said for the long-established ELK integration created by "UltraJones" for Homeseer. Same goes for Dean Roddey's excellent ELK M1 driver for CQC. There's also a very complete ELK integration available for Home Assistant. Hubitat's ELK integration is just the latest in a long line of ELK integrations and not even the "best, fastest, most secure method talking with ELk". That's true if it's qualified with: compared to SmartThings ...
 
FWIW, I migrated most of my rules out of my ELK M1 and into Premise, years before Hubitat even came into being. The M1's rules engine can be coerced into doing some clever things but just about any modern home automation software allows for more complex automations.
 
Hubitat is a fine home automation hub. That's not damning with faint praise, just my honest (non-hyperbolic) assessment. There are aspects I like:

• Good bang for the buck.
• Enthusiastic and responsive development team.
• Frequent releases and bug fixes.
• Helpful community.
• Free cloud access.
• Very good support for Zigbee and Z-Wave devices.

and several aspects that reflect upon its relative "newness" to the market:

• Inability to export and share rules. Bruce said it was too difficult and wasn't needed. So everybody shares them as screenshots on the forum. :huh:
• Limited support for anything that isn't based on ZigBee or Z-Wave.
• No support for cameras.
• Very simplistic UI with limited customization.
• Outdated tutorials and references materials (although I've seen recent improvements).
• No official support for MQTT (user-contributed beta in progress).

 

[bucko]

I came from a Vera 1 and 2 that I pounded away at for 5 years before throwing in the towel and getting with Hubitat. 
While NO controller is perfect, Hubitat has all the hallmarks of a controller that just works. Fast, powerful, hugh community support, great price point, great Elk M1 integration, LAN based, no cloud dependancy, secure, and well supported by the company, don't have to be a coder to make it work, stable and reliable.
That's the end of it for me. It's just that simple.

 

[upstatemike]

Reading this thread has me thinking I should make myself an updated HA Controller Index spreadsheet. If I put controllers across the top and interfaces/features down the side it should make it pretty easy to see what controllers are rising to the top of the heap. On the interfaces/features I'll put "Deal Breakers" at the top and "Nice To Have" below.
 
I think my list of controllers would be:
 
Homeseer3
Homeseer4
CQC
Home Assistant
Smartthings
Hubitat
Polisys
 
My list of deal breaker interfaces/features would be:
 
TTS (multiple voice fonts would be a nice bonus)
Insteon (via ISY or just PLM)
Elk M1
Alexa
Land Line Caller ID (Don't care what modem hardware it uses)
Weatherflow
Hue
Lifx
Harmony
Sonos
LMS/Squeezebox
HTD Audio
Z-Wave
Zigbee
Nest (or whatever thermostat I end up changing to)
Blue Iris (only need it to incorporate video streams into displays)
Able to use cheap Fire tablets for displays
 
This is something anybody can do by simply substituting their own preferences for controllers and interfaces/features. I would think it should highlight a "best choice" for most people so they could feel confident that they have made the right controller selection.

 

[upstatemike]

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Was there supposed to be functioning link to something?