I Tried Building the PERFECT Smart Home: What I Learned (Mistakes Included)
Affiliate links to Smart Home Tech I used and had lots of success with:
Kara Light Switch: https://amzn.to/40PwC1V
Hue Motion Sensor: https://amzn.to/3Vl1OVO
Hue Light Bulbs: https://amzn.to/3AFS1Qv
Lutron Switches (Requires Hub): https://amzn.to/3HrhIIa
Aqara Temp and Humidity Sensor (Requires Hub): https://amzn.to/3oSelDO
Tapo Smart Plug: https://amzn.to/4295JqN
Affiliate links to YouTube gear I use:
Sony a7siii: https://go.magik.ly/ml/1qb8i/
Sony A7c: https://go.magik.ly/ml/1qb8k/
14in M1 Pro MacBook Pro: https://go.magik.ly/ml/1qb83/
Mac Studio: https://go.magik.ly/ml/1qb8o/
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:00 What’s the Goal?
1:50 What Needs Automating?
2:40 What Devices Do We Need?
5:53 Smart Home Standards
7:53 Smart Home Ecosystem
10:23 Home Assistant
12:21 Conclusion
Let’s talk about what I learned trying to make this house smart, this includes all the things I would do differently with everything I know now. That’s the idea, make things more convenient and make less things for me to worry about, which you’re about to see from me, actually leads to a lot of inconveniences itself.
We’ll need a way to control the ceiling fan, the 3 lamps, and the blinds. We also need something that can tell when someone is in the room, and a way to tell how hot or cold this room is. So, what devices are available to do these tasks? If you’re trying to control lights, you have smart bulbs, smart plugs, and smart light switches. Each have their own pros and cons and really you have to figure out for yourself what’s best to use for your situation. As for the ceiling fan, I’m going to use a smart switch since I don’t care about the fan speed and the fan will only be kept on medium anyway when I have it on. Now the hardest part was finding devices for the blinds. I had to purchase these aqara E1 drivers, to smartify and motorize these existing blinds.
To solve the remaining items, we’ll need to use sensors. These are the “eyes” of your smart home. These can be used for your smart home to understand what’s happening in your house and can be used in your home automations. And sometimes you can actually find multi-purpose sensors that have more than one sensor built in. Like the one I have right here. The Philips Hue motion sensor, has a motion, illuminance and temperature sensor all built into this single device.
The primary smart home ecosystems are Alexa, google home, and Apple Home or Homekit. You have to be careful using one because you have to be on the lookout to see if your specific ecosystem is supported by the device or hub that controls all these devices. So it requires a bit of research to make sure you have the right device. These systems don’t talk to each other and you get stuck in a situation where a bunch of devices only work on one platform but not the other. So my solution for a while was to just use both google home and apple home and use them for different things.
Home Assistant is a tool that enables you to consolidate pretty much all your smart home devices and more like your NAS into a single point. And from there it can behave as your smart home letting you control all your devices in the Home Assistant app, or then route all of your devices back to your desired smart home ecosystem even if they were not originally supported by that ecosystem. See this TP-link motion controlled light switch? It’s not Apple Home compatible, but with Home assistant controlling it, it can be used in Apple Home. Home assistant also has super robust automations that let you make some really complex stuff. The level of customization Home Assistant provides is fantastic. That being said, it has its own issues too, some integrations with Home Assistant aren’t very good and doesn’t work the way you’d expect. Home Assistant also requires being a bit techy to fully setup, and since the automations are so robust, it’s easy to make a mistake that leads to unintended consequences, like the lights turning on randomly at midnight causing your significant other to wake up. So if you’re willing to spend some time with it, it can definitely enhance your smart home, and make it so much better as long as you’re aware of its limitations.
So here’s a summary of all my tips. Research what you’re buying, make sure they’re compatible with everything you use now and in the near future, use 3rd party platforms like Home assistant to further consolidate what you need and force compatibility for the devices that aren’t compatible with your smart home ecosystem and use it to control all the automations in a single place. And take it one room at a time to keep the end goal in sight.
Does anyone know if there are light bulbs or timer systems that you can set an “away” schedule to when you’re away on vacation for example, that would simulate people still being in the home by switching lights or devices like a tv on and off at different times BUT not always at the same times so that it doesn’t look programmed?
Help! I want to start setting up a smart home for my parents as it can greatly help make their lives easier and i enjoy tinkering with these things. I just want to start out with lights, fans and such and have no issues with that. But i need to ensure that 1) i dont want to use a hub if i can get away with it 2) whatever app i use is compatible and able to have multiple users in control 3) minimally invasive, easy to use. They simply want to turn everything on/off with their phones, control whatever i set up like the sprinklers and such in the future. Any suggestions?
I subscribed when you muted yourself when you say Alexa !!
here to see whats the next big thing in smart home.
Bro, I really like your brown leather computer chair, where can I buy that?
Great to review all your devices and see if they are matter compatible…… It now MATTERS.
then, you can buy a smart brain, too. one that has no grammatical errors.
Im a tech junkie. I have been installing smart homes for about 15 years now. to add to his selection on electrical you can also get smart outlets. as well as outdoor smart plug in outlets. some products have dimmer control. to give some ideas in my home i have 17 controllable devices. the light on my fish tank it turns on 15 min before sunrise and off at sunset, my air compressor, the ‘im going to kill myself trying to find the pull string light in the back of my basement’, i have an outlet in my kitchen. plug in a crock pot. load it up. turn it on at 11 come home at 4… I have clients that get into it simply because they recognize the value with home resale. some is simple safety. say a keyless deadbolt you can control. the same lock you can set to A. lock automatically it has been left unlocked 30sec. and B. Unlock and stay unlocked if the homes life safety alarms go off (smoke carbon or heat.. big or electrical fire, there isn’t alot of smoke) in the end it is a very very deep rabbit hole. i tell my clients a Smart home is like a microwave, until you have one you dont get it and once you have one you cant go without. youll be running to the store. for older clients a simple motion in the hallway to turn on the light for them at night stay on 5 mins and shut off. the list goes on and on
I’ve always wanted to automate my toilet. When I open the lid, I want a voice to say "Welcome Master"
It always starts with a light bulb !!
I just bought those Tapo smart switches and now I have a Google Nest home, 2 more smart switches, 4 different smart light bulbs, and I’m looking for more…… I just moved into this place omg.
White Kimberly Jones Karen Anderson Kimberly
Brown Ronald Hall Maria Wilson Kimberly
I literally started with a light bulb
"Where here to spend hundreds of hours now, to save minutes later…"
The most honest smart home review.
Dude, as a moderately techie guy who has stood at the edge of the rabbit hole and stared down into the abyss; I wanted to say thank you. The video was well done, caused me laugh quite a few times, and made me second guess my decisions.
Thank you Jimmy for Trying
How to spend a month to set up the house, to save few days of your life 😉
Hello I’m curious, I am trying to set up a handful of cameras inside my one bedroom apartment, running an experiment, I do not want Wireless, I want everything fully analog tethered to motion sensors, I want the feed to go to one hard drive that I can just access the footage by plugging in that hard drive to my laptop and watch it through VLC player, I want no other bells and whistles outside of the obvious audio, Does anyone have any recommendations for a possible bulk purchase to achieve this? I’m imagining it would be a total of about five cameras only, but again I want them completely in sync at all times with zero Wi-Fi or Bluetooth nonsense, no interface outside of saving the footage to a hard drive then I will then use my laptop as a screen too pick and choose what I view, doable?
My Smarthome was a mess of apps, switches, voice commands and some automations as well. And just because I built my one NAS with unraid, i stumbled over Home Assistant… OH MY GOD!
I know thar feeling, when you first see ALL your devices and some you did not even know you can integrate (my security cameras have temperature sensors and I can even tap into their motions sensors)… Finally my home is really getting smart.
I don’t need an automatic fan….mine in the bedroom runs 24-7-365 days a year! I am moving into a new home and trying to get set up. I am using everything compatible with Ring and Alexia. What is your opinion on the best TV that I can use Alexia through??
❤
Yeah home assist, I used to run it on an old raspberry. What do you run it on ?
hahahha Alexa always has something to make you laugh, I think it’s top tier tech for home. That and my vionentus wallet with airtag slot made my daily life more stylish
I have a nest doorbell that I hate. Someone rings the bell and it takes forever to show who is there
Give Lutron Caseta a try when it comes down to you controlling lights. Great user interface and integrates well.
"it starts with just a single lightbulb"
wise words dude wise words hahahahaha same here. and now i’m head deep into a home assistant server setup adding matter devices, presence and zone detection sensors, flashing ESP32 controller boards with WLED and adding tablets to my walls with a map of my home…
but you know what? i love it. it’s my way to wind down on a friday evening. or let me correct that actually: it’s my way to be frustrated over why i can’t get sth to work only to realize at 2am that the issue was in my line of sight all along lmao. but again: i love it.
Very helpful
How did this video find me as I fall down the smart home rabbit hole
I love how he said it starts with the light bulb, cuz that’s exactly how I got here. 😂 do I stop and turn this off now? Forget it ever existed?
Big tip: Never name your child Alexa. You will ruin her life and yours, trust me…
Why did you censor alexia and amazon is some parts of the video? Lol
I love this video! Saving it to my future smart house playlist
I do not like to connect to wifi directly. Are there any HUB or bridge that support these switches?
Well that was very useful, thank you! Having a conversation with the family about what we want before we start is definitely a good idea. I think I want something at the "dumber" end of the smart home spectrum so I’ll stick with Google compatible products to smarten my home. A routine that will switch on the lights when I park on my drive will be useful – I suspect that will involve a compatible smart alarm system.
3:33 whaaaat? The last option??? LOL
Thanks
I previously owned a home and I installed 67-69 Insteon Devices operated by Indigo 6. When I sold my home I left the setup as is and moved to Florida where we bought a new home that about 6 Lutron Devices installed. I brought with me 10-15 new and used Insteon Devices. Just before Insteon went under I bought a new Hub. The light was red then green then nothing at all.
I am an Apple guy but I purchased a Raspberry Pi 400 and loaded the Home Assistant software and gave up after giving it a real try. I purchased a PLM for my Insteon Devices.
I am 76 years old and love tinkering on my older iMac 27s.
Questions:
• Will HA allow me to use my Insteon Devices that I currently have installed in my newer home and will I be able to control my Lutron Devices?
• I currently have no wireless control of my Insteon Devices, only my Lutron Devices but I did manage to setup some scenes with my Insteon Devices.
I just need wireless control of my Insteon Devices.
• Am I correct in thinking that HA will allow me to control Insteon & Lutron Devices?
•• This was a great video by the way😁!
OMG! Exactly! My spouse is always asking which system we use to do things. Backstory: I have always been an Apple person, but before Homekit got much better a couple of years ago, I used Google Home for all my home stuff. DropCam, rebranded as Nest and then bought by Google, paved the way for that. The cameras were great, so it was a combo of quality of product, with the Google search engine pretty much owning the internet that got me to invest in smart displays in the house, and then nest doorbells, so I could see who was outside, and then Nest thermostats and smoke detectors to round things out for the backbones of my home’s system. And the wisest choice I made was to replace all of my dimmers and switches with Lutron Caseta, which has always been rock-solid and reliable. But Google has this history of buying other companies, developing new products, and abruptly either losing interest in them or discontinuing them, which has been upsetting when you’ve invested thousands of dollars. Then, they created these two-system problems with legacy products that only worked in the Nest app and other newer products that only worked in the latest Google Home app! So, while we were all promised that they were working on getting that addressed so folks didn’t have to use two different apps, everyone had to use one app for old cameras and products and another app for the new stuff. And around that time, Apple updated Homekit and improved the app. So, I decided to move to Apple since I already use all Apple devices and services. Lutron, again, is marvelous. Works well under both systems. But many other companies like TP-Link/Kasa, Wemo, or Nanoleaf were half and half.
Some of their products were Homekit, and others were not. Then Matter/Thread…ugh. The anticipation was great, and I immediately went out and replaced my smart bulbs with Nanoleaf bulbs that had thread. They seemed ok and worked in my Apple setup, so I bought more, thinking they were the same bulb but not noticing that instead of saying "thread," they instead said "Matter." The setup was different, and I couldn’t figure out why my older a19 Essentials bulbs (which weren’t that old) had different setup procedures from the new a19 Essentials bulbs. I finally figured out the difference. At this point, years later, I’m exhausted. LOL. I feel that when the smart home industry is figuring out how to play with each other, companies like Lutron & Philips are safe choices, even if they require their own hubs and then talk to various home assistants. I am okay with having a few tiny boxes in my data closet. They don’t take up any space and plug into my switch connected to my router. They have been very reliable. I’ve never once had issues with my Lutron hubs or accessing my lights connected to Caseta switches. Smart bulbs, though, are finicky creatures, whether WIFI-based or thread/matter. I always breathe a little sigh of relief when they operate correctly.
Another thing about Lutron is that they are easy to reach by phone. When I’ve called to ask a question, I have almost always gotten through to a person who quickly knows the answer. I love a deep pockets company that knows its stuff. Anyway, long story endless (sorry for the monolithic monologue), we are getting there with more cohesive products. Still, the takeaway is that you can definitely throw money down the hole. Things are changing quickly, and future-proof seems like a myth.
You are missing one more app to your list, the Watt for Smart Devices (for your tapo and Kasa devices)
I started with a camera. Then bought an alexa. Realized that the camera brand isn’t fully integrated with Alexa. Ended up returning the camera, now I bought a lightbulb then realized that alexa doesn’t have the flexibility that I wanted for the light bulb. So considering returning the alexa for the nest. Then I did some search it seems that alexa works better than the nest. So I’m confused. LOL
What is that lamp at 2:14? Who makes it? Cool lamp. Great video!
You have a real knack for explaining things clearly. Keep it up!
Thank you very much. You have given us a lot to think about. You mentioned and showed us the Home Assist device, can you provide a link for us please? We are based in the UK and use Google Assist.
Pls keep posting
HA 👍
Thanks for the video. Good idea with doing a room at a time. I’ve definitely jumped down the HA wormhole / rabbit-hole and I’m loving it! Setting up my Home Office to go into YouTube filming mode is my next step. I had a raspberry Pi laying around and an ikea Zigbee hub. I’m going to buy a Zigbee / Z-wave / whatever is the best and cheapest! I’m thinking building some WLEDs + ESP32’s for the bedroom, Kitchen and Living room will be straight after I setup the office.
It makes us wonder if it really makes any sense. Okay, it’s cool, but does it make sense? His statement is even better than the video – and the video is great!
The more I look into smart home stuff the more I realize I don’t need that crap. Ok I stopped here at 6:45. This smart home stuff is just stupid. I might find one thing that my be practical one day, who knows.
i hate saying hey google or hey siri.
just long press my phones power button, say "turn on lights". back in pocket or waist side within 2 secs.
feel like james bond every time ….
Bro ur a genius there is a lot to learn 👏🏽