Best smart Socket/Plug

eddiem74

SachaJ wrote: »

If anyone's after a z-wave plug I'm liking the Aeotec Smart Switch 6. I'm still figuring it out but seemed to integrate into HomeSeer fairly easily.

+1 using it with Fibaro HC2 controller for dishwasher, washing machine and dryer monitoring and push notifications to family members when power cycles are finished. Also using the prior version 5 for weekly sky box reboot.

Mach Two

Mach Two wrote: »

I am looking for a smart socket. Something that will switch on/off a socket remotely using mobile preferably. There seems to be so many gadgets out there that I don't know what does what.

Thanks to everyone for your replies.

Mach Two

Can anyone tell me if the Logitech plug mount works in Ireland. As in is it a standard 3 pin plug.

afatbollix

afatbollix wrote: »

Need a smart plug for the Christmas tree lights. I don't need to worry about ampage.

Would like Alexa control and be able to set schedules.

Would rather not have to get a hub. Any recommendations? The cheaper the better!

Went for this one.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01IBUF48S?ref=emc_b_5_t

It's not the cheapest but at least I'll know it works and hubless is good for me.

Black_Knight

afatbollix wrote: »

Went for this one.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01IBUF48S?ref=emc_b_5_t

It's not the cheapest but at least I'll know it works and hubless is good for me.

Curry's, Harvey Norman etc have this for cheaper. €35.
http://www.harveynorman.ie/computing/networking-and-connectivity/security-safety/tp-link-wi-fi-smart-plug-with-energy-monitoring-hs110.html

Cheaper again if you weren't bothered about measuring power usage (HS100 for €30). Likely drop to ~£16 for black Friday on Amazon (based on them costing £16 on prime day in the summer)

Alexa can turn them on/off by voice command. For schedules, just use the Kasa app (it's the app for setting up these TP-link devices).

TitianGerm

Are there any smart plugs that can be controlled directly with the Harmony Elite Remote?

thecivvie

As my HS100 seems to have issues with my mobile broadband, I am wondering What would be better hub wise. Limited funds so need to careful

Mach Two

I have purchased a "hive hub". Anybody know what are the pros and cons of it. It came with two smart lights.

THE ALM

Mach Two wrote: »

I have purchased a "hive hub". Anybody know what are the pros and cons of it. It came with two smart lights.

The hive hub is the hub that you need to connect to your internet router to be able to control your bulbs through the app and online, it is what connects all the hive products together be it the bulbs, heating or sensors and allows you to control them with the app, you won't be able to do anything remotely without it.

A lot of the smart products have there own hub which generally use a protocol like zigbee or z-wave to 'talk' to the other products in its ecosystem, hive have one, hue have one etc.

You will need to connect the hub and then pair your lights with it. Once done you can controls these with the app, set schedules etc.

bk

thecivvie wrote: »

As my HS100 seems to have issues with my mobile broadband, I am wondering What would be better hub wise. Limited funds so need to careful

Strange, do you mean while at home? I thought that the HS100's should work, if your wifi is working, that they only need the broadband when out.

thecivvie

bk wrote: »

Strange, do you mean while at home? I thought that the HS100's should work, if your wifi is working, that they only need the broadband when out.

I get constant errors from GH saying an error has occured. Open the app and it says local onky, even though the remote Switch is on. I am remote here, West Connemara and using Three mobile broadband

Cerco

thecivvie wrote: »

I get constant errors from GH saying an error has occured. Open the app and it says local onky, even though the remote Switch is on. I am remote here, West Connemara and using Three mobile broadband

Have you tried the Kasa app without GH?
I have tested the HS100 on HUWAEI B593s modem with Three and it seemed to work fine using Kasa.

thecivvie

Cerco wrote: »

Have you tried the Kasa app without GH?
I have tested the HS100 on HUWAEI B593s modem with Three and it seemed to work fine using Kasa.

Yeah that works fine , just prefer to use GH alone

bk

thecivvie wrote: »

I get constant errors from GH saying an error has occured. Open the app and it says local onky, even though the remote Switch is on. I am remote here, West Connemara and using Three mobile broadband

thecivvie wrote: »

Yeah that works fine , just prefer to use GH alone

Ah, yes, that makes sense.

So when you use the Kasa app on your phone in your home, it is connecting directly to the plug without going on the internet. e.g.

Kasa App -> Wifi -> Plug

When you use Google Home, GH is connecting to the plug using the Kasa cloud service out on the internet and I guess thus your issues, e.g.

GH -> Wifi -> Internet -> Google Servers -> Kasa cloud servers -> plug

To be honest, almost everything Google Home does is done out in the cloud in the internet. So if you broadband connection is not reliable then I'm not sure there would be much point in spending money that might not help. Sorry

BTW beautiful part of the country, I assume you have looked into the National Broadband Scheme to see if something might be coming your way eventually?

thecivvie

bk wrote: »

Ah, yes, that makes sense.

So when you use the Kasa app on your phone in your home, it is connecting directly to the plug without going on the internet. e.g.

Kasa App -> Wifi -> Plug

When you use Google Home, GH is connecting to the plug using the Kasa cloud service out on the internet and I guess thus your issues, e.g.

GH -> Wifi -> Internet -> Google Servers -> Kasa cloud servers -> plug

To be honest, almost everything Google Home does is done out in the cloud in the internet. So if you broadband connection is not reliable then I'm not sure there would be much point in spending money that might not help. Sorry

BTW beautiful part of the country, I assume you have looked into the National Broadband Scheme to see if something might be coming your way eventually?

Yet my Hue lights work perfectly, never any issues and as does the Netatmo thermostat. Just the TP Link socket

bk

thecivvie wrote: »

Yet my Hue lights work perfectly, never any issues and as does the Netatmo thermostat. Just the TP Link socket

Both the Hue lights and Netatmo Thermostat have a hub, so perhaps they are handling it better and more directly.

Options for Hub based sockets would be lightwaveRF and Smart Things Hub. But no guarantees it would make it better for you, it would be very much try and see.

Smart Things starter kit including Hub and a smart socket and a few other sensors is on sale on amazon today for £100 if you want to give it a try. You can always return it in 30 days if it doesn't work.

thecivvie

bk wrote: »

Both the Hue lights and Netatmo Thermostat have a hub, so perhaps they are handling it better and more directly.

Options for Hub based sockets would be lightwaveRF and Smart Things Hub. But no guarantees it would make it better for you, it would be very much try and see.

Smart Things starter kit including Hub and a smart socket and a few other sensors is on sale on amazon today for £100 if you want to give it a try. You can always return it in 30 days if it doesn't work.

Oddly it has worked perfectly all day. If course now I have jinxed it lol

Cerco

thecivvie wrote: »

Yet my Hue lights work perfectly, never any issues and as does the Netatmo thermostat. Just the TP Link socket

Test them using Kasa (without GH) over your internet connection I.e. remotely. This will narrow down the cause.

Mach Two

THE ALM wrote: »

The hive hub is the hub that you need to connect to your internet router to be able to control your bulbs through the app and online, it is what connects all the hive products together be it the bulbs, heating or sensors and allows you to control them with the app, you won't be able to do anything remotely without it.

A lot of the smart products have there own hub which generally use a protocol like zigbee or z-wave to 'talk' to the other products in its ecosystem, hive have one, hue have one etc.

Have you any idea do you need to leave the power to the light on constantly and use the wi-fi to control it. At one stage the wi-fi would not work the light. So I played around with the hub. Knocking it on and off. Pressing the reset button. It worked eventually. I would have thought that they would be completely fool proof. If I was out and they did not function properly where is the point in having them.

thecivvie

Cerco wrote: »

Test them using Kasa (without GH) over your internet connection I.e. remotely. This will narrow down the cause.

Yeah I will do that

thecivvie

Cerco wrote: »

Test them using Kasa (without GH) over your internet connection I.e. remotely. This will narrow down the cause.

Yeah works fine. Once or twice when I have had issues with GH and the switch, when I started Kasa it shows the switch as local only even when I am in Wi-Fi

THE ALM

Mach Two wrote: »

THE ALM wrote: »

The hive hub is the hub that you need to connect to your internet router to be able to control your bulbs through the app and online, it is what connects all the hive products together be it the bulbs, heating or sensors and allows you to control them with the app, you won't be able to do anything remotely without it.

A lot of the smart products have there own hub which generally use a protocol like zigbee or z-wave to 'talk' to the other products in its ecosystem, hive have one, hue have one etc.

Have you any idea do you need to leave the power to the light on constantly and use the wi-fi to control it. At one stage the wi-fi would not work the light. So I played around with the hub. Knocking it on and off. Pressing the reset button. It worked eventually. I would have thought that they would be completely fool proof. If I was out and they did not function properly where is the point in having them.

Yes, leave the lights powered on, no need to turn plugs/switches on or off, if you turn the power off to the bulb there is no way of the hub communicating with it.

Once you have the hub powered on and connected to the router a solid green light should be showing, meaning the hub is running correctly and connected to the Hive Cloud Service. When you initially connect it it can take a while as the hub maybe updating to the latest firmware. Once that is done you will be adding the bulbs through the app or maybe through your online account, whichever is easiest for you. When these are added you can control them through the app or online although once added and a schedule set up you can leave them alone and they will just automatically turn off or on.

This is what I find I am doing and letting the schedule take care of everything, I will use they app on the rare occasions that I need to turn them on or off outside that schedule. You could then look at things like setting an iffft that will turn on the lights when you are on your way home e.g.

Mach Two

What happens if the electricity goes off all over the house. Do you have to reset the hub.

THE ALM

Mach Two wrote: »

What happens if the electricity goes off all over the house. Do you have to reset the hub.

No, the hub will reconnect again, can take a couple of minutes. I have found, occasionally, when there is a power outage and then everything has reconnected again when I launch the app that it appears that nothing or some of the items are offline. The only way that I have found to remedy this is to uninstall the app and then reinstall it and log in as normal.

Edit: Just thinking that another option may be to clear the app cache on the phone, will try that myself next time.

viperlogic

anyone order/use this smart plug?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B076DPZR9S/

"Only" £14. Missed the offers on a HS100

bk

viperlogic wrote: »

anyone order/use this smart plug?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B076DPZR9S/

"Only" £14. Missed the offers on a HS100

Looks very interesting, looks like it might be from the same folks involved in Sonoff. If you do get it, let use know how it goes, we would have some questions.

cherryghost

I have a pair of these and they work without issue. App is straightforward, seems like they're sonoff switches, can plug into home assistant and Google Home without problems.

Stoner

bk wrote:

Looks very interesting, looks like it might be from the same folks involved in Sonoff. If you do get it, let use know how it goes, we would have some questions.

It is the SONOFF socket, uses the same app it's also available in their IFTTT channel, I wanted to get them in the past but the UK outlets sell out quickly

8.99 on sale is the best I ever saw them at, but usually 12, 14 is ok as you'll have them quickly and can go over 22 euro at a time

These will be fine for out of reach and hidden away areas, but again they look muck out in the open IMO

I'd certainly use them handy for the slow cooker, Christmas tree behind the TV etc

viperlogic

Ordered one for the Christmas tree. Should have it next week. Will report back. Loving the sonoff light switch so far thou

SachaJ

I've picked up a couple of these Z-wave monitoring plugs when the price was slightly higher. Now £22.49 each or buy one get 50% off a second. Two Z-wave plugs for £16.86 each is fantastic value. Although I don't use Smartthings I believe it's Z-wave so they should work. HomeSeer picked them up in a flash.

So they work, I'm reading my Hue Bridge is drawing 1.870W and I can switch it on/off from HomeSeer. HomeSeer is getting periodic wattage updates - seems to be every 1 minute 20 seconds followed by a 40 second poll. Not tried Imperihome yet. They have not burned the house down yet so that's positive....

I killed power to the plug (using the rocker switch on the socket itself) and left it for 10 seconds. When powered back on the plug defaulted to on (which was it's last state).

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Heiman-HS2SK-Z-Smart-Plug-White/253260185417

https://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/z-wave-smart-power-monitor-plug-buy-one-get-one-half-price-2249-each-foniacs-ebay-shop-2841285

These were priced at £29.99 each. I just order another pair.