Hi, I recently made the switch to Lemmy from Reddit. But r/homekit is one of the communities I miss the most.
What can I do to help build this community up? I’m happy to make posts, comment, and upvote. Is trying to poach people from r/homekit a bad idea?
I would love to get to know everyone better. Here’s some info about my smart home.
- I’m using Apple Home, and my primary hub is a 4K Apple TV 4K Ethernet, which I chose for the Thread radio.
- I’m almost exclusively using Thread devices, and most of those are Matter over Thread.
- Most of my lights are Nanoleaf Essentials (Matter over Thread), and despite people hating Nanoleaf, they have been much better lately.
- For more advanced lighting, I’m using WLED, which is a DIY project for controlling addressable light strips.
- My WLED lights are bridged into HomeKit via Homebridge, though I’ve considered switching to Home Assistant.
- I’m using a Deco mesh router with two nodes, and it’s been amazing for the relatively low cost.
- Outside of Apple Home, I use Ring, which I’ve bridged into Apple via Homebridge. I hate the Ring subscription, but their hardware is solid.
Excited to get to know everyone!
I used to use homebridge as well but have since moved everything into home assistant. I then export all of my home assistant items back into Apple home for the wife acceptance factor. I can now use non-homekit items in Apple Home very easily and the homekit native items are all paired to home assistant.
Well howdy!
No real thoughts on helping to make this community more active (except for simply posting things that people might reply to, like this…) but I definitely will keep an eye out for more posts here!
I’ve got a mix of mostly cheap HomeKit gear along with some other junk that I’ve bridged in with Homebridge as well. I’m actually needing to rebuild some stuff, rethink, and reconfigure. I’ve got quite a few years of tacking things together that were never really meant to be mashed together and there has been some instability lately. I am heading towards Thread and Matter over Thread myself though! I’ve been very happy with Thread in general actually.
Maybe if a few of us started posting miscellaneous (and hopefully interesting) HomeKit news we can get this HomeParty started?
Hi! I’ve gone all in on Matter/Thread the last twoish years! I’m not an expert, but I’ve definitely learned from my mistakes. Let me know if you need help with anything! I’ll start posting more Thread related content.
Subbed to the community. I only briefly scanned your cross post in which folks were talking about HomeKit as a front end for home assistant essentially, and I’m largely in that camp also. The one thing that I do really like about HomeKit though is the secure video stuff, and I do like HomeKit certified things (less important now that matter and thread are around — you can also pair those locally without an app using the QR code). Will watch this space and hopefully contribute some to it if I can.
If you haven’t yet done it look into scrypted. I have all kinds of cameras feeding into my HKSV from home assistant and it is flawless across all devices. If I want to review video footage events I will normally go into Apple Home versus manufacturer specific apps because it is just better.
Ah I love scrypted! Unfortunately I don’t have a powerful enough server right now (running home assistant off a spare rpi3). Once I can get my self host server up, I think I may be in good shape to return there (I can sort of get the doorbell I have integrated, but it would be way better if I could use scrypted).
I have 6 cameras running on a rpi5 and it doesn’t seem challenged. I wouldn’t try Frigate here but this does what I want archiving security cams to cloud.
Yeah I have an old Ryzen 1700 system that I’m going to repurpose as a home server. NAS and some self hosting, including scrypted and home assistant.
Haven’t tried secure video yet, but I’ve heard it’s cool! Initially I was hoping that going all in on Matter and Thread would mean I could swap my hubs later if I want. I really wanted battery-powered light switches since I rent. I’m using Wemo Stage and the new Nanoleaf Sense+. Wemo is actually not terrible (battery could be better), but it’s HomeKit over Thread not Matter, I think. And Nanoleaf Sense+ so far is fantastic since it uses Nanoleaf’s proprietary lightwave protocol to directly control bulbs, but it also sucks because it uses Nanoleaf’s proprietary lightwave protocol and can’t control anything outside of Nanoleaf. Eve Thread smart plugs have also been solid!
Hi
Hello!
Hi there!
I’ve got 3 Apple TVs, 3 HomePod minis of which 1 is the preferred hub. For some reason my setup is a lot more stable on a mini. The Apple TVs over Ethernet always ends up causing no response.
I’ve got a mix of devices. Lutron Caseta switches, Meross garage opener, Tradfri bulbs, Tapo bulbs, Tapo outlets, Meross thermostat extension cord, Meross switch, Ring security system and cameras/doorbell, Harmony smart hub, string lights, rainbird sprinkler system, and various airplay 2 devices from home theater receiver to an AirPort Express 2 running my office speakers.
Running various automations for lights coming on and off, fans on and off and shutting the garage door later in the evening if we forget. As you mentioned, I’ve also got a homebridge server to get Ring into the system. It’s also bridging the Rainbird sprinklers, Harmony smart hub.
I’ve been trying to get products that only work on Matter thread but they’re harder to find. Most of my newer stuff is Matter over WiFi. I’ve got an extensive Eero mesh system that works well so I’m not too worried about over saturation.
That’s super cool! Interesting that the HomePod mini has been more stable. One thing that I found was that one unstable hub can throw off the entire network. I had a HomePod mini that was stuck in a quiet reboot loop due to a non-Apple USB-C power brick. Despite having a pinned Apple TV Ethernet connected to my router, that one HomePod sent everything into unresponsive.
You have more device categories than I do. Initially, it was lighting that got me into HomeKit. I love that I can make colorful scenes for my entire house. Then I go to concerts, and it blows my mind what these lighting crews can do. Chasing that concert vibe, but with HomeKit instead of DMX.
I have the Ring security system too, not just the doorbell. I think you can get other Z-Wave hubs and connect Ring sensors to them. It just doesn’t seem like a lot of home ecosystems like Apple are designed to be an alarm system.
I’m not really the type to make posts so I won’t tell anyone to post more but I guess that is what would help this community.
My Apple TV 4K is my main hub. I also have a HomePod mini in the bedroom that is less reliable as a hub so I’m glad that Apple finally lets us choose the preferred hub.
Most of my devices (lights, plugs, sensors, switches) are IKEA because they are cheap and so far without problems. It’s what I recommend anyone to buy who wants to dip into smart home stuff but doesn’t want to spend a fortune. It works, it’s cheap and it runs locally (even if you don’t use Homekit).
Other devices are an Aqara camera in Homekit Mode (I generally avoid China stuff but cameras are just so expensive), Eve Thermos (apart from the schedules, don’t use their own automations, they just stop working after a while) and Hue motion sensors (mostly for the integrated temperature and brightness sensors).
One plug handles my Gardena indoor irrigation system. It’s awesome for when I’m away for more than a few days but it’s not smart on its own.
I’ve had Eve door sensors but they didn’t work reliably and I hate that they use these odd batteries, so I recently switched to the new IKEA ones.
That’s cool! I never thought of IKEA as a smart home brand.
I was considering picking up some Eve motion sensors, but I’m not sure I want to be waving at the lights all the time. I could do presence sensors, but idk something just feels weird about tracking the exact location of everyone in my apartment. If I did do presence sensors, I might try Home Assistant.
I would love to do smart heating, but I rent and I’m not sure how to do it without pissing off my landlord. Smart window air conditioner was nice for the summer!
I think presence sensors are very cool but if I don’t trust the brand I’m out. If Apple or Eve ever releases one I’m buying that. I also think that regular motion sensors are pretty much useless for light automation.
Thermostats for radiators can just be screwed off and on, there is nothing to worry about damaging anything and it doesn’t take any extra skills. I’m renting too. It’s just a device that pushes a pin in and out. If you want to try something kinda smart without spending too much, get a digital thermostat. They cost about 10-15 Euros and can do schedules. If you don’t have a radiator then that’s a different topic.
Yeah, I don’t have radiators. I think my thermostat might actually be busted - first winter in this apartment - but I might ask the landlord for a digital one. They have been pretty good with maintenance. A smart one would be cooler, but realistically, idk if I can get them to do that, and I’m not sure they would let me choose my own.
