These new homes are to include smartthings and a few other components. But still nice to see this and getting the smartthings adopted and not some other crap
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unless something drastically changed in the reliability department, don’t know that smartthings is going to cut the mustard
The problem with home automation is unless you are techie and something doesnt go right non techie customers freak out. Smart things is easy for me but i am a techie and understand technology. But 10 years ago the people with the money for the extra technology did not have the technical understanding on how it works. I feel like that all is changing now that younger people adapted to technology growing up are now starting to get money for these things. But in my opinion smartthings really is a great echo system that is completely user friendly to me and reliable. I have not seen any relablity issues from smartthings.
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Damn, bought my Lennar home at the wrong time! 2 years ago they were still putting in z-wave thermostats and door locks, but no longer including the Nexia hub. In fact, the sales guy never even mentioned the devices being “smart”. Luckily the construction superintendent mentioned it on our final walk through. I did some googling and come to find out the sales office had a used Nexia hub in the back. And that’s what started my addiction…
I’m honestly mildly suprirsed we haven’t seen a line of Amazon Basics smarthome supplies. Specifically, plug in sockets, lightbulbs etc, that “work with Alexa.” That’s been their MO in the past. Seeing them continue to use SmartThings, Hue, etc is a good thing.
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Give them a little time…
I dunno exactly what drives them to enter hardware market(s). Smart “things” are considerably less complicated than tablets, phones, and e-Readers. Amazon is doing well on 2 out of 3 (Fire Phone, anyone?.. decent device, really!).
This continues to be a very weird industry. Connectivity is key, and SmartThings holds a tremendous lead, technically in its flexibility. Not sure it is being leveraged to the max. Meanwhile, interconnectivity by other business strategies big and small (e.g., Alexa, Google Home, HomeKit, … vs Stringify…?) are treading different paths.
The industry analysts can’t seem to wrap their heads around this one. CNET “dumped” SmartThings (presumably for weak Alexa integration). I’ll be there’s a lot more behind that decision. Or not?
Yeah, it seems inevitable. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind giving Amazon more of my money for reliable sensors. It’s not like I have any strong loyalty to most of the companies out there - who all seem to be rebranding the same stuff (Linear, Gocontrol, Ecolink) for motion/door/sockets, etc.
At this point in the game, I’ve pretty much got all those things covered and am looking for new advancements or areas to automate in my home - Home Depot’s zigbee fan controller seems like something that should have come along a while ago.
I do think Amazon has been deliberate to not enter the “higher thinking” arena - ie true automation hubs like SmartThings. Or thermostats like Nest or Ecobee. Hue or LIFX for advanced lighting. Mostly because it’s being handled and it’s a ton of work to get it right - which has been demonstrated often.
However deep we are in this hobby/obsession - the majority of hub recommendations I’ve seen for automation newbs who want to control a home with Alexa’s help have been for ST, with Wink being a very distant runner up. And while stability is never where we wish it was, that flexibility seems to have been the key to weathering the emerging IoT storm.
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I just hope Z-Wave and Zigbee stick around for a very long time. I have this nightmare of my home suddenly becoming obsolete in the future, and having to redo the entire thing.
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Want one ? I think I still have 2-3 NIB that I picked up for less than the $99 free year of Prime that came with them. Only opened up to register on Amazon to redeem the free year of Prime, then reset and put back into the boxes.
I am think about mounting one ( or 2 ) as controller for the WiFi speakers, since leaving app up and running on phone or tablet is a PIA. I am really starting to run out of wall space for all my different monitors, control panels.
I wonder if/ how well Samsung Multiroom app would run on Wink Relay ???
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