Bankrupt or not, they’ve just released their iOS app update. There’s a chance that Flextronics is serious about keeping them afloat rather than liquidating.
What is a hub and why do you need one? From the consumer point of view a hub is just a useless piece of hardware that has no practical use. It’s only purpose is to bridge multiple incompatible networks together just because a bunch of smart-ass engineers thought it would be a great idea to have multiple incompatible wireless communication protocol just to keep things interesting.
Actually, Amazon is ahead of its time by supporting the only protocol that really matters - WiFi.
Flextronics has been working hard to increase their presence and based on their field it makes sense for them to keep Wink as their marquee product. Judging by their social media presence, I would say they are pretty serious. A good sign would be the return of the hub on Amazon and relisting the hub as Nest partner. Time will tell.
I really like the Echo, but as far as home automation goes, it’s a UI, not a controller. It doesn’t talk to any devices directly, just passes the message on to the real HA hub.
For clarity and accuracy… Wink was part of an incubator called Quirky. Quirky filed for bankruptcy and in November Wnk was purchased by Flextronics[quote=“Ciscoheat, post:40, topic:31931, full:true”]
So, keeping this on topic…that is why even though I’m frustrated with ST, I still think its the best out there. Wink’s company filed for bankruptcy. How much support are they truly going to have in the future? Subscriptions won’t be sustainable (not saying ST’s won’t be…saying subscription only strategies) in my opinion. I actually do agree with the strategy of ST to partner with Samsung and to get into making more sensors themselves. The only problem is, as you guys stated…the now! I said it in an earlier post, if we equated ST to a stock, it would be a Hold right now. I don’t see any other company being a Buy and some that would be a Sell.
BTW, Amazon isn’t really a hub. Its fabulous, don’t get me wrong…one of the better purchases I felt we made…but its definitely not a hub any where to the level that ST or any other hub is.
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Ha, I responded twice to them as I have 126 devices. My v2 still sits gathering dust. Not a peep back from them. No response is different from slow response and I think a valid thing to point out that they aren’t following through on that special queue/promise.
To all, I understand many companies come out of bankruptcy, but its worthy to note the state of the industry. Nothing is truly stable right now. From this post, the two that are most popular are ST (which has quirks that we all agree are there) and Wink (which we don’t know long term viability or how it will transform). In my opinion, ST took a step toward securing their future with Samsung. Unfortunately, it’s taken 10 steps back before making a step forward (once again, in my opinion, not for everyone).
As for Amazon though…and once again…I love the Echo…it can’t do many things for the consumer. A hub communicates with devices. Echo communicates with Hubs. I can’t attach a device directly to Amazon. Yes, Nest and Phillips integrates, but they still hold their own control. I can’t tell Echo to turn off the lights at night, or on when I come home as a routine. I can’t have Echo communicate to my water sensors, my window sensors nor my door locks. It can’t turn my tv on or off. It can’t send me messages or pictures from my nestcam. Bottom line is, its not a Hub. If you don’t need a hub, then yes…its great. But its only as powerful as it is in my house because it can integrate with Hubs, mainly ST’s (although it does support Wink too).
Yes, I agree, in my opinion they shouldn’t have sent out the initial email. I’m not super satisfied but I will state, ST does have a ton of pluses. I’m trying to wait long enough to see them fix some of these items. When we first started with them, there were several things that were pretty rough. They made a lot of positive improvements before moving to V2. It just sucks that V2 came with so many problems. I do believe long term, they will get back to where they were and even improve. We’ll see!
So you made me curious about the Zipamini, and I went ahead and bought one. The device itself seems very, very immature, but their back end service (web service and app) are really nice. Very slick interface, but honestly I don’t know how it could work with the internet down. Maybe only automations and rules run when the internet is down? I’ll have to dig more into it. One thing that caught me off guard is the upsell. Looks like they charge based on the number of devices you connect, and charge extra for things such as Sonos, Nest, or Philips Hue connectivity. 1 credit in their store = $1 USD
An interesting platform with some benefits, but it could get pretty pricey. Also, device compatibility and community probably aren’t as good as SmartThings.
Oh, and when I said the actual Zipamini seemed immature, I’m not kidding. It is running android 4.2.2, does not have the play store or really anything installed on it. No instructions on how to set it up. No interface on the actual device to control any of your home automation stuff. It doesn’t even have a “System Updates” option in the Android settings so it doesn’t look like it was ever intended to be updated. It also had no remote, so I had to hook up a keyboard and mouse to it to configure it.
Considering each zwave module is $20-$40, $1 to make it work sounds like a bargain to me.
My understanding is that net access is only needed for administrative tasks like building rules that are then downloaded onto the home unit for runtime.
The one thing that isn’t clear to me is if custom devices are allowed? Or is one dependent upon zipatos interpretation of how a device should operate (for instance, the Fibaro rgbw has an obvious use case — RGBW LED lights — but it can also control any 12-24vdc actuator.)
That makes sense about the rules being stored on the device and ran locally. You probably wouldn’t be able to interact directly with devices if your internet connection is down though right? It would be nice if that was possible. I’ve been able to do it with other systems, but it has involved more advanced knowledge of networks and routers.
Oh, and the credit reference I was giving was just to show the conversion rate. It is actually 9 credits ($9) to add an extra device, but looks like you can buy packs. I would probably buy the unlimited at $99. I would also need the Philips Hue plugin for $59. I’d also need the Zigbee dongle once available, not to mention some of the other features like messaging. It would probably cost me $400+ to get started with their system.
As for device types, I don’t see anywhere in the web interface to load them or tweak them. That would be greatly missed, but maybe it is possible. Overall it is a pretty nice system. I personally prefer SmartThings though and I’m just hoping they get the consistency and reliability of the system where it needs to be.
Anyone else gone this route. All the issues with SmartThings has caused me to remove devices and functionality over time. I’m just waiting on the sidelines so to speak. I feel others are too and some may be moving out of the market completely.
At some point in time I will jump back in. If there is a viable alternative I’m all ears. However, I don’t want to jump out of the fire into a frying pan as they say.
Just an FYI there have been various reports of hub outages in the Wink world recently although it doesn’t seem like it’s widespread.
Also (although admittedly beta) they nearly had a second Winkening and released a firmware that nearly bricked several hubs.
People think it’s all roses over there, it’s not and Winks future is still uncertain. This post isn’t intended to bash Wink although I’ve never hidden the fact that I hate Wink with a passion. This is meant to serve as a fair comparison, feel free to check out their status page:
When I was testing Wink, they bricked my hub twice with their updates. The first time I was able to correct it myself with their DNS hack, the second time I had to send it in for them to fix. Took a few days to get it back.
It did not work with most of my devices. I use almost exclusively Z-Wave, but it wouldn’t pair with my door sensors, some light switches, bulbs, water sensors, and many other devices. My thermostat paired, but I never could change the temperature with the Wink App. Philips Hue paired up, but I could not control the lights (or see their status) unless I was on my local network. Their quirky products that I had were complete garbage (Eggminder, Refuel, Porkfolio).
On the plus side, I prefered their app over the SmartThings app and loved the Android Wear and Ok Google integration.
This. 
