Good day everyone I am knew to the Smartthings world. I have a few question that I hope I can get help with:
Is there a big difference between the Smartthings hub V2 and the Samsung connect Home? I want to order a hub but saw the Samsung Connect home which supposed to have the hub built in. Any difference and is the hub itself better choice?
What are good places to buy home automation equipment in Canada and where can you buy Smartthings hub and accessories in Canada?
What are the best outdoor and indoor cams to get to use with Smarttings?
I presently have Yales Assure YRD 426 door locks with Z-wave plus, Honeywell Wi-Fi RTH6580WF thermostats, TP-Link HS100 plugs and TP-Link light switch and Lorax security cam and plan to add more device to my set up. I am in the process of deciding to get either the Smarttings hub v2 or the Samsung connect home.
Any help or inputs is much appreciated and thanks in advance!
We do have a number of forum members from Canada so I added that to your topic title to attract their attention as they may have more suggestions for you.
As far as where to buy, Amazon remains popular and usually has quite a good selection.
Home Depot Canada has a few smart home items, but not a lot compared to the US stores.
Aartech is an online smart home Devices retailer that quite a few people use in Canada as it is one of the few places that can offer a full warranty to Canadians.
Iâm not sure whether The Smartest House, another online retailer, ships to Canada or not, but you can ask them. They have a good selection and are very active in this forum. @TheSmartestHouse
You may already know this, but the Z wave protocol which smartThings uses operates on different frequencies in different regions, so you need to make sure to buy devices which will match the frequency of your hub.
North America (Canada, the US, and Mexico) count as one region for zwave purposes and all use the same frequency. The UK is on a different frequency. So in your case, you want to make sure to get the âUS frequencyâ (really the North American frequency) for your devices.
If youâre ordering anything ST branded, youâll likely save by ordering from shop.smartthings.com. They do regular sales (10% is common, and 30% is not uncommon) on the ST branded items.
Yes, you pay more for shipping vs Aartech, but you save in the end.
Smartthings themselves ship to Canada but the exchange, shipping, and duty is a deal-killer. Canada Post even charged me a $10 fee to collect the $10 in GST on my last order⌠That said, bundle a bunch of stuff with your initial hub purchase, and then look to Lowes, Home Depot and Best buy for some of the âstandardâ items - Lutron switches, Arlo cameras, Hue - that you want to add to your system.
I have also used Aartech and they were good to deal with as well, especially for the stuff that our American friends can find in any big box store but donât seem to make it to the Canadian stores.
Depends on what you are trying to do with it. If you are using the hub portion for official supported device like Hue, yale locks, TV, etc you can get the Connect Home if you really need the wifi mesh thing to work in your home.
If you are more looking for home monitoring, with sensors like xiaomi or other devices that is not official supported but the community has created device handlers for, will suggest you to get the hub v2.
I am in Canada and i have the Connect Home, it works great with Hue, google home, and customizing guest wifi network etc. But I canât get it connected with xiaomi sensors that I mean to use it with. I havenât found an answer and a solution yet but some folks here believe itâs due to the different of firmware versions between the Connect Home and Smartthing Hub V2.
