What's the deal with Deako smart swtches

Besides costing two to three times a typical smart switch, has anyone ever worked with a Deako switch?

We took a look at them for some inspiration for our Gen 3’s. Pretty cool idea with the interchangeable options, but yes, the cost is outrageous.

If you’re into touch feedback, they’re kinda cool too. The other thing that’s interesting is they appear more European (square) than North American.

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Am I reading it right that they use Bluetooth or wifi via a hub/bridge?

It is a cool plug and play concept, but you’re definitely paying a premium for that experience. Not sure how often someone would be planning on just swapping out switches for the heck of it either. If the price was lower I could see it taking off more, but as-is it seems more oriented towards someone who’d rather just pay for an easy setup and single app for control than install the switches/smart hub themselves.

Yeah likely one of them (probably wifi) as it’s promoting Alexa and Google Home.

Yeah I didn’t quite get this one outside of maybe having some sort of trade-in program when new switches are released.

We were looking at it as inspiration for kind of an entire ecosystem where parts could be swapped out bc they use the same chassis (ie: in-wall tablet or something similar to the Wink relay, various switches, etc).

Agree - if it was somewhere down by the $50-55 mark or below, these would be flying off shelves.

One thing that would really take them to the next level (and what we’re trying to do as well) would be if you could just plug them in and the switch auto-detects all wires.

Did find confirmation - “Deako devices use Bluetooth to communicate with one another and the Deako App. To remotely control your Deako system or to enable integrations with other Smart Home systems, your Deako home needs to be connected to WiFi. Your Deako system uses one Deako WiFi-enabled device to act as the bridge from Bluetooth to WiFi so you can use more smart home features.”

I haven’t exactly been looking for smart devices using Bluetooth, but that doesn’t seem to be a large portion of the market? Interesting they went that way.

I guess on a trade in, and my fiancĂ©e mentioned you could move around a smart switch and just swap them out for a party etc and then move them back where you had it. Still, when the ‘dumb’ switches cost $50-60, that feels like a hard sell to me.

Would be an interesting idea with the chassis option, just a matter of how many options can you come up with to make sense to swap between. I’d also be curious how much space is left in the box when you get those backplates in there too though, might be a tight fit.

Oh that would be really cool. Sounds challenging to implement, but that brings installation difficulty way down as long as you don’t mix up wires in the box :slight_smile:

Well, there is this
 I swear my phone monitors our conversations
 I haven’t talked about them until today!

Great for them - exciting for the industry!

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Dang, 1 in every 8 new homes. Still millions of existing that doesn’t touch but that’s at least some guaranteed future customers. Wonder if they just do the simple dumb switches by default and then expect homeowners to replace as they want or if it’s done in picking options etc for the home.

Considering how many different contractors are building homes and just the sheer volume of housing being built, I find it hard to believe they reached enough people to get to that 1 in every 8 new homes built number. 1 in 8 homes by the builders they have setup is more realistic.

I expect they sell and get the cheapest dumb stuff installed (likely into “smart home ready” builds) which would then allow the home buyer to install the smart devices themselves without touching wires or even having to use a screw driver.