White Series Dimmer (VTM31-SN) vs On/Off Switch (VTM30-SN) Details

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Hi All,

I purchased five White Series Dimmers (VTM31-SN) and am very happy with them. However, I noted a few things:

If I wanted to pass a dimmer in on/off (simulated) mode through Home Assistant to Apple Homekit without dimming functionality, I had to do some Home Assistant voodoo.

Additionally, the White Series Dimmer (VTM31-SN) page says that the switch cannot be used for fans or with ballasts/transformers. Whereas the White Series On/Off switch (VTM30-SN) says that it can be.

For those two reasons, especially, I decided to wire the rest of my house with simple White Series On/Off Switches (VTM30-SN). Unfortunately, Inovelli accidentally sent me more dimmers. So, I have to ask:

  1. Will the On/Off Switches present differently in Home Assistant (and thus to Apple Home Kit via my bridge): Specifically, will VTM30-SN units appear as a simple light/switch without dimming capability? Or will it appear just like my existing dimmers?

  2. Can a dimmer be used with a fan/ballast/transformer when it is put into On/Off mode?

Aside from those two things, I think the only other concern is the humidity sensor on the On/Off model. But I won’t miss that.

If the Dimmer is safe with fans/ballast/transformers in On/Off mode, and the On/Off switches don’t appear any different to HA, I might consider just keeping the Dimmers and using them in On/Off.

Thanks for any details/clarifications!

–Brian

2

No, the on/off mode still uses the dimmer circuitry. So the dimmer is not rated for fan load regardless of the mode, unfortunately.

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3

Not sure about the white series. But the blue on/off appear exactly like dimmers. I would expect the white to do the same. You can make a template entity in Home Assistant to convert the light to a switch entity and send that to Homekit.

4

To my knowledge, there is no way for the on/off switch’s LED bar to work like the dimmer switch showing the brightness level. It’s either on, off, or showing a notification.

5

It does show the brightness on the blue series with smart bulb mode. I assume the white series would do it too if it was bound to a thread bulb.

6

I just bound a VTM30 to a Matter bulb and it only turned the light on and off. Dimming did not work. Smart Bulb Mode was enabled and the Switch Mode is set to Dimmer+Single.

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Did you put it in the Dimmer mode?

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Yes. I said “Switch Mode is set to Dimmer+Single”.

9

This is just a WAG, but try setting the dimmer mode via a quick tap to confirm. I’m waiting on a response from Inovelli re this.

10

Answering my own question now that I have both dimmers and On/Off switches. The White Series On/Off do indeed appear as simple switches in Home Assistant and when passed through to Apple Homekit, they are simple On/Off there too (of course). So, there’s no tweaking necessary in either to get them to just be On/Off and no “slider” for dimmer in the control presented in the app(s).