What’s great about the Blue series is if someone accidentally resets it with the force reset, it will add back into your controller and know exactly what it used to be (speaking for Hubitat, I think the other hubs are the same).
For Zigbee2Mqtt I know it will add itself as the same unique ID and Z2M remembers that part and correctly integrates with existing home assistant names and IDs, but afaik it won’t re-pair with Z2M unless I leave Z2M in “pair with anything that moves” mode (which is rude to my downstairs neighbor if they add new devices, and kinda bad for my own network’s security).
In addition, I’m pretty sure Z2M won’t backfill any former direct device bindings or groups, since those are stored on the respective devices themselves.
It’s definitely something I can work around, and as you say, it’s probably pretty rare - but it’s the sort of thing that could be a difficult to debug customer service question that could come with a ton of technical debugging time with the firmware team - how do you track down “why do my switches keep losing their config?” especially for a not-super-technical customer?
(As a point of reference, one of my guests managed to factory reset my Legrand wall switch while trying to operate the bathroom lights, and I know that reset sequence is complicated)
I hope they do well enough that there’s eventually a “hospitality” firmware variant that makes them excessively poke-and-prod proof.
Great! These both sound like major improvements to help keep unexpected resets at bay. Still a tad bit of concern for “lean on the top of the switch resets it” if it’s the top and the config switch, but a lot less likely than just the config switch and much safer for someone just pressing buttons. (Especially with the reduced config switch height)
Looking at Hue, as much as it’s a pain sometimes, I think their decision not to have a “toggle six times and hold” reset mechanism like most other smart bulbs makes them more resilient to all the weird stuff that happens in the world. Touchlink with a remote is basically THE option for grabbing a bulb back if it’s paired wrong, and after doing that to about 40 bulbs the other weekend (don’t ask why), I’m convinced that it really does work pretty dang well.
Anyway, super stoked to get these in place. I don’t NEED another whole contractor pack (my closets really don’t need switches this fancy) but I uh… am having trouble resisting temptation.
You should totally sell the “if you have a neutral at either end, a traveler location can support the full smart switch” a bit harder in the docs and sales page! I didn’t realize it until reading about it here, even though it makes logical sense when I think about it. Unlike other commenters, I have neutrals in, shall we say, an artistic assortment of my switch boxes, but definitely not all of them.
Get some rest though. You’ve done a good job and deserve it!
You mention Legrand wall switch, is it the Netatmo one by chance? I’ve been trying to figure out more about if the Netatmo stuff (outlets) are Zigbee 3.0 and if so how they work as routers/repeaters.
@Eric_Inovelli awesome thanks! I’m most interested in how the LED bar looks in terms of diffuser. One of the locations I’m considering would have a Blue next to a Red Light+Fan (I don’t think any of my other double-gangs will be a Blue + LZW31-SN). Mostly wanting to make sure that the LED bar aesthetic is fairly consistent. I’ve got a mash of Zooz, Legrand dumb switches (Radiant line), and Inovelli Reds. I know where I plan to put 2 or 3 Blues to get a big footprint to be able to place some outdoor sensors and then 3 or more locations that I know I’ll either have smart bulbs or might have poor Zigbee coverage once I’ve got more devices deployed.
I’ve had to do some “big brain” rewires with 2 of my 3-ways (only 1 left, hoping it’s not as wonky). So far both 3-ways have been power at the light; it seemed like one had another fixture added later (top/bottom of stairs) so I actually rewired it to not be a 3-ways and now I’ve got dedicated switches and fixtures at the top and bottom of the stairs and thanks to double taps, each switch is also virtually 3-wayed to the opposite switch.
The other was a bit more crazy in that the non-load dumb switch is in a 2-gang with a switch on a different circuit. Thankfully I was able to use the neutral there and tie it in to the trailer as you mentioned. In those weird instances I committed sacrilege and used Zooz’s wire label stickers so I know what I did if I have to change it later.
Yep, it’s the quite new-to-the-states variant of the Netatmo with the Legrand branding, and I’m… sort of happy with it. It is Zigbee 3.0. This location was a wall box, but I had to go with the battery powered switch for silly reasons. Obviously that means it isn’t a repeater, so I’m not sure about the hardwired ones.
As far as “looks like a decora but is battery powered”, it absolutely takes full marks, and installs very naturally over a junction box. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite have enough travel on click to FEEL comfortable to decora users who tend to press too hard, or press and hold, or just jam at it a bunch and worry they’ve broken it. Hence the accidental reset. Single click response time is good, press-and-hold takes too long. Honestly, I’m also stupidly annoyed about the feel of the screwless wallplate - it looks great but feels slippy and loose, and makes people worry the switch itself will slide around. I need to get under it with some double stick tape.
It’s the only product I’ve found so far in that category though, so if “can be used over a junction box, battery powered, looks like decora” are your criteria, worth a shot.
(I justify this complaining in their thread about other brands as an opportunity for Inovelli to learn what customers dislike )
Fair enough, I’ve held off on replacing a few outlets to try the Netatmo, just didn’t know if their gateway was needed. You do make a good point, remote switches are in short supply. I have a hall light that really should have been a 3-way to the point my wife and I keep trying to slap the wall where we think a switch should be. I just need to mount the Zooz I bought for it because it was the only thing I could find and liked.
Take that point as you like, marketed properly, a smart switch and a wireless mount-anywhere-or-nowhere-at-all switch go well together. Enough people like Pico switches, you get a good Z* device with the features of an Inovelli and the marketing of “What were they thinking when putting this switch here?” and I’d wager you’ll have a popular product.
The Netatmo stuff works with Z2M, so I’d hope it works with whatever your setup is.
Yeah, strong agreement there about the absolute value of a complimentary battery powered switch. Obviously it wouldn’t have all the LEDs, but I’d pay a pretty penny (look at the retail price on that Legrand - the only zigbee thing of its form in existence, or the Hue dimmers, and they didn’t even need to get UL certified to carry power!) for a similar switch.
The configurability that Inovelli offers is absolutely missing in the battery powered smart switch market. There are lots of cheap euro style battery powered Zigbee controllers, but now that I have a giant pile of them sitting in my drawer, I can confirm that they ALL have fatal flaws.
Most of them have too much (unconfigurable) lag while they wait for followup multi-click actions, which I’d prefer to program for myself on the controller. The ONE device I’ve found that has a good “fast mode” is the Aqara H1, but setting that mode sadly disables any ability to receive “press and hold” because fast mode transmits the one and only signal on key down, rather than sending key down, hold, and keyup separately. I’d be overjoyed for a “just be chatty and tell me exactly what happens when it happens and don’t be smart on my behalf” mode.
When I describe zigbee and zwave to people, I say “zwave has the broadest selection of wall switches, but zigbee has so much more variety for everything else.” I think Inovelli may have been missing a much more thirsty market for a long time here!
About to place my pre-order too. So exciting! Before I click go, is there any issue with installing 60 of these in a home? I’m doing a renovation and planning to replace every switch with these. I believe the Zigbee device limit is well above that, but any worries about signal crossing/etc. with that many installed? Also, I assume there is a way to cancel the preorder and be refunded if, God forbid, UL certification falls through or something of that nature?
I’ve got several hundred zigbee devices in my (not super huge) apartment, so from that perspective, I don’t think you have anything at all to worry about. Some people split their networks into one-per-floor, but I think that’s more for ease of management than technical reasons.
I’m sure they’ll make it right for us if the UL cert needs more go-around, but having worked on a similar project in the past, I think there’s basically zero chance of them not getting the cert for the baseline functions. By buying now, we’re giving the company more runway to do great stuff for us!
If yours don’t show up in time, just have the contractor put in cheap regular switches till these arrive, and then replace them as is convenient. It’s really no big deal to do the swap.
I’m coming out as one of the testers on HA and ST, so feel free to give me a tag.
Lots of great questions! A few general thoughts:
Improvements over Reds:
dimming is smooth as silk on low-wattage applications.
notifications can be single LED based (similar to homeseer), but they blend really well so you can do a rainbow notification WITH effect. This is great for seeing multiple status items in my master bedroom (all green good, yellow is not secure, red is alarming, etc.)
smart bulb mode just WORKS. I have a lot of ZigBee groups, and it controls them no problem with great speed and reliability.
My ZigBee network LOVES these (~32 devices, mostly battery powered). They are now one of the main devices holding the network together, I have one on a cord that l moved around and got it to bind at ~45’ no issue.
No one is mentioning the aux switch, but I’ve also been testing that and it is such a great solution for areas without led bar/notification needs. Multi-taps work great!
I’m also going to state that I have been surprised by the reliability and resilience of ZigBee. It seems to handle a LOT of traffic perceptibly “faster” than zwave just due to bandwidth increase.
I have a very robust 2.4GHz wifi network and have had absolutely zero perceptible interference in my home.
Hopefully this puts people’s mind at ease! Also, here is a blue and a red next to each other:
I’m a big planner personally so I tend to approach it from the perspective of I’d open a gang box to see what I have before ordering. Now I may be a bit biased because I recently installed some Kasa switches and therefore had to know if I had a neutral or not, but that brings up a good point that a lot of competitors require neutral. And therefore you have to know before buying way kind of setup you have. I think I’d be disappointed to open my new product (whatever it is, Inovelli or not), be excited to set it up, and find out I bought the wrong thing. Not to mention an added level of frustration if I now couldn’t get the right thing because it sold out in the interim.
Then again I also made a spreadsheet of every switch in my house last night in preparation for pre-order and that’s not something I think most customers are going to even consider doing.
But since competitors make it so obvious that many of their products require a neutral up front, I think it’s starting to become part of the zeitgeist (there’s a cool word I never get to use) to think about neutral wiring ahead of time. Perhaps there’s some market data on how common a non-neutral setup is? Maybe it’s all moot if non-neutral wiring is super rare?
Hopefully that answers your question; I think you’ve got a great level of detail regardless and it’s clearly written so whatever you do this is going to be great!
If I missed anything else you asked let me know.
Also thanks so much for the soft open of pre-orders; my project is big and requires a lot of planning and I didn’t want to miss out not being glued to my phone 24/7, and I’m sure others in this thread feel the same way.
I’m not familiar with Legrand’s reset procedure, but with normal human characteristics, one is more likely press paddles up or down for more of a response as opposed to holding down a button for 20 seconds. I can easily see someone resetting an old Jasco switch I had in the basement before an Inovelli. Now if someone resets by holding down more 20 seconds, it feels more intentional.
I always like the shaved down button for the config button. It definitely reduced the human error of hitting it. The new config button in beta, I thought, was perfect. Others thought too low. Others said it was still too high! Ultimately Inovelli raised it just a little bit more than what was shipped on the beta switch (.5-.75mm? Can’t remember).
Coming out of the Insteon debacle, I just placed a small preorder for (2) contractor packs to test the water. If all goes well, I’ll need at least (5 maybe 8) more packs, depending on the construction of our carriage house.
Quite excited for the possibilities and finally dumping the defunct Insteon protocol.
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