I currently have red/500 series Zwave switches/dimmer in my house (also have a few of the blacks in areas that don’t require the advanced features) and at the time had opted for using the mechanical switches in 2/3/4-way setups.
Now I want to go back and eliminate all mechanical switches in my house and move everything over to smart switches.
I have a few questions that I was hoping the community could help answer:
How does the physical looks of the different models of switches/dimmers compare? Do buttons/light bars/etc of the 500 series look the same as the Zigbee/800 series switches/dimmers?
How does the LED colors compare between the two? I currently use tye white LED color everywhere, so hoping that the color/brightness roughly match.
How does the white switch cover compare between the Zwave 500 series and the Zigbee/800 series? I will have a few locations where the older 500 series switches would be side-by-side with a newer model.
Which model would give the best configuration/setup for having smart switches on all sides of a 2/3/4-way setup? I would want the same features (i.e. button controller; dimming) available on all sides of the N-way setup.
The answer on what’s best for you will be dependent on the rest of your network.
You mentioned all current switches are Zwave 500 series. It may be best to continue building out your Zwave network, especially if you have nothing Zigbee at all. On the flip side, having some Zigbee switches could give you a solid start on a Zigbee network.
As for appearances, I’ve never put them side by side in the same box. But I do have some in the same room and if I didn’t know which were red and which were blue I’d never be able to tell the difference. LED Colours are the same. Lightbar shape and design are the same (although the Blues and new Red have individually addressable LED’s which can make them different).
There’s no right or wrong answer to which route you should take.
Here is a picture I just took for comparison. Middle switch is 500 red series on/off, the two on either side are 2-1 blues (which are supposed to be essentially the same as the 800 series z wave red 2-1’s). Some slight differences in paddle color (though I’m color blind, so what do I know).
Appreciate the response. I should have mentioned that both Zwave and ZigBee are options for me. I was actually leaning towards the blues to add hardwired ZigBee repeaters into my environment but noticed the 800 series were close to release.
Thanks for the picture. In the picture the blue series switch plates look like they are a brighter white, similar to the red series fan/light switch plates.
At one point Inovelli was going to offer the 500 series plates in that same color…maybe some day.
