Bought a new house and want to start with some basic home automation and want some advice on if I can do what I want, will VeraLite work for what I want or if there is a better way of doing it. I would like to spend no more than $1,000 on the whole project.
First priorities are to enable both kitchen and living room lights that will be can lights to work on a dimmer that can be controlled remotely on the Internet. At least 3 wall switches for lamps and the wife’s curling iron that is left on too often (May need to be a GFC). Finally, some sort of control for the outside light so it is lit when it is dark and off when it is light.
Next I would look at 2 cameras. One on a screened in porch and other in an alcove by the front door. Possibly put another in a garage. Finally, I would like 2 thermostat controls.
I figure ebay is my friend and I can piece items together. Thoughts? Anything I should stay away from? Anything you would encourage me to look at or purchase instead? It looks like the X10 products are low cost compared to some of the Z-Wave items. Are they compatible with VeraLite and are they worth the money or do you get what you paid for? Thanks for your assistance.
X10 is still a viable solution. I use X10 at my Hanger. They are slower to respond.
I have a standalone controller for these …
X10 and/or Insteon are not well supported by Vera. They can be commanded, but status is often an issue.
When you get Z-Wave devices, you need to make sure they provide instant status updates to Vera when the devices are activated manually. Otherwise Vera needs to poll, and you might as well have an X10 device!. I use Leviton Z-Wave devices for lighting and power management. I do have a large shop where I have 24 Overhead lights, individually controllable. I used HA01 receptacles for those. They are not as quick as the Leviton, I think they often require a retry to get the commands through.
They do not make a GFCI -Z Wave outlet … but you can get a GFCI breaker and replace your existing circuit breaker … Then the whole circuit is GFCI protected.
Before you choose a camera, check the forums for the make and model you are interested in.
Some do not work very well with Vera.
This all might be tough to get everything on your list done for $1000. But you can go a long way …
Maybe if you leave out the cameras or the thermostats.
Don’t get X10 if you are buying new. Z-wave is a much better technology.
A cheap option is GE dimmers, switches, and receptacles (power outlets) for about $50 each. A downside is they don’t use a neutral wire in the circuit meaning that light circuits with less than about 25Watts load don’t dim reliably. In general this means you need at least 3 LED bulbs on the circuit. You don’t have this problem with other brands that use a neutral.
The cheapest z-wave devices right now are the Intermatic CA600 dimmers and CA3500 duplex receptacles. These are 6 for $99 on ebay. Some of us have found them to be flakey. The Intermatic CA3000 (relay version of the CA600 dimmer) is the only z-wave device that has given me trouble. Not sure I can really recommend this option, although I have a bunch of each in my garage because the price was right.
Z-wave thermostats can be had for $100 each. Foscam IP cameras are about $80.
I am new (by new I mean BRAND new) to HA… Finally biting the bullet to start putting together a system - buying everything from ebay.
I am mainly interested in lighting scenes as the person that built/wired my house was a maniac about light switches and there are about 10 (literally) light switches in just my KITCHEN. and similarly more than necessary in the entryway and livingroom…
So I bought a Vera 3 as my controller, and I bought a bunch of CA600’s to swap out my standard switches - only a couple of which are actually wired as 3 ways. I read somewhere that you don’t want to use multiple dimmers on the same circuit… and that you don’t want to use a dimmer for CFL’s. Given that I am intending on setting up at least most of my lights as ON (no dim), I can’t understand what difference it would make whether it was dimmable or not if I am not planning on using the dim capability (other than 20% premium price?).
I was thinking of getting a Levitron VRCS4-1LX or GE 45631 to put on the main wall (kitchen entry) so I can define several scenes but have a single button scene activation for them. All of the different combinations are mind boggling, and I haven’t even attempted to program anything yet. How complicated is it to program one of these “contollers” in a system - do I do this through the vera interface, or program the device itself?
And then finally (and similarly), I am not sure what to do about remote controls. I see these cheapo ge 45600 remotes that have more buttons on them than I even need… but browsing through the posts it seems they are not very friendly - and I can’t understand 1/2 of what I am reading because I am new to the terminology - I am gathering that the 45601 is basically the same thing but connects better. So if I step up to a more friendly (and expensive) remote (say a levitron VRCPG-BSG or RZCPG-SG) It seems that these are used as a the controller for an entire system - so what do I need vera for !?
My hope was I could order a bunch of stuff and it would all work w/out too much complication, but it seems like I am going to have to immerse myself in HA for dummies for a couple months…
It makes a big BIG difference. Non-dimmable lights on a circuit with a TRAIC (e.g., dimmer) are a FIRE HAZARD!
EDIT: It sounds like you are making a good start on home automation. I can’t tell you about those scene controllers, because I just use my android phone to control everything, but I’m sure people on this board can. We are a pretty friendly bunch, so if you get stuck just ask questions.
It would be nice to see more of a working list than is found on the wiki pages I agree, but if there is one I have yet to find it.
As far as the instant status it seems only cooper and leviton have that due to some silly patent issue. These of course are much more expensive than other dimmers and switches.
There is a chart at one of the smarthome stores that lists features, but not how or how well they work with vera.