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I want a home security system, but I don't want to pay a monthly fee. Given that my phone receives texts and e-mails in a matter of seconds (or at worst, minutes), I'd rather have a system notify me if a door opens or motion is detected, rather than calling the police. It looks like there are several Home Automation systems that do this very well. I want to see what your experiences are with these.
The first two look more like Security systems, but SmartThings looks like they style themselves a full home automation setup. Each of the systems supports a variety of sensors and power outlets and whatnot, so you can do lots of cool things with each. Like I mentioned above, I bought the Iris system, but I'm thinking of returning it in favor of SmartThings. Does anyone have any experience with any of the systems I listed, or anything else?
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May 20, 2014 20:45
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| # ¿ Apr 26, 2024 05:05 |
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I ended up buying SmartThings. What do you mean 'integrate with a security' product? I use SmartThings as the security product. Here's what I had to buy:
Basically, I use the SmartThings app on my phone to set my status to 'Away'. Then, whenever any of the door sensors or motion sensor are triggered, SmartThings sends a push notification to my phone and sounds the siren. It also has tons of 'apps' and encourages third party development, so it seems pretty extensible. My only complaint with SmartThings is that their documentation is terrible, and they don't have a very good "end to end experience". For example, they have a slick dashboard for getting notifications when someone opens a door while you're gone, but if you want a Siren to go off as well, you have to set up a SECOND 'app' to do that. Oh, there's no way to search for apps either, so you have to browse each one individually and see if it does what you want based on a vague description. Overall I'm pretty happy with SmartThings so far. EDIT: Do you mean integration with a service that calls a security team or the police for you? (similar to what typical alarm companies like ADT do) syphon fucked around with this message at 20:52 on May 28, 2014 |
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May 28, 2014 19:15
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I've been using SmartThings for a while now, and am reasonably happy with it. I basically use it as an alarm. Using our phones as 'presence sensors', the alarm automatically arms whenever my wife and I both leave the house (and disarms whenever one of us gets home). The only pain in the rear end is that it's all 'cloud based', so the entire service is susceptible to outages. Last night their site had an outage (its first since I bought it), so we couldn't disable my alarm all night, short of unplugging it. We ended up unplugging the siren, and dealing with the "door is open!" alerts whenever we opened a door.
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Oct 29, 2014 00:57
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It's not perfect. I'd say 1 out of every 15-20 times, the alarm won't disarm in time, and we'll accidentally set off the alarm by opening the front door. Still, the ease of use (an alarm that activates itself when necessary) is well worth the false positives, I feel.
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Oct 29, 2014 18:23
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It happened quite a while ago, but it's worth noting that Samsung purchased SmartThings back in August: http://blog.smartthings.com/news/smartthings-updates/smartthings-samsung-open-platform/ What this means for the platform as a whole... I do not know!
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Nov 4, 2014 19:24
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Are the sensors wired or wireless? If they're wireless, they very likely use Z-Wave or Zigbee, which are both relatively open standards. I know SmartThings (and most likely other systems) worth with both Z-Wave and Zigbee, so it's very possible it would pair with your existing sensors just fine.
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Nov 6, 2014 20:46
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I'd recommend taking apart one of the sensors and look for some kind of branding or labeling. I don't know much of anything about the protocols themselves... pairing a sensor is very much like Bluetooth. You have to press a button on the sensor and (usually via the software) put the system in "searching for new device" mode. I can't think of any easy way to determine what protocol your sensors use other than trying to look for a label, or attempting to pair it with a hub of each type. 
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Nov 14, 2014 22:09
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Three Olives posted:So as of today Nest is completely integrated into Google Now and it is completely awesome. The only reason I was considering the Honeywell Lyric over the Nest was geofences, Google Now is 1000% better: I was actually considering the new ecobee thermostat, mostly because it has a separate temp sensor (which will help a little bit with the difference in temperatures between my upstairs and downstairs.
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Dec 16, 2014 22:40
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I don't know about the ADT thing, but almost all "IP Cams" these days (the ones that hook into your network) are viewable over a browser. For my home, I just bought a handful of cameras like this one and then forwarded ports on my router so I could view them over my phone. I've purchased a few different ones over the years, so I have a mismash of cameras. Most manufacturers have their own apps for viewing/recording their own cameras, but there are a couple other bits of third party software that let you hook up multiple cameras and view them in one place. I used ZoneMinder for a bit, but it was kinda of crappy. I eventually switched to BlueIris, which isn't free ($40) but has a really nice mobile app and does motion detection pretty well. So basically my "Home security system" is SmartThings coupled with these cameras. If my phone gets a SmartThings alert that a door opens while I'm away, I'll take a look at my cameras to see who's there. If someone really is breaking into my house, I'll see them on the camera and can decide to call 911 on my own. EDIT: My experience with ADT sensors is that they're not compatible with other systems. ADT wants to make money, not adopt open standards. That MAY not be the case with you, but I've chatted with a handful of people and every time, they had to buy new sensors.
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Mar 6, 2015 20:08
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Ironically I don't own that one. I have a Foscam I got during a sale, some Cisco one, and a higher-end D-Link. Honestly, all 3 work almost exactly the same. The Foscam has PTZ (which I never use) and the D-Link has night-vision (I always leave a light on), so it doesn't make much difference to me. If I were you, I'd buy that D-Link I linked, since it's only $30. Give it a try for a bit, and if you like it, you can buy more. If not, you're out $30, no big deal.
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Mar 6, 2015 20:29
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The Dropcam will integrate with a SmartThings setup you buy later, so I vote you get that for now and keep using it after you build out your ST setup.
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Mar 18, 2015 19:39
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The reliance on a web server is a disadvantage of SmartThings, I'd say. The advantage to it is that you get things like mail or text or push notifications for "free", but it's drat annoying when your internet connection (or even their website) goes down and you can't disable your alarm before going in the front door. It's only happened to me once, but I had to go down and unplug the siren because I couldn't disable it. The various sensors DO keep working, like MeKeV mentioned above. I still got notifications whenever a door opened, but I couldn't set the alarm back in "home" mode to stop them until the site came back up. Overall this sounds really annoying, but it's only happened once since I installed the system almost a year ago.
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Mar 20, 2015 00:12
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I'd recommend buying a Wireless camera from Newegg or Amazon, and setting up on motion-detection on it so it records when it sees motion. Most cameras have this feature these days. Here's an example (not necessarily the best or cheapest, just the first that popped up in a search): http://www.amazon.com/TENVIS-JPT381...31022334&sr=1-1
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May 7, 2015 19:12
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BlueIris isn't free, but I really like it. It aggregates all of your cameras into a single view, has a decent mobile app, and provides all the usual Motion Detection, alarms, and notifications you'd expect. Foscam or Dropcam seem like they can do the same thing, but BlueIris will work with nearly ANY camera you can by. I've assorted a collection (well, 3 so far) of random IP cameras over the years and they all work just fine with BlueIris.
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Jul 13, 2015 04:49
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I use BlueIris + various IPCams for pet-watching while we're at work. BlueIris is ok software. It aggregates all the cameras and has a nice mobile app. The only pain in the butt is that the cameras still need to have power, so I have cameras hung up on the walls and power cables dangling down to the nearest outlets. Short of drilling holes in the ceiling and running extension cords through the attic, I'm not sure there's much I can do to make it look better.
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Sep 30, 2015 20:41
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| # ¿ Apr 26, 2024 05:05 |
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Anyone have any experience or recommendations with smart locks (even just a combo pad would work) for sliding glass doors?
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Feb 6, 2023 04:05
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