Hi,

Philips will soon require an account to use their shitty app so I’d like to move away from them. I also have a few IKEA Tradfri stuff.

I look around on this sub and a few others and it seems like these are the best options:

I think a hub is better than a dongle so I don’t have to use Home Assistant and I can keep using HomeKit as before. If I have to, I don’t mind Home Assistant but it was very clunky when I tried it a few years ago, not sure how it evolved.

Although here are my criteria:

  • It must not require an account,
  • I’d love something that works with the Hue Sync Box. Is it realistic? Maybe with hass-emulated-hue? I don’t mind replacing it if there’s something as good,
  • It’d be nice to be able to use HomeKit.

Feel free to share your experiences!

    • SpayliaOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Does it work well? No disconnection or anything?

      • venquessaBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        All of these devices and hubs use the same chips from Texas Instruments.

        There are basically 2 defacto chips. The “older cheaper one” and the “newer expensive and powerful one.”

        The ZZH is the later. Most others (do check) are the lesser chip.

        Issues with the lesser chip are:
        * Limited number of devices supported (something like 16?).
        * No support for “direct binding” close proximity binding - required to re-bind re-join a Phillips hue bulb.

        • Lower signal strength.

        I have 4 Hue smart bulbs acting as routers around the house, which helps, but honestly it’s far more reliable than the Wifi setups.

        • SpayliaOPBEnglish
          1·
          10 months ago

          I would guess CC1352 is the older cheaper whereas CC2652 is the more powerful one?