Hi, i have a smarthome with mostly KNX devices. My temperature sensors are from aqara and i use zigbee2MQTT to get my data to openhab. I use a SMLIGHT SLZB-06.
Now i´m a little bit lost in all the new things (new for me) which are there now. I build my house about 10-12 years ago. So i´m not so familiar with the new technics.
To integrate matter devices, what do i need to buy?
I don´t want google alexa, amazon echo, apple homepod or something like this devices which are sending tons of data to the cloud. I want some local bridges/hubs. Best would be something like my zigbee hub/coordinator from smlight with lan connection.
Can someone help me? I have 2 aqara u200 door locks, which currently are not connected to my smarthome, because they are matter devices.
It depends. Matter works over WiFi or a mesh network technology called Thread. Most Matter devices will be one or the other.
If you have devices that support WiFi you need nothing else. These can integrate with OH directly using the Matter binding.
If you have devices that run on Thread, you need what’s called a Thread Border Router (TBR). Many (but not all) hubs, displays, etc. from the three big vendors come with a TBR. Even a bunch of WiFi 6/7 multichannel access points include a TBR (but not all, notably the TPLink Deco claims support for Matter but only with WiFi).
A number of vendors are releasing Zwave/Zigbee/Thread combo dongles too, but I don’t know which ones and how well those are supported by the Matter binding. Maybe all of them?
That first link might be relevant as @reyhard showed the steps he took to get u200 door locks integrated with OH. The second link is to a tool that handles most of those steps described in the first link automatically.
I have a similar setup as @halloween , knx backend, 12 years “young” (but continuously enhanced).
Maybe more familiar with the “latest stuff”, running ZWave, ZigBee and some basic Matter stuff.
Got a SLZB-06p7 and the new SLZB-10MR up and running as POE devices.
So here my 2 cents:
The SLZB-Devices can act as a border router as well, check the manuals on it.
Currently there are some stability issues with the -06 devices, causing them to freeze regularly (Did you experience that as well?). The -10MR didn’t how this behaviour yet.
When it comes to voice control of items (e.g. knx ones) I dumped the old Alexa-Integration metadata and shifted to the Matter metadata. Works like a charm, integrated easily and is stable. Number of device types is restricted, but guess this will improve. Many Alexa devices are able to control Matter devices. Got a few of them, but mostly my “Matter devices” are knx, zigbee or zwave devices exposed as Matter devices using openHAB (Great feature!)).
What I can highly recommend when it comes to Zigbee and ZWave is using z2m and zwave-js - discovery is working well based on the HA mechanism. Allows you to have multiple radios with different z2m instances in your home (or remote location) and control them all similar through mqtt.
Adds a layer of complexity but also some helpful abstraction and openness.
Some advantage if you do not need to link devices directly on e.g. Zigbee level.
MQTT HA support is being added to more and more devices and solutions like ems-esp or evcc,
discovery make life much more easy.
Regarding Matter:
I think it is still somehow limited in the kind of device types supported/available, but this will improve. Thread in the end has the potential to overhaul zigbee, but currently the number of devices available is limited still.
Matter itself supports Wifi as well, depending on the devices, but this only works well for non-battery devices.
I’d say currently Matter and Thread is still nothing for the weak-at-hearted but definitely will be the upcoming standard replacing ZigBee and ZWave in the long run as it is backed-up by the major players in the market. Using the Matter binding / functionality in OH make it very easy to expose devices to the Matter universe → Thanks to the maintainers!.
