Hey guys,
I am in the market for some new blackout shades for my home theater room. I already have openHAB set up with Z-wave so I am considering these but wanted to check with y’all to ensure they are compatible with openHAB. How do I tell?
If you have any other good recommendations, please post them below!
If it bears the Zwave logo/certification it will work with OH. If it’s a new or rarely used device, the Zwave database may need to be updated but that’s not hard and there are lots of people who can help. Battery powered devices are often not immediately recognized but will become so after they are woken up and the binding is given a chance to interrogate it.
The same goes for Zigbee, though there are a lot of Zigbee devices out there that have extra stuff which might not be compatible. There you have to pay attention to the brand.
Matter support is up and coming, but I think it should work with any Matter certified device too. There aren’t too many of those out there yet though.
I’m interested in this topic too an look forward to suggestions. I’ve a large roman shade I DIY’d that I’d love to automate. It’s been on the todo list for a long time.
I went with Bali Z-wave blinds (available at most online retailers). Unfortunately the motorization and z-wave options basically triple the costs (coupons and sales pop up periodically). I’ve been very pleased. Easy ordering, easy install, z-wave is flawless, Somfy motors, and good quality. 8 AA batteries last 12-15 months with regular use. Of all automation I’ve done, I would put this at the top of the list, despite the costs.
this is all very helpful info. I appreciate it!
thanks. I’m checking this out now. Can you please give me an idea on price for these?
+1 for Bali Z-wave
I went through costco (dot) com when they had a sale on Bali.
I have these blinds in two rooms, three blinds / windows in each room side by side. Six blinds total.
The customer service from Bali was good when I needed them. One of the blinds started pulling apart at the seam. I called them, well out of official warranty. They said the fabric had a lifetime warranty. As luck would have it that colour was no longer available. Since I have three windows side by side I couldn’t have one of a different colour. They made all three again in a different colour all for no charge to me.
One negative I have with Bali Z-wave is the power supply. For those with batteries this wouldn’t apply. Mine are mains power. The power supply if highly proprietary. You can’t call up Bali and order a power supply. They don’t sell to the public. You have to go through the likes of costco or home depot and they don’t know what you are talking about (ask me how I know). Luckily I had spare power supplies from my warranty claim shipment. ebay is hit and miss for the power supplies.
The only other complaint is that they don’t respond as a group, intermittently. If I send a command to the group of three it is hit and miss which will respond. I decided it was a Z-Wave thing. To get around it I have a script that takes the intent (all 100% open as an example) and staggers the Z-Wave commands by a small time period. That made them rock solid.
Mine show as Mfg Springs Window Fashions CSZ1 in Z-Wave
Pricing… through costco (dot) com for Bali blinds here is what I paid…
One of the two smaller ones is a higher price as it includes the more fancy remote control that is able to control all three at once. I don’t ever use that remote as the blinds are automated to my every whim.
I also have Bali Blinds purchased from Costco Canada. I got the 1/2" double-cell shades for maximum energy efficiency. They have a sale every spring (ending on June 1), so now is a great time to get them if the same offer is on in the US.
I bought them two years ago with the Lithium-Ion battery packs, which I’ve only had to charge maybe once or twice. Funny thing: when you customize your order it says that there’s an additional cost for AA battery cases (instead of Li-Ion packs). However, if you select the AA option, the price drops. I suspect that I didn’t notice this when I ordered. Oops.
I didn’t order the proprietary gateway or a remote, since I already had a Z-Wave controller. Pairing was super easy with the OH Z-Wave Binding, and they’ve given me no trouble at all.
One minor thing I dislike is that the batteries connect with Micro-USB, despite the shades requiring 12V. That’s fine for me since I know what I’m doing, but I’m generally not a fan of companies using connectors out of spec. I could imagine someone trying to power the shades with a different battery, or plugging a 5V device into the 12V Bali battery.
I went with SmartWings roller shades, using Zigbee motors, which arrive this week. Lately I’ve been favoring Zigbee over Zwave because Zigbee2MQTT supports more devices and is easier to implement compared to the native OH Zigbee binding.
I’ll report my experience after I get them installed.
Did you mean to write “native OH ZWave binding”?
I use Z2M, but I’ll push back on it being “easier to implement” than either of the ZWave/Zigbee bindings. If someone has never used Zigbee, Mosquitto, or the MQTT binding, Zigbee2MQTT can be a serious headache to implement. It only gets easy with practice and experience. I don’t want to give new users the same impression that it’s easy, as there’s a lot more to learn with Z2M. In contrast, the ZWave and Zigbee bindings are one-click installations.
After installation, there’s almost no difference between adding a device through any of the three methods. If anything, there’s an extra step in Z2M since you have to pair the device, configure in Z2M, and then configure again in OH.
The pain tends to come from devices that are brand new to the world. For both ZWave and Z2M, someone has to add it to a database before it will work. The difference is that the Z2M community is much larger than the OH community, so we can just wait for someone else to do the work for us.
In contrast, there’s a chance that the OH Zigbee binding will work immediately if the device adheres to Zigbee standards. But in the past, that was far from a guarantee.
Again, I’m not arguing against Z2M and I’m not arguing against you finding it easier to use for yourself. I just want to balance the perspective a bit for new users.
I look forward to hearing about your SmartWings shades!
No, I meant the native OH Zigbee binding.
Since I already had MQTT working on my system it seemed easier to just add the Z2m piece, but you’re right all things being equal there are more components needed.
I also find the documentation and support for Z2M better than what we have on OH side so that’s another reason to favor Zigbee (and Z2M) over Zwave.
SmartWings had support for both (as well as Matter and Thread) so, for me, it was an easy choice.
I will let you know how the shade project goes
Okay, then your original sentence doesn’t quite make sense. You led with: “favoring Zigbee over Zwave because…”, but then seemed to compare Z2M and the Zigbee binding. I get what you meant now. It was first why you prefer Z2M over ZWave, and second why you prefer Z2M over Zigbee binding.
Yeah, MQTT can be really confusing the first time you try to set it up. New users sometimes don’t realize that Mosquitto and Z2M are separate software from openHAB.
The main reason I’d favour Zigbee over ZWave is price. At least in Canada, Zigbee devices tend to be much less expensive.
The main reasons I’d favour Z2M over the Zigbee binding are the compatibility with non-standard Zigbee devices and the easy OTA firmware updates.
@TheJM I have 30+ SmartWings roller shades in my home. I’ve been very pleased with them. Their customer support is also awesome. I opted for the Z-Wave motor. I can confirm they work with the Z-Wave binding (I was actually the one who got them imported into the device DB).
FWIW, I also have been contributing to and recently switched full-time to the still in development Z-Wave JS binding. They work great with that binding as well. I believe the main developer is pushing to have this in OpenHAB 5.
