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Review: Nanoleaf's Skylight Adds Modular Smart Lighting to Your Ceiling
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From what I see, you need to re- setup your devices if converting to matter. Having to do this is ridiculous. There are many things, like my front gate controller, that I do not want to have to access again. Same with my garage door opener. Matter is supposed to 'just work' and I should not have to redo everything.
There have been many instances of devices either not working, or dropping out of HomeKit. The integration isn’t quite there yet. I want it to be good, but it’s not… yet.
With regard to Home Assistant, or Homebridge. I have yet to have a play with it, and do I really want to have to learn all this stuff? I have a QNap, but not sure I really want to rely on another device to get this done. I already have HomePod Mini's and Apple TV's that run my HomeKit system. I want to get a device, and just add it to my HomeKit. If I have to download Smart things to do it, that’s no big deal as I have a folder full of 1st party apps, but I want it to integrate perfectly into my HomeKit, because it is supposed to.
Point taken. I read a reddit thread where they said it did, but I accept you point, and understand. Thanks. Also, didn’t realise these Nanoleafs didn’t have thread/matter. I should have read the story properly. I have the thread Light bulbs, so I assumed (wrongly) that they would be consistent.
Agree 100%.
It's criminal how LED manufacturers have colluded to make LED bulbs last a SHORTER amount of time than they used to.
Remember the original LED lights that you got a 5 year warranty for because they would just last and last? Turns out that was as good as it gets
It's sickening that companies are putting engineering resources into making our products less durable just so they can sell more.
This is the case not just with lights or tech products, but with everything.
Ever wonder why the soles of your $200 Goretex shoes wear out in a year? That's by design.
Genuine question; what's a good alternetive matter enabled brand that can be driven with homekit only?
I'm planning to invest in a smart light setup.
Nothing fancy, mostly just changing the colour of the lights.
I’ve always found Meross to be great. I’m about to get the light strips. https://shop.meross.com/collections/smart-lighting
I don't know what LED bulbs you've been using, but good light quality LED bulbs can look just as nice if not better, often providing more evenness, adjustability, and customizable shapes. Nanoleaf has always shipped extremely cheap controllers and bulbs/diffusers and justified the marked up with some customization gimmicks. I've seen quite a few light panels that does the same thing a lot better for less.
That's on manufacturers trying to squeeze every last cent of profit, not a fault of LED technology in and of itself. This is nothing new. Ever heard of the Phoebus cartel from the 1920s? They're the reason each incandescent bulb only lasts 1000 hours to this day while the centenial light bulb made in the 1890s has been continuously burning from more than a century.
We seem to agree on the entire topic here and yet your tone couldn't be more condescending
Good times
I quite agree with you. I wasn't too happy with the light from a lot of these products (I have 3x nanoleaf products, lots of Hue bulbs, Meross, etc.). Have you looked at Waveform Lighting and Yuji Lighting? These companies have really high quality light used for professional coloring application (and industrial / residential applications) though their bulbs aren't "smart". At this point, I've switched 80% of the lights in my house to products by Waveform and Yuji and it's so much better.
This is good, Maybe it will trickle down to the lower priced phones. But on the other hand, I assume no one wants to use a phone as a border router. So what is the purpose? I think maybe to allow the phone to be used as a light switch. Having a Thread radio means the data does not need to go over WiFi twice before even getting to a border router. Thinks like dimmer sliders should be more responsive.
I've just started experimenting with Shelly products. They offer a range of small WiFi based boxes that can fit inside most electrical boxes and make dumb lights and dumb switches "smart". So far they seems to be very reliable although I've not directly connected them to HomeKit. What makes them nice is that you can on-board and configure them with no special app. They power on initially and look like an access point with a web server. There is a Shelly App you can use but any browser will work. The little $9 box has a webserver inside.
So if you have a preferred brand of "dumb light", for $9 more you can make it smart.
I'm using these on already installed lights and fans and ceiling-mounted IR heaters and they can be made to work with Hue (and other) Motion sensors and Siri (and other voice assistants) what I really like is they work with dumb switches either basic toggle or monetary contact. Shelly seems to be the thing to use with no-neutral switches because you can place them in the ceiling box (where neural is available. I just bought ten of these and I'll know more in a few months. As of today, I am thinking of them as the "smart home installer's Swiss Army Knife."
I hate to say it, but Apple is not the leader in this smart home field, far from it. It is too bad because they could be and it is a huge growth opportunity.
So says you.
Have 2 Auora's. Been going for 8 years. So.... there's that.
That's the only product I will own from them. There was a period where they were having connectivity issues. Then there's the time their app went from awesome to complete garbage (still to this day). To the point I rarely ever touch my panels. HomeKit takes care of all the automation and colors.
Would never own another Nanoleaf product again for different reasons.
Now this new skylight.. looks like crap to me. It reminds me of those old kitchens that had those fluorescent lights that nobody wanted anymore.
The comment you were “agreeing 100%” with is saying the issue lies in inherent issue with LED technology rather than cheap parts and planned obsolescence. I disagree entirely with that notion.
read it again, friend. I said the issue is corporate greed and used LED technology as an example.
It’s not about where it was made, it is about the company that designed and accepted the quality. I think the iPhones assembled in China have been fantastic build quality and that’s down to Apple. These products are made by a Canadian Company and accepted as the standard they want. If they look cheap it’s because it’s Cheap looking Canadian Junk.
It says a lot when the reviewer, after being given a free product to use, decides that they are only good enough for the laundry room. The only worse thing he could have said was "I put them in the shed where we store the lawn mower".
If the quality were really good, he'd find a more public place to show them off.
I agree, don't blame China. You can have anything you want made there to any level of quality you are willing to pay for.