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+--- Thread: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? (/showthread.php?tid=10752)
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What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - ghurty - 01-01-2019
I am trying to put together what would be the "best experience" equipment to use with CQC to get you the most control and capabilities and with the best integrations. Also that we can get the most data out of
Any input would most be appreciated.
Here is what I have so far if I am making a mistake please let me know
Intrusion - ELK
Sensors for the door, windows, etc ... (to trigger events) - ELK
Lighting - Lutron RA2
Occupancy Sensor/Ambient light sensor - Lutron??
HVAC - I know NEST is good but is a different thermostat better? Maybe one that can get readings also of the temperature of each room
Wired lock - ELK Relay
Weather - OpenWeatherMap (seems like our only choice for now)
Physical buttons to trigger events and rules - Lutron RA2
MEDIA
Media Repository - ?
Multizone audio amp - ?
Audio Switcher (or will this fall under the multizone repository)?
Something to send video out to multiple destinations and can mix and match -?
Any integration with a PVR (tivo style device) -?
TVs - ?
MISC:
Voice control - ?
Any appliance (oven, fridge) Integration?
Door Bell?
Controllable power outlets?
Irrigation -?
Pool/Jacuzzi - ?
Power usage monitoring?
Color Changing LED lights and LED strips?
Temporarily give someone remote access into your house?
Wireless lock -
Anything else?
Thank you
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - Dean Roddey - 01-01-2019
The RA2 system gets you a good bit of stuff. Some of these I don't have a lot of knowledge about. Some that I would go with are:
1. Hue for colored lights. And you could use it for the occasional other thing that the RA2 system might not provide but where you need wireless. It's Zigbee based so more reliable than Z-Wave.
2. For voice control, the Echo is likely the only one you would want to use if you are installing for other people. Of course that also means setting up their network to allow it and such.
3. If you are doing wired door locks, then access would have to be through the automation system. How you'd do that I'm not sure. There's no keypad in that scenario. Of course if you mean literally doing it remotely, they could do that with WebRIVA set up for secure connections and just open the door for them.
4. Irrigation there are folks here who do that and can give you some useful info. Some folks just use the Elk to control actuators, and use the irrigation driver to control the Elk.
5. On the media front, I think that three of those are all basically a matrix switcher. Or maybe two of them, one for audio and one for video perhaps.
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - ghurty - 01-01-2019
Thank you.
To follow up on that question:
Wired Locks - I guess CQC can just tell Elk to trigger a relay to open a door. Can CQC receive from ELK what user code was entered into an ELK keypad to enter into a door so it can run an event based on which users code was used?
Wireless Locks - Do Zigbee or Zwave report better their statuses to CQC?
For the Media - Any suggestions on which is the best Matrix switcher to work with CQC?
Any input on the best way to get multple temperature sensors throughout a house? I know elk has them, but they are wired. Can CQC talk to Lutron RA2 wireless sensors?
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - Dean Roddey - 01-01-2019
I don't think you can do that, but you can set a flag in the Elk that can trigger an action in CQC.
I don't know of any Zigbee locks right off hand. Z-Wave seems the only game in town for wireless. And, just have a couple locks in a Z-Wave network usually isn't good since it's a mesh network and the doors are usually as far from the transmitter as possible.
I don't know much about of matrix switchers. That's above my pay grade. Someone else would have to chip in on that. But of course Russound and Nuvo are often used. There are more high endy pro type stuff as well, but I don't know as much about those and drivers would be required and such.
CQC doesn't talk to any Lutron bits directly. It talks to the Lutron repeater box. If they are exposed via the repeater, and the API, we should be able to see them.
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - ghurty - 01-01-2019
I sent an email to Lutron asking them about the bridge. Do you know if CQC can do events based on scene buttons being pressed on the Lutron devices? And if yes, will CQC react almost immediately or does it need to poll it?
I see that Yale makes some zigbee locks, but zigbee is also a mesh network so I am not sure if that will be any better. On the high end side, I use Salto wireless locks, but they are not targetted towards residential projects and thus are much more expensive ($700+). As a general rule, for new home installs wires strikes are better but they are not always an option.
So to clarify about Elk flags... I would be able to have the Elk set a different flag based on which user entered the code and CQC will be able to act based off of that?
Thank you
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - Dean Roddey - 01-01-2019
It can. You have to set up the buttons a particular way, which is described in the driver doc. It doesn't have to poll. All changes in the Lutron are async notifications, so it should be quite fast. Some other folks here use it and might be doing this and can give some feedback perhaps.
There are also some other stuff, like counters, that you could set to a number and then set the flag to invoke the event in CQC, which would look at the counter and use the number to do something perhaps. You could encode the the user code in that value. If the user codes are like 4 or 5 digits, that will easily fit in a 32 bit unsigned value, which I think the counters are.
Having Zigbee locks only helps if you can access them. The Hue may not understand locks at all. And it depends on what Zigbee profile the locks implement. You'd have to check on that.
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - sic0048 - 01-03-2019
For your multi-room audio, do you want keypads in each room for local control? If so, Russound is about the only player around anymore. If not, then there are other options available including something as simple as a Sonos or even Alexas.
PVR/DVR solution - I highly recommend looking into SageTV. It is now open source (it started as a private company which Google bought and integrated some technology into their fiber boxes before open sourcing it) and the community is still going strong. It has good integration with CQC as well. It's a computer based system, but you can use clients to view on the TV (so you aren't trying to hook a computer up to each TV). They use to sell hardware clients (HD-100, HD-200 and HD-300 devices) which is what I primarily use, but they have been out of production for years and are not readily available. The good news is that there is a great Android client and many people use Nvidia Shields as clients at the TV. They work great and offer plenty of other advantages than just SageTV. I actually have a Shield and not only do I use it at home, but I even carry it with me when I travel and I can hook it up to a TV and have access to my home Sage system when away from home. SageTV supports all kinds of tuner options as well. Personally I have cable, so I use a 6 channel cable card tuner which allows me to record up to 6 shows with just one cable card rental ($2/mo). I don't have a single cable box in my house and therefore save the $8-10/mo per TV that most people pay for their DVR system. There are also plugins that add features like commercial skip and recording extension (monitors sports events and will automatically extend the recording time if an event goes past the originally scheduled ending time) that really make this system a powerhouse.
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - Dean Roddey - 01-03-2019
Keep in mind that he's talking about systems he's installing for other people, not for himself. So there may be other concerns there for something like SageTV.
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - ghurty - 01-05-2019
In regards to Lutron, this is the reply I got from them
"The sensor data is not stored in the bridge, you would have to do 3rd party integration through the main repeater."
Thank you
RE: What products would give the best experience working with CQC? - Dean Roddey - 01-05-2019
I think maybe there is some confusion going on. The main repeater is what we talk to and our driver would be the third party integration he is referring to, I'm assuming. I'm not sure what the bridge is in this case?