Can you Effectively use Z-Wave Devices Without a Hub?

Updated on 3rd Sep 2020 04:49 in General

Z-Wave devices are robust and remarkable to use in countless situations. One question that might come up is if the use of a Hub is necessary to use Z-Wave devices. Indeed it would be fascinating to be able to have two or more devices communicate with each other directly without the need for extra components. The protocol specifications say that devices can communicate with each other directly, so it should be possible, right?

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When Should you Really Use a Smart Hub?

Updated on 31st Aug 2020 19:42 in General, Smart

On this site, we talk a lot about building your own smart devices and other DIY technologies of the like, but when should you use a smart hub and what are the benefits? To find out, we're going to look at some of the benefits a smart hub can bring compared to using standalone devices along with some of the disadvantages you might discover with them.

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The Meross Smart Humidifier: Finally a True Smart Humidifier?

Updated on 31st Aug 2020 19:07 in General, Review, Smart

The Meross Smart Humidifier 320ML is an exciting product as it's both small and compact while also providing a broad set of "smart" features out of the box. In this review, we're going to take a look at some of this unit's strong points as well as some of its weaknesses. More importantly, though, we're going to see why this isn't really a humidifier and for who exactly this product was designed. 

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The Best Way to Use Z-Wave with Home Assistant

Updated on 15th Sep 2020 14:05 in Home Assistant, Tutorial

Z-Wave is really cool, it has so many great features that can provide both ease of use for regular users and advanced features for use by power users. How can you get the power of Z-Wave into a DIY platform like Home Assistant or OpenHAB? Sometimes, you also want to have a different device act as the network than the one that's running your smart home software. 

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How to Easily Improve WiFi for your Smart Home

Updated on 28th Aug 2020 15:04 in General, Smart

So many smart devices are sold as being hubless and being super easy to set up via a mobile app, to then connect to the WiFi network. This model works really well because most homes contain a WiFi network these days, and this technology aims to take advantage of this existing wireless connectivity to reduce the cost of creating a smart home. This means that your WiFi network better be up to the task though, as an inadequate network will result in poor smart home performance! Find out how to tune up your network today!

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