Why do you need more than one Wink 2 hub?
What are you doing with Alexa?
- Thread starter yromj
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Why do you need more than one Wink 2 hub?
yromj
Well-Known Member
As for the plug-in switch I would recommend Belkin, Leviton, or Lutron. I have two Levitons that work very well and every Lutron device I've used for myself and others has been flawless. I've read good things about the Belkin, too.
The dead bolt we put in my friend Steven's house is more than 15' from any of his Wink hubs and it works fine. The range of z-wave is its biggest limitation, though. I was a little curious about my Leviton plug-in dimmers because they're z-wave. I have my Wink hub down stairs and they're controlling my bedroom lamps which are upstairs (more than 15' away through ceiling/floor etc.) but everything works fine.
Steven sent me two Wink 2 hubs because he bought them for his house (2 stories, ~7,000 square feet) but didn't need them (I think he is currently using 3 to serve the house). So, yes coverage is something to be mindful of but the manufacturers also tend to be conservative with the specs as well.
John
The dead bolt we put in my friend Steven's house is more than 15' from any of his Wink hubs and it works fine. The range of z-wave is its biggest limitation, though. I was a little curious about my Leviton plug-in dimmers because they're z-wave. I have my Wink hub down stairs and they're controlling my bedroom lamps which are upstairs (more than 15' away through ceiling/floor etc.) but everything works fine.
Steven sent me two Wink 2 hubs because he bought them for his house (2 stories, ~7,000 square feet) but didn't need them (I think he is currently using 3 to serve the house). So, yes coverage is something to be mindful of but the manufacturers also tend to be conservative with the specs as well.
John
yromj
Well-Known Member
The only reason would be for extended coverage area. So far, I don't need the second one (or the original Wink hub I also have) as everything is working fine with the one hub.
John
Sonos and Amazon Alexa finally work together!
BUT ... if you have a “Bedroom Dot” device and a “Bedroom” Sonos device and you speak “Alexa, play Tom Petty in the Bedroom” it will assume you want to it on the Dot.
So, I’m going to have to go back and rename my devices because right now there’s a lot of overlap.
BUT ... if you have a “Bedroom Dot” device and a “Bedroom” Sonos device and you speak “Alexa, play Tom Petty in the Bedroom” it will assume you want to it on the Dot.
So, I’m going to have to go back and rename my devices because right now there’s a lot of overlap.
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Make certain the rope doesn’t come from Towen7 because there will be a hefty credit card bill attached to it with references to Sonos up and down the statement.
I may have your rope.
-As of now Alexa integration with Sonos does not support a local library, only streaming from these online services.
- Amazon Music
- Pandora
- iHeartRadio
- TuneIn Radio
- SiriusXM
Features Not Currently Supported
- Playing songs based on lyrics
- Setting Sonos alarms and sleep timers
- Grouping rooms (see note below)
- Thumbs up/down initiated with voice is not reflected in the Sonos app
Also, volume commands will only affect the player the command is directed to. If the player is grouped, the group volume will not be adjusted.
hawk52
Well-Known Member
So I fell over this today. Posted on a FB group I joined.
I was sitting and listening to music via my DOT connected to my receiver via BT adapter. I had my phone and went to open the Amazon Music App, for no good reason. When I did, there was is big bold letters, Alexa now in the App. Just tap the ICON in the lower right hand side of the app and say play xxxx. Tried it and it worked. Disconnected DOT from BT and connected the phone to BT. Said "play music" and it is. What i like about this is it now frees up the DOT for other functions. If I wanted to do something else while listening to music it will be interrupted until I was finished. Now the Dot is freed up. I have all my other music apps on the phone so the need for DOT for music is not critical. As of now sirius and pandora, when you ask to play either Alexa says not supported on this device. Hopefully that will be supported in the near future.
I was sitting and listening to music via my DOT connected to my receiver via BT adapter. I had my phone and went to open the Amazon Music App, for no good reason. When I did, there was is big bold letters, Alexa now in the App. Just tap the ICON in the lower right hand side of the app and say play xxxx. Tried it and it worked. Disconnected DOT from BT and connected the phone to BT. Said "play music" and it is. What i like about this is it now frees up the DOT for other functions. If I wanted to do something else while listening to music it will be interrupted until I was finished. Now the Dot is freed up. I have all my other music apps on the phone so the need for DOT for music is not critical. As of now sirius and pandora, when you ask to play either Alexa says not supported on this device. Hopefully that will be supported in the near future.
WAIT ONE MINUTE!!!
Are you saying they enabled voice commands on phones? That would be a HUGE step towards separating Alexa from dedicated devices AND compete directly with Siri, Google Assistant, Cortana, and Bixby. It may just be for music today, but in time your phone could be a fully functioning Alexa device.
They enabled voice control only within the Amazon Music app. For it to compete they’d need integration into the OS. Right? Which I’m guessing Apple and Samsung my be a little hesitant to do.
No. Cortana is a natural speech assistant today, but it doesn't control the hardware. It controls Microsoft apps and interacts with the internet and Bing. Amazon could enable nearly everything Alexa does on a phone - it would talk to your prime AI data account in the cloud and react accordingly, even controlling your smart home.
Actually, every time I use Cortana it asks to be the default assistant. I like Bixby, so I ignore or decline the request.
Bixby and Siri can control hardware
Bixby, Siri and Google Assistant can control native apps.
Google Assistant, Siri, and Cortana are general assistants. Alexa could join them.
Bixby and Siri can control hardware
Bixby, Siri and Google Assistant can control native apps.
Google Assistant, Siri, and Cortana are general assistants. Alexa could join them.
hawk52
Well-Known Member
Lets hope this was the 1st step to evolve this as you stated.
Another minor quibble... While playing music on Sonos initiated by Alexa, when Alexa hears it’s wake-word the volume of the music playback will dip dramatically. This makes sense if you have one Alexa device and it’s in the same space as your music. But not so much if you have Dots in other rooms.
It’s a little disconcerting to be listening to tunes in the office and have the volume drop because my wife is using voice commands to set a timer in the kitchen. I’m submitting feedback to Amazon and Sonos to only lower the playback volume if the wake-word is heard on the same device that initiated the music.
yromj
Well-Known Member
So I've been working with geofencing with mixed results. The first night was quite frustrating because the bedroom lights would randomly come on because my phone kept thinking it was leaving the house. This was primarily due to the fact that since phones use wifi networks to help locate themselves, it thought we were still in our old location (this is getting better).
I was having a similar issue with the lights not turning off when we leave. I solved this with an IFTTT applet which initiates a Stringify flow when my phone disconnects from my home wifi (thankfully these things are easy to write because that's a twisted way to go about this). I probably could have stayed strictly in IFFFT but I had the Stringify flow written and I just needed a reliable trigger.
For the coming home part, I wrote some Wink robots to solve this. The first one is simply a robot which turns on the lights when I arrive. To stop the random lights turning on, I use another robot which runs when we leave (which is very reliable) to enable that robot, which is normally disabled. Then I have another robot which is simply triggered by the kitchen lights coming on, which is part of the arrival activity, to disable the arrival robot (this also helps with the phantom leaving issues).
So far the biggest problem with this is that my phone often doesn't "realize" we're home for a few seconds so the lights sometimes come on shortly after we come in. I'm going to work on ways to correct this.
In summary, I think goefencing could be awesome but it has a few flaws. Also, from what I've read, Apple seems to better at this than Samsung (BTW, I really REALLY miss my LG phone). Being in a new subdivision with a recently changed city and zip code makes matters much worse.
John
I was having a similar issue with the lights not turning off when we leave. I solved this with an IFTTT applet which initiates a Stringify flow when my phone disconnects from my home wifi (thankfully these things are easy to write because that's a twisted way to go about this). I probably could have stayed strictly in IFFFT but I had the Stringify flow written and I just needed a reliable trigger.
For the coming home part, I wrote some Wink robots to solve this. The first one is simply a robot which turns on the lights when I arrive. To stop the random lights turning on, I use another robot which runs when we leave (which is very reliable) to enable that robot, which is normally disabled. Then I have another robot which is simply triggered by the kitchen lights coming on, which is part of the arrival activity, to disable the arrival robot (this also helps with the phantom leaving issues).
So far the biggest problem with this is that my phone often doesn't "realize" we're home for a few seconds so the lights sometimes come on shortly after we come in. I'm going to work on ways to correct this.
In summary, I think goefencing could be awesome but it has a few flaws. Also, from what I've read, Apple seems to better at this than Samsung (BTW, I really REALLY miss my LG phone). Being in a new subdivision with a recently changed city and zip code makes matters much worse.
John
I wish I was smart enough to mess with IFTTT routines. The Lutron system also has geofencing but I’m not terribly interested in triggering the same action every time I arrive or leave.
What if I’m arriving home at noon and I don’t need the lights on? What if my wife’s phone is dead and I run to the grocery store and don’t want all the lights to turn off?
I avoid that complication with the Pico remote and Alexa.
On the way out just say “Alexa, turn off all lights”. On arrival I have a pico in the car that I can tap to turn on the the patio and entryway lights.
What if I’m arriving home at noon and I don’t need the lights on? What if my wife’s phone is dead and I run to the grocery store and don’t want all the lights to turn off?
I avoid that complication with the Pico remote and Alexa.
On the way out just say “Alexa, turn off all lights”. On arrival I have a pico in the car that I can tap to turn on the the patio and entryway lights.
yromj
Well-Known Member
I understand that, too, and may move away from it as I go along. Right now I don't have Jan's phone doing any geofencing yet (which I actually care more about than my phone doing it). As far as the multiple phones, it's easy enough to set up if conditions that prohibit the lights from going off just because one person leaves (IF [phone 1] AND [phone 2] depart EXECUTE, ELSE "do nothing"). Also, you can use logic to set things like valid times such as after sunset.
John
Yeah ... from my perspective geofencing is really cool concept. I’ve given it a lot of thought and I can’t think of anything except maybe air conditioning that I’d want to so rigidly depend on the location and signal of our phones.