What advice for newcomers debating automation?

Chris joins Phil and Rohan to share a brutally honest smart home journey: starting with Philips Hue, hitting limits with multiple bridges, battling MyQ and RatGDO, and landing real energy savings with Home Assistant.

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Chapters

00:00 Welcome

01:03 Meet Chris: the ‘reluctant Home Assistant guy’ (NZ/Canada background)

03:00 Hue as the gateway: GU10s, COVID mood lights, buying a house

04:39 Discovering Home Assistant; cost shocks and smart switch vs smart bulb decisions

06:30 Legal wiring quirks in NZ and scoring bulk Hue downlights

08:00 Hue motion/presence, bridge device limits, and Pro Bridge API exposure

09:50 Upgrade cadence, iOS/MacOS betas, and why Shelly bodies didn’t fit

12:00 Daily frustrations: a random red light, Roomba fails, Alexa vs Siri

14:36 Garage/gate saga: MyQ, RatGDO struggles, Grandstream Wi‑Fi, Meross HomeKit fix

20:00 Adaptive Lighting: Hue app vs HA integration; mixed CCT bulbs going ‘red’

26:00 Three points of failure; behavior change, the cleaners’ switch, and one non‑motion room

31:40 Protocol choices: Wi‑Fi vs Zigbee vs Z‑Wave; Matter/Thread pain in practice

36:40 Energy saving wins: free ‘hour of power’, Bosch Home Connect, Hue Tap + TTS

47:06 Simple scenes that matter: spa lighting that won’t trigger floods

51:00 Biggest surprises, time sink, and the idea of HA consultants

53:40 Advice for newcomers: hobby vs lifestyle; draw the line

56:00 Dashboards: new layouts, family tabs, activity timelines, and to‑dos

This episode was made possible thanks to our sponsors

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Hosts

Phil Hawthorne

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Twitter: @philhawthorne

Bluesky: @philhawthorne.com

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Rohan Karamandi

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Twitter: @rohank9

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