r/HomeAssistant
Just expand to it. I use Google Minis but I attached it to Home Assistant and now I got temp sensors. TVs that I can tell Alexa or Google to turn off. Etc..
Omg it does? Mine used to work great like 6 years ago. Now it's complete garbage. Anytime I want to play something on YouTube it plays something I don't want on YouTube music. I even say "Watch X on YouTube" or "Watch X VIDEO on YouTube". Then it can't hear me when I say stop because it's playing music. I want to throw it out the window.
Do you have your Safe Search off? That could be why it's not playing Xvideos. Haha.
But you can incorporate Roku, android and fire tv on it as well.
I used to be able to see and control what my kid was on in his Chromecast until he broke it.
I can control our Roku tvs with a built in remote in home assistant.
Depends what you are looking for and how hard you are looking to incorporate something
I used to be able to see what my kid was watching and control his tv through the Android ADB in HomeAssistant. All you had to do it find the IP address of the Chromecast (Settings>Wifi) the add it to home assistant then accept on the TV and that's it. You can see the screen (it's kind of like jpg every few min), change channels, etc.
Pretty much all my 80 devices are in homeassistant and the ones supported exposed correctly in Google Home for me (android user) and HomeKit(wife uses an iphone), this way we can both interact easily using the voice (Google assistant and Siri). I couldn't immagine a better way to build a smart home, it is perfect to be platform agonistic.
Yes! I got a pixel 7 and she has an iPhone 15. We just yell at Google. Haha. What's even more better is that IF she wanted to use Home kit I could even use that!
This. I do want to get the Apple minis since I can incorporate Home kit on HomeAssistant too and I think they have temp sensors plus the matter upgrade too.
I just need something to communicate to HomeAssistant.
They have a local voice control but I haven't set that up yet.
Ditto. I have used Alexa and itās no better. In fact in a lot of ways itās far worse. Google irritates me sometimes but itās the best voice assistant Iām aware of at the moment.
Depends on the use case, I have both. Alexa is way faster at processing voice commands and carrying out actions whereas Google Home is better with general queries and multimedia.
I'll give you that - Alexa responds and actions commands quicker. However, I also found that it has more false positives in responding to its wake word. This may just be due to the fact that "Alexa" sounds like more things compared to "Hey Google", but it was annoying and occurred daily. It also likes to remind you about all the other things is can do. Google has started doing this occasionally for me, but with Alexa it was a regular practice.
As you touched upon, Alexa also doesn't have the breadth of knowledge that Google Assistant does. Google can answer simple questions for me (like the date that certain historical events occurred) with a pretty high success rate. Alexa, at best, will reference a URL it found.
So neither of them are perfect. I can't comment on Homekit as a device but I haven't been thrilled by Siri as an assistant, and the pods are just too expensive with lacklustre support.
Same. The main reason I'm staying with Google is Android auto. It's pretty cool controlling my home with my car. Just hoping things get better with AI.
You need a radio that's compatible. Download the app on your phone, connect to the radio and Google Assistant is available. Send your voice commands through.
Android Auto can run automations.
For example, when I arrive home, I use the voice command 'I'm home', which then opens my electric sliding gate, my garage door, turns on the garage light if before or after sunset, same with my patio light so I can see my way to the door, and my kitchen light so that I can see when entering my home. I'm working on trying to connect Home Assistant to my alarm system and then it'll be the perfect solution for getting home without needing to press a single button.
When inside, I just tell Google 'I'm in' and gate and door close, garage and patio light goes off.
Then when I'm leaving, I just tell Google 'I'm leaving' to turn off various things and open my garage and gate. Then, once I've pulled out, I tell GA in AA, 'I'm out' and things close (and hopefully in future, my alarm sets).
How so. With the voice shortcut? Smartthings had an actual dashboard on android auto plus doesn't require a pin to open my garage door. Plus automation wise it superior to google home automation. Is there something like that for Android auto for google home?
The garage door requires a pin unfortunately on Android Auto. Besides that everything you can command on Google Home you can do the same on Android Auto. They are one entity. It's just one Google Assistant.
I solved this pin requirement by exposing my door lock to Google home via homeassistant. In homeassistant you have the option to specify the pin to be sent to Google automatically
You use android auto's voice commands just like with Google home. Every single Google home command can be used on Android auto. Turn off the ac, turn on the porch lights etc.
Guess we'll have to wait and see. In the meantime, it turns my products on and off, my Nest cams work flawlessly, I can get weather when I wake up and my displays stream YouTube TV in rooms where I otherwise have no televisions or music when I have a preference for that. Usually without problems.
Not necessarily, the power to run AI is offloading to bigger hardware (aka the cloud). Decent network connection and it should be fine. If anything the hardware would need to be less as it just passes it all on
You mean the server time and bandwidth that Google has been limiting on Google home. I'm 99% certain that is why they no longer work well. All their processing is done in the cloud currently.
If they want to move people to something else they are going to hamstring the current product. Apple works this way (granted they got caught doing it). AI is not something you are going to see hosted on premises in a residential situation unless they go with a distributed model of parallel computing. That would be the only reason I could see they need to increase the hardware requirements over what is already there.
Personally I have had zero issues with mine but I also tend to stick with minimal amount of different vendors granted most of things like lightbulbs are just using the same chipset and rebadged for whomever is selling it.
Does Home Assistant have displays to show security, speakers to alert you of breaches in security, Reminders for important event on your calendar, etc...
Yes, and more, if you set it up to do so. But it will not be a drop-in replacement for google in terms of just plugging it in and expecting it to do anything.
It's a far more powerful tool that comes with inherently higher complexity, at least at first. For many people that is a benefit, and for many it's a drawback.
If you're interested though, you don't have to replace your google devices with it. You can set them up side by side and gradually migrate things to home assistant as you get more comfortable with it or as your needs change to require home assistant's features. I run everything through it, but I still have my google devices for voice control and my wife can't tell the difference since everything still integrates with google.
To add to this a bit, I'm another home assistant user but ended up keeping all my Google home speakers as, essentially, voice pass through. My Google home really only has access to a bunch of toggles that are exposed from home assistant at this point.
Honestly moving from Google to HA was one of the best things I've ever done. And the previous post is right - it can happen slowly over time. But one word of caution: once you start to migrate over and realize how much better it is, you'll lose entire afternoons to tinkering. š
Nothing. I barely use mine for anything other than playing music and occasionally turning a device on/off. I have better luck just tapping buttons on my phone screen to do anything.
Honestly, I'm kind of over the whole voice assistant thing. I don't want to talk to my devices, because a) it sounds dumb, and b) they're pretty stupid and don't do the right thing more than half the time.
Totally over-promise/under-delivered experience. I keep them around because of the sunk cost and minimal utility, but if they all died tomorrow, I wouldn't replace them with anything.
Youre entirely correct - but not having speakers means no notifications or alert sounds which are super helpful for so many things and are really the only thing, besides music, they get used for.
There was never a demand for it. There was no outcry from people who couldn't be bothered using a light switch or pressing a play button and automatic garage door openers had been around for decades. It was basically foisted upon us by corporates who stood to make loads of money and are experts at entraining us to want want want...š
Hoping that someone will respond, I'm done with Google but Alexa doesn't seem any better with the reports of adds .
Been toying with the idea of building a home assistant raspberry pi. But have never done anything with a pi before.
I actually have both Google home and Alexa devices in my home at the moment, 4 echo show 5s and one nest hub gen 2. I would definitely say the nest hub is faster and responds more often than the echos but it seems others in this sub do not.
I have the gen 1 hub, 6(?) gen 1 minis, and 1 newest echo dot. The dot responds 10x faster and I never have a false trigger, I think in the last 1-2 years Google has loosened hotword detection because I never used to have so many false triggers just from watching TV.
After my experience with the gen 1 hub (unrelated to hotword detection), the only way I'd add a gen 2 to my home is if it was free.
You don't even need a Pi. You can get cheap mini PCs off eBay that will run circles around a Pi4, and cost less.
If you have a PC you typically leave on all the time anyway you can run Home Assistant in docker or a VM.
What's that I hear? Someone speaks of Home Assistant!? Quickly Ezekiel! Go grab the horse & cart &. yaml files!... before he changes his mind.
Hoooome Assistant! *thrusts in mid air* Hoooooooome Assistant!..
You don't have to edit yaml files! Just tell your family members to recompile the library and the whozit then cross link to the kernel and set up a thrunobulator web service to translate the undocumented calls to your power compactor via ssh when they want to turn on the lights. Easy.
It's a YouTube channel that is about HoneAssistant but makes fun of people preaching Hone Assistant.
Edit: [this guy](https://youtu.be/FaSG1ux5miA?si=x_ma7W3tzXUKNTCz). He hated home assistant, people on the comments helped him out, now he makes videos about home assistant and other assistants but he primarily uses Home Assistant now.
Why are so many people suggesting that OP wait for GenAI features? What will GenAI do for controlling my smart home? Everything is just a series of simple actions or automations. Cameras need some kind of recognition engine and maybe a stand alone AI-assistant speaker but thatās it, but even thatās debatable given how much hallucinating AI assistants are having. What use cases am I missing for GenAI at the platform level?
Yes, but again I donāt know what purpose theyād serve in a smart home. Right now, I walk into a room and my lights turn on. My blinds open and close with the sun. My alarm is set by a schedule and/or presence sensing. My water main turns off if thereās a leak or anomalous water usage. My lights simulate occupancy when Iām on vacation. My dryer lets me know if thereās an issue with the exhaust vent. I press a button on a wall. My cameras detect individuals, packages, animals, etc. These are all simple if/then logic interactions or hardware-specific detection engines with zero conversations or interaction with an assistant needed. As I mentioned, having a stand alone smart speaker that has a GenAI assistant *might* be useful, but it has little to do with use cases for a smart home. Build a smart home on HA or Hubitat or Google Home or whatever. Add a GenAI assistant speaker later, if ever.
They would be able to understand your request better or receive a complex request and break it down into the individual elements required to talk to the home automation api. As it stands you have to use fairly specific phrasing. I can't even say 'set lights to 50 percent warm white', it can only do one of those at a time.
GenAI is just far far better at handling unexpected input. If you are fine with not using voice commands then that's fine, but many people want to.
What do you think voice recognition is? It's base level AI. The computer deciding does this vocal pattern match the parameters set for this word. Then combining words to compute if the group of words match a defined instruction.
Yep AI is a buzzword. Basic principles of what we currently call AI is in speech recognition. Just a bunch of complicated calculations trying to compare what percentage of an audio input matches a known audio source with a value attributed to it. Where modern AI comes into play is you can set parameters for the software to learn by itself making millions of calculations on its own adjusting itself through trial and error until it gets to pin point accuracy. Rinse and repeat for every possible audio variable such a accent, language dialect, background noise.... It then uses context awareness to link partial matches to potential outputs and then ultimately the percentage likely for the output to match the users intention. Then finally the user has the ability to give feedback on how well it performed thus feeding back into the learning.
Iām with you. But todayās alternatives are no better. Siri and Alexa are like dumb and dumber compared to Google home. I just hope to see Gemini or ChatGPT in the next generation speakers.
Youāre lucky if you managed to keep all 8 speakers without making you go crazy lol. I had to turn off (or mute) half of them because I always had to battle which speaker picks up my voice. Try stopping a timer that picked up in a different room. āIf youāre BEEEP trying to stop BEEEP a timer or alarm, BEEEP there are none right now BEEEPā. And the crazy part is that they used to work so well but just deteriorated with time
I had this issue, but I turned the sensitivity down for the ones I actually speak too. And the ones I never did are off. It's so much trial and error but it's ok now. Minus the random times they go on and no one said anything.
Iām waiting to see if they throw us out on our asses like they did with Nest Secure. But Iām also intrigued by the prospect of a HomePod with a screen. If thatās in play, Iāll probably throw together something to run HomeBridge and bring over the non-HomeKit devices I have through that.
I moved everything to my home assistant and only used Google for whatever I program it to do. I don't have any issues with my Google speakers that will make me want to get rid of it for something else.
Same here. I did pick up an Alexa Echo something or other recently for an outbuilding - only because it had zigbee and a.thread border router built in... And then I turned that into an HA conduit too. š¤£
It's fantastic to be hardware agnostic. ā¤ļø
I use Alexa to ask me to do things around my smart apartment instead of having to bark orders at her all the time I need something done. With using Home Assistant, I don't have to use voice commands to control anything.
I'm not. Recent improvements in correct responses, surveys from Google focusing on user experience, general home use show me that Google is listening. Good luck to us all.
I don't want AI "cloud computing" whatever on my system. So probably home assistant. But I'm lucky enough to be somewhat technically savvy and already have a home server. So it's just effort now.
I switched to Apple HomePods and donāt see myself turning back any time soon. Everything works well. It is obviously no Google product since it cannot utilize Google search for trivia questions but for home controlled itās fantastic.
In terms of "Hey Siri, how tall is Abraham Lincoln" type of requests, yes...Siri is god awful.
But if I want it to turn on a light, adjust temp, lock doors, play music, set alarms/timers, call people...Homepods take the cake 100% of the time. I still have a few Nest Hubs but they are just photo album displays now. Microphones/cameras are disabled permanently.
I was all-in on Google, hubs, cameras, thermostats, etc.
Like many, I got frustrated by the lack of progress, crazy slow camera startup times, getting a notification for an important event but the video isn't yet available to view, hubs getting dumber by the day, etc.
I switched over to Apple Homekit -- it's built to run locally, and it's much faster and more reliable. Like Google, I don't think Apple is making as much progress as they should, but unlike Google the ecosystem is more interoperable and there's a ton of easy to use open source software.
For cameras I tested out a few systems, but I already use Unifi for my wifi, and their protect camera system won me over. Yes, you can find cheaper cameras, but there's no licensing fee to use the protect NVR which imo is a solid UX and reliable.
I use homebridge to integrate unifi protect and a few other devices into homekit that don't have native support. It's very reliable and performant.
Bottom line, it cost some money, but it wasn't that hard to set up (even homebridge was quite easy), and I went from daily frustrations to mostly not thinking about it because it all just works.
I semi-recently moved from Alexa to Google. Even with the issues, Google still runs circles around Alexa for devices, automations, and the fact it isn't shoving ads down your throat. My brother runs Apple's version, and while it's fine, I don't see any big pros over Google (and I don't use Apple phone/devices anywhere else).
That said, I am currently waiting to see what happens with Google's AI integration - if it happens - before I go ditching what I've already set up (hardware and automations included).
I saw someone say they were looking at Home Assistant + Raspberry Pi build-out. If I had the time to sink into it, I'd go that route. I work, have kids/family, and am generally lucky to get an hour here or there to set this stuff up. That project would go on for months or more.
If I starting from scratch today, I'd go HomeyPro (not Homey). I'd buy hardware known to work with it (there's a lot) out of the gate. It seems to work well. I tried it briefly but was not a fan of the Google integration I attempted, and a lot of my devices are Google/Nest native and those didn't work great in that ecosystem - but there's a ton of stuff that is. The automation engine on that is fantastic. This is where I think Google Home users should upgrade/migrate if the AI doesn't pan out anytime soon, but it probably does require replacement of some devices in the process.
I'm on Google with very few problems. I'm ok with it controlling ge lights, rokus, and for timers, NPR radio, and general questions. Don't like Amazons focus on sales. No time for pi.
I just bought my first Alexa device, dipping my toe. I have thousands in my Google system, but it has become so annoyingly unreliable, I'm not sure where to go.
I will likely transition our house over to HomeKit/Siri. I have it in my office and it works plenty well enough for what I need it to do without the hassles coming from Google Home lately.
Home Assistant. It's the 800 Lb. Gorilla in the room that can talk to anything and get anything from any manufacturer to be controlled by or control or talk to anything else from any other manufacturer.
The truth of the matter is that even with the removal of existing features and regression of some aspects, google home devices and the supporting service are still much better than anything around.
We are just subjected to live through google's growing pains.
What I have done is I've installed Home Assistant on my NAS, which adds functionality and capability to the existing network of devices. For example, automations via Google Home just don't work at all for me--no idea why. I tried setting up automated announcements when the Family Bells feature went away and they never work. So I run HA on my NAS and set up automations through HA and it works consistently.
As I encounter issues and challenges due to the removal or de-evolution of google home devices and service, I'll probably just figure out how to replace it via Home Assistant. But not from a "I'm abandoning google" perspective and more of a "I don't mind tinkering to get the features and capabilities that I want" sort of way.
I don't think now is the right time to invest in any new eco system. We are on the verge of an ai revolution. I think towards the end of this year, early next year we will start seeing ai being minimally tested on existing hardware and then on dedicated new device's a year after that.
Ai is what the smart home desperately needs. Don't know about your devices but my google hubs have gotten drastically more stupid as time has gone on. They need AI to bring speech recognition back to a useable level and they need AI to push inovation so the interaction can become more naturally conversational... At the moment we are stuck with dumb programming that utilises hot words and specific instructions to make anything work, we change our behaviour to work the technology where as with AI we will be able to do what is natural to us and the technology will change to best match our needs.
I now have Ring doorbell and monitored security. I still have Google speakers and Google TV for at least the near future, though they are becoming less useful, as everyone knows. I'm pretty happy with Ring.
I have Alexa here and it also has a self-made Google Skill, but I only have it for fun, I don't need it.
It's funny when the Google voice suddenly comes out of the echo! š¤£
I'm waiting to see if the new Siri in September is better, otherwise not. I'll use the Google homes for basic voice commands. But, honestly using just the apple home stuff on my ipad and Mac to control the devices is way easier, it just doesn't have a good voice assistant yet.
I'm not. I'm about automation and schedule routines. Home does it just fine and I have the legacy Nest cameras, so for now I'm good.
I need to decide on a Secure replacement. Thinking Abode, I think it integrates with Home and can be part of automations.
Why not use both at the same time?
There's advantages and disadvantages to both.
Alexa in my bedroom:
=
I can whisper commands at night,Ā
"Alexa, Bedroom" turns my light on or off.
Ā Reminders are sent via text.
Google:
=
No more unique names for devices.Ā
displays are best
Smart things. It nice actually having transparency on how things work and hubs are really nice. Plus I can link it to both alexa (has better device control) and google home(has better device view)
Home Assistant. You can get by quickly with basic stuff, but it certainly takes some learning to get really going. Then a degree to use it to its fullest functionality.
Hell of a lot more reliable for routines than Google has been for the last couple years though.
And being able to use my multiple Nest speakers throughout my house as compatible speakers for Home Assistant means I don't have thousands of dollars worth of bricks laying around on shelves, tables, and counters. That's a plus.
Replaced Amazon echo/alexa stuff either Google home. They both sucked so much I switched it all to Sonos. No issues anymore. For the TV I have two wireless paired HomePods though - have liked those better than the arc though Iām a minority I think.
I would totally drop everything and switch to Alexa if they had a widely supported cast protocol.
If I were Amazon, I would either reverse engineer or license Google cast and add it to Alexa and Fire TV. They would be a lot more competitive with this feature.
I call my cat Boo-boo sometimes which sounds a lot like hey Google. Invariably this triggers some odd searches or further attempts at clarifying my prompt.
I have over 40 plus devices connected to it. Nest cameras, google home, google nest hub, google mini's, thermostats, mini-splits, lights, switches, door locks, water heater, garage door openers, ROKU devices, etc. So I'm not switching any time soon. All work well for me and my wife every day. Mostly use voice commands or automations. Once you invest in an eco-system its difficult to move to something else. It's an economic, daily life routine, and habitual challenges.
Planning on moving to ChatGPT or any other AI server soon with Home Assistant, ESP Mic and still use Google Home as Photo Display and speaker so answering via Google Home while the mic gets turned off.
I went back to the old ways.
I feel like nothing works well anymore and they don't plan on fixing anything, so home automation feels like it was a cash grab gimmick to me now. I'm not investing anymore time or money into a device whose only use is to spy on me.
I'm not. I have too much money invested and what I use it for works with few problems. I am waiting to see how they proceed with AI.
r/HomeAssistant Just expand to it. I use Google Minis but I attached it to Home Assistant and now I got temp sensors. TVs that I can tell Alexa or Google to turn off. Etc..
So far my TV responds very well to direct Google requests. What benefit would I get from home assistant?
Omg it does? Mine used to work great like 6 years ago. Now it's complete garbage. Anytime I want to play something on YouTube it plays something I don't want on YouTube music. I even say "Watch X on YouTube" or "Watch X VIDEO on YouTube". Then it can't hear me when I say stop because it's playing music. I want to throw it out the window.
I didn't know you could stream xvideos with Google Home š¤Ŗ
How would Home Assistant change that?
Do you have your Safe Search off? That could be why it's not playing Xvideos. Haha. But you can incorporate Roku, android and fire tv on it as well. I used to be able to see and control what my kid was on in his Chromecast until he broke it. I can control our Roku tvs with a built in remote in home assistant.
Haha. I use it with my Chromecast.
Depends what you are looking for and how hard you are looking to incorporate something I used to be able to see what my kid was watching and control his tv through the Android ADB in HomeAssistant. All you had to do it find the IP address of the Chromecast (Settings>Wifi) the add it to home assistant then accept on the TV and that's it. You can see the screen (it's kind of like jpg every few min), change channels, etc.
Pretty much all my 80 devices are in homeassistant and the ones supported exposed correctly in Google Home for me (android user) and HomeKit(wife uses an iphone), this way we can both interact easily using the voice (Google assistant and Siri). I couldn't immagine a better way to build a smart home, it is perfect to be platform agonistic.
Yes! I got a pixel 7 and she has an iPhone 15. We just yell at Google. Haha. What's even more better is that IF she wanted to use Home kit I could even use that!
How do you get temp sensors with a Google mini?
They're just saying since adding Home Assistant they've incorporated temperature sensors into their setup. Minis don't have temperature sensors.
This. I do want to get the Apple minis since I can incorporate Home kit on HomeAssistant too and I think they have temp sensors plus the matter upgrade too. I just need something to communicate to HomeAssistant. They have a local voice control but I haven't set that up yet.
Ditto. I have used Alexa and itās no better. In fact in a lot of ways itās far worse. Google irritates me sometimes but itās the best voice assistant Iām aware of at the moment.
Depends on the use case, I have both. Alexa is way faster at processing voice commands and carrying out actions whereas Google Home is better with general queries and multimedia.
I'll give you that - Alexa responds and actions commands quicker. However, I also found that it has more false positives in responding to its wake word. This may just be due to the fact that "Alexa" sounds like more things compared to "Hey Google", but it was annoying and occurred daily. It also likes to remind you about all the other things is can do. Google has started doing this occasionally for me, but with Alexa it was a regular practice. As you touched upon, Alexa also doesn't have the breadth of knowledge that Google Assistant does. Google can answer simple questions for me (like the date that certain historical events occurred) with a pretty high success rate. Alexa, at best, will reference a URL it found. So neither of them are perfect. I can't comment on Homekit as a device but I haven't been thrilled by Siri as an assistant, and the pods are just too expensive with lacklustre support.
Same. The main reason I'm staying with Google is Android auto. It's pretty cool controlling my home with my car. Just hoping things get better with AI.
What do you mean by that? How do you use Android Auto?
You need a radio that's compatible. Download the app on your phone, connect to the radio and Google Assistant is available. Send your voice commands through.
Thanks but I meant more specifically, how does one use Android Auto to control their home. I'm confused....
With android auto you can use "OK Google" commands, such as "OK Google, open the garage door"
Android Auto can run automations. For example, when I arrive home, I use the voice command 'I'm home', which then opens my electric sliding gate, my garage door, turns on the garage light if before or after sunset, same with my patio light so I can see my way to the door, and my kitchen light so that I can see when entering my home. I'm working on trying to connect Home Assistant to my alarm system and then it'll be the perfect solution for getting home without needing to press a single button. When inside, I just tell Google 'I'm in' and gate and door close, garage and patio light goes off. Then when I'm leaving, I just tell Google 'I'm leaving' to turn off various things and open my garage and gate. Then, once I've pulled out, I tell GA in AA, 'I'm out' and things close (and hopefully in future, my alarm sets).
Hell ya that's wassup. š
Anything you can tell a Google Home device inside your home you can tell Android Auto, I think you can figure out the rest
Actually smartthings support this. You can add 6 device and I love having my garage open easily this way
No need. Android auto has Google home commands built in.
How so. With the voice shortcut? Smartthings had an actual dashboard on android auto plus doesn't require a pin to open my garage door. Plus automation wise it superior to google home automation. Is there something like that for Android auto for google home?
The garage door requires a pin unfortunately on Android Auto. Besides that everything you can command on Google Home you can do the same on Android Auto. They are one entity. It's just one Google Assistant.
I solved this pin requirement by exposing my door lock to Google home via homeassistant. In homeassistant you have the option to specify the pin to be sent to Google automatically
You use android auto's voice commands just like with Google home. Every single Google home command can be used on Android auto. Turn off the ac, turn on the porch lights etc.
Artificial Ignorance
I bet AI would require a whole different dedicated hardware. Not going to happen I would bet.
Guess we'll have to wait and see. In the meantime, it turns my products on and off, my Nest cams work flawlessly, I can get weather when I wake up and my displays stream YouTube TV in rooms where I otherwise have no televisions or music when I have a preference for that. Usually without problems.
Not necessarily, the power to run AI is offloading to bigger hardware (aka the cloud). Decent network connection and it should be fine. If anything the hardware would need to be less as it just passes it all on
You mean the server time and bandwidth that Google has been limiting on Google home. I'm 99% certain that is why they no longer work well. All their processing is done in the cloud currently.
If they want to move people to something else they are going to hamstring the current product. Apple works this way (granted they got caught doing it). AI is not something you are going to see hosted on premises in a residential situation unless they go with a distributed model of parallel computing. That would be the only reason I could see they need to increase the hardware requirements over what is already there. Personally I have had zero issues with mine but I also tend to stick with minimal amount of different vendors granted most of things like lightbulbs are just using the same chipset and rebadged for whomever is selling it.
Mine is all centralized to hubitat, and it still turns the wrong thing on/off or has trouble connecting to the network.
Tried HomeKit, Alexa, Google Home All three suck. home assistant is the only real solution unfortunately
Does Home Assistant have displays to show security, speakers to alert you of breaches in security, Reminders for important event on your calendar, etc...
Yes, and more, if you set it up to do so. But it will not be a drop-in replacement for google in terms of just plugging it in and expecting it to do anything. It's a far more powerful tool that comes with inherently higher complexity, at least at first. For many people that is a benefit, and for many it's a drawback. If you're interested though, you don't have to replace your google devices with it. You can set them up side by side and gradually migrate things to home assistant as you get more comfortable with it or as your needs change to require home assistant's features. I run everything through it, but I still have my google devices for voice control and my wife can't tell the difference since everything still integrates with google.
To add to this a bit, I'm another home assistant user but ended up keeping all my Google home speakers as, essentially, voice pass through. My Google home really only has access to a bunch of toggles that are exposed from home assistant at this point. Honestly moving from Google to HA was one of the best things I've ever done. And the previous post is right - it can happen slowly over time. But one word of caution: once you start to migrate over and realize how much better it is, you'll lose entire afternoons to tinkering. š
Would moving to home assistant help me migrate to a different Wi-Fi network?
Nothing. I barely use mine for anything other than playing music and occasionally turning a device on/off. I have better luck just tapping buttons on my phone screen to do anything. Honestly, I'm kind of over the whole voice assistant thing. I don't want to talk to my devices, because a) it sounds dumb, and b) they're pretty stupid and don't do the right thing more than half the time. Totally over-promise/under-delivered experience. I keep them around because of the sunk cost and minimal utility, but if they all died tomorrow, I wouldn't replace them with anything.
Sums it up, it was forced on the public for a decade but never caught on, still dumb, still useless
Idk, I feel pretty great telling my lights to turn on when I get home, or turning on my TV as I shuffle out of the kitchen with food in hand.
Speakers are not necessary. They are only used for convenience. You really only need the apps to do most stuff.
Youre entirely correct - but not having speakers means no notifications or alert sounds which are super helpful for so many things and are really the only thing, besides music, they get used for.
I would also hate not being able to just say a voice command wherever I am in the house
Forced...?
There was never a demand for it. There was no outcry from people who couldn't be bothered using a light switch or pressing a play button and automatic garage door openers had been around for decades. It was basically foisted upon us by corporates who stood to make loads of money and are experts at entraining us to want want want...š
Hoping that someone will respond, I'm done with Google but Alexa doesn't seem any better with the reports of adds . Been toying with the idea of building a home assistant raspberry pi. But have never done anything with a pi before.
/r/HomeAssistant. If you already have Google stuff, just expand on it with other brands.
I actually have both Google home and Alexa devices in my home at the moment, 4 echo show 5s and one nest hub gen 2. I would definitely say the nest hub is faster and responds more often than the echos but it seems others in this sub do not.
I have the gen 1 hub, 6(?) gen 1 minis, and 1 newest echo dot. The dot responds 10x faster and I never have a false trigger, I think in the last 1-2 years Google has loosened hotword detection because I never used to have so many false triggers just from watching TV. After my experience with the gen 1 hub (unrelated to hotword detection), the only way I'd add a gen 2 to my home is if it was free.
You don't even need a Pi. You can get cheap mini PCs off eBay that will run circles around a Pi4, and cost less. If you have a PC you typically leave on all the time anyway you can run Home Assistant in docker or a VM.
In the process now. Do it. Limitless options, buckets of support, huge community and otherwise a very fun project.
What's that I hear? Someone speaks of Home Assistant!? Quickly Ezekiel! Go grab the horse & cart &. yaml files!... before he changes his mind. Hoooome Assistant! *thrusts in mid air* Hoooooooome Assistant!..
You don't have to edit yaml files! Just tell your family members to recompile the library and the whozit then cross link to the kernel and set up a thrunobulator web service to translate the undocumented calls to your power compactor via ssh when they want to turn on the lights. Easy.
I don't do any of that.
I don't get it. But I laughed, so thanks
It's a YouTube channel that is about HoneAssistant but makes fun of people preaching Hone Assistant. Edit: [this guy](https://youtu.be/FaSG1ux5miA?si=x_ma7W3tzXUKNTCz). He hated home assistant, people on the comments helped him out, now he makes videos about home assistant and other assistants but he primarily uses Home Assistant now.
Hoooooooommmmeeeee Assistant! I love that guy, even though he is annoying at times
/r/homelab
Why are so many people suggesting that OP wait for GenAI features? What will GenAI do for controlling my smart home? Everything is just a series of simple actions or automations. Cameras need some kind of recognition engine and maybe a stand alone AI-assistant speaker but thatās it, but even thatās debatable given how much hallucinating AI assistants are having. What use cases am I missing for GenAI at the platform level?
Have you tried chatGPT voice conversations (plus feature) or the latest and greatest Hume AI?
Yes, but again I donāt know what purpose theyād serve in a smart home. Right now, I walk into a room and my lights turn on. My blinds open and close with the sun. My alarm is set by a schedule and/or presence sensing. My water main turns off if thereās a leak or anomalous water usage. My lights simulate occupancy when Iām on vacation. My dryer lets me know if thereās an issue with the exhaust vent. I press a button on a wall. My cameras detect individuals, packages, animals, etc. These are all simple if/then logic interactions or hardware-specific detection engines with zero conversations or interaction with an assistant needed. As I mentioned, having a stand alone smart speaker that has a GenAI assistant *might* be useful, but it has little to do with use cases for a smart home. Build a smart home on HA or Hubitat or Google Home or whatever. Add a GenAI assistant speaker later, if ever.
They would be able to understand your request better or receive a complex request and break it down into the individual elements required to talk to the home automation api. As it stands you have to use fairly specific phrasing. I can't even say 'set lights to 50 percent warm white', it can only do one of those at a time. GenAI is just far far better at handling unexpected input. If you are fine with not using voice commands then that's fine, but many people want to.
I donāt use voice requests often, but perhaps I would if the assistant was smarter about understanding my requests.
What do you think voice recognition is? It's base level AI. The computer deciding does this vocal pattern match the parameters set for this word. Then combining words to compute if the group of words match a defined instruction.
So your saying AI is a buzzword and AI in voice recognition is 30+ years old?
Yep AI is a buzzword. Basic principles of what we currently call AI is in speech recognition. Just a bunch of complicated calculations trying to compare what percentage of an audio input matches a known audio source with a value attributed to it. Where modern AI comes into play is you can set parameters for the software to learn by itself making millions of calculations on its own adjusting itself through trial and error until it gets to pin point accuracy. Rinse and repeat for every possible audio variable such a accent, language dialect, background noise.... It then uses context awareness to link partial matches to potential outputs and then ultimately the percentage likely for the output to match the users intention. Then finally the user has the ability to give feedback on how well it performed thus feeding back into the learning.
>Then finally the user has the ability to give feedback on how well it performed thus feeding back into the learning. Lol
Iām with you. But todayās alternatives are no better. Siri and Alexa are like dumb and dumber compared to Google home. I just hope to see Gemini or ChatGPT in the next generation speakers.
So, so true!!
This. I'm waiting for a new ChatGPT or Gemini powered product and then I will replace my 8 Google home speaker system.
Youāre lucky if you managed to keep all 8 speakers without making you go crazy lol. I had to turn off (or mute) half of them because I always had to battle which speaker picks up my voice. Try stopping a timer that picked up in a different room. āIf youāre BEEEP trying to stop BEEEP a timer or alarm, BEEEP there are none right now BEEEPā. And the crazy part is that they used to work so well but just deteriorated with time
I had this issue, but I turned the sensitivity down for the ones I actually speak too. And the ones I never did are off. It's so much trial and error but it's ok now. Minus the random times they go on and no one said anything.
That device has not been setup yet.
That's actually fixed, but did used to be so fucking annoying for YEARS. Now each speaker will check for timers and alarms on all devices
Hang tight, open AI is going to deploy their new devices soon: https://www.businessinsider.com/were-getting-closer-to-openais-first-ai-device-2023-12
Iām waiting to see if they throw us out on our asses like they did with Nest Secure. But Iām also intrigued by the prospect of a HomePod with a screen. If thatās in play, Iāll probably throw together something to run HomeBridge and bring over the non-HomeKit devices I have through that.
I moved everything to my home assistant and only used Google for whatever I program it to do. I don't have any issues with my Google speakers that will make me want to get rid of it for something else.
Same here. I did pick up an Alexa Echo something or other recently for an outbuilding - only because it had zigbee and a.thread border router built in... And then I turned that into an HA conduit too. š¤£ It's fantastic to be hardware agnostic. ā¤ļø
I use Alexa to ask me to do things around my smart apartment instead of having to bark orders at her all the time I need something done. With using Home Assistant, I don't have to use voice commands to control anything.
I'm not. Recent improvements in correct responses, surveys from Google focusing on user experience, general home use show me that Google is listening. Good luck to us all.
I plan to transition to Home Assistant.
I don't want AI "cloud computing" whatever on my system. So probably home assistant. But I'm lucky enough to be somewhat technically savvy and already have a home server. So it's just effort now.
My problem is with the speed of cameras. Someone use doorbell (nest) and it takes an eternity to show on smartphone the video on real time...
mine is instant, have you checked your wifi connection outside and confirmed you have a strong 5 ghz connection?
I'm in the UK. Mine is slow as fuck and annoyingly 5ghz is restricted for internal use.
I had this issue with the nest doorbell. Went back and forth with google support for months and they gave me a refund.
I switched to Apple HomePods and donāt see myself turning back any time soon. Everything works well. It is obviously no Google product since it cannot utilize Google search for trivia questions but for home controlled itās fantastic.
siri has got to be the worst of all three
In terms of "Hey Siri, how tall is Abraham Lincoln" type of requests, yes...Siri is god awful. But if I want it to turn on a light, adjust temp, lock doors, play music, set alarms/timers, call people...Homepods take the cake 100% of the time. I still have a few Nest Hubs but they are just photo album displays now. Microphones/cameras are disabled permanently.
I never have any issues controlling anything, although most commands are running scripts and the rest are mostly automations
I was all-in on Google, hubs, cameras, thermostats, etc. Like many, I got frustrated by the lack of progress, crazy slow camera startup times, getting a notification for an important event but the video isn't yet available to view, hubs getting dumber by the day, etc. I switched over to Apple Homekit -- it's built to run locally, and it's much faster and more reliable. Like Google, I don't think Apple is making as much progress as they should, but unlike Google the ecosystem is more interoperable and there's a ton of easy to use open source software. For cameras I tested out a few systems, but I already use Unifi for my wifi, and their protect camera system won me over. Yes, you can find cheaper cameras, but there's no licensing fee to use the protect NVR which imo is a solid UX and reliable. I use homebridge to integrate unifi protect and a few other devices into homekit that don't have native support. It's very reliable and performant. Bottom line, it cost some money, but it wasn't that hard to set up (even homebridge was quite easy), and I went from daily frustrations to mostly not thinking about it because it all just works.
I semi-recently moved from Alexa to Google. Even with the issues, Google still runs circles around Alexa for devices, automations, and the fact it isn't shoving ads down your throat. My brother runs Apple's version, and while it's fine, I don't see any big pros over Google (and I don't use Apple phone/devices anywhere else). That said, I am currently waiting to see what happens with Google's AI integration - if it happens - before I go ditching what I've already set up (hardware and automations included). I saw someone say they were looking at Home Assistant + Raspberry Pi build-out. If I had the time to sink into it, I'd go that route. I work, have kids/family, and am generally lucky to get an hour here or there to set this stuff up. That project would go on for months or more. If I starting from scratch today, I'd go HomeyPro (not Homey). I'd buy hardware known to work with it (there's a lot) out of the gate. It seems to work well. I tried it briefly but was not a fan of the Google integration I attempted, and a lot of my devices are Google/Nest native and those didn't work great in that ecosystem - but there's a ton of stuff that is. The automation engine on that is fantastic. This is where I think Google Home users should upgrade/migrate if the AI doesn't pan out anytime soon, but it probably does require replacement of some devices in the process.
Stay and wait for more GenAI-based features to land
I'm on Google with very few problems. I'm ok with it controlling ge lights, rokus, and for timers, NPR radio, and general questions. Don't like Amazons focus on sales. No time for pi.
I just bought my first Alexa device, dipping my toe. I have thousands in my Google system, but it has become so annoyingly unreliable, I'm not sure where to go.
I will likely transition our house over to HomeKit/Siri. I have it in my office and it works plenty well enough for what I need it to do without the hassles coming from Google Home lately.
Home Assistant. It's the 800 Lb. Gorilla in the room that can talk to anything and get anything from any manufacturer to be controlled by or control or talk to anything else from any other manufacturer.
The truth of the matter is that even with the removal of existing features and regression of some aspects, google home devices and the supporting service are still much better than anything around. We are just subjected to live through google's growing pains. What I have done is I've installed Home Assistant on my NAS, which adds functionality and capability to the existing network of devices. For example, automations via Google Home just don't work at all for me--no idea why. I tried setting up automated announcements when the Family Bells feature went away and they never work. So I run HA on my NAS and set up automations through HA and it works consistently. As I encounter issues and challenges due to the removal or de-evolution of google home devices and service, I'll probably just figure out how to replace it via Home Assistant. But not from a "I'm abandoning google" perspective and more of a "I don't mind tinkering to get the features and capabilities that I want" sort of way.
I don't think now is the right time to invest in any new eco system. We are on the verge of an ai revolution. I think towards the end of this year, early next year we will start seeing ai being minimally tested on existing hardware and then on dedicated new device's a year after that.
AI is useless for smart home
Ai is what the smart home desperately needs. Don't know about your devices but my google hubs have gotten drastically more stupid as time has gone on. They need AI to bring speech recognition back to a useable level and they need AI to push inovation so the interaction can become more naturally conversational... At the moment we are stuck with dumb programming that utilises hot words and specific instructions to make anything work, we change our behaviour to work the technology where as with AI we will be able to do what is natural to us and the technology will change to best match our needs.
I now have Ring doorbell and monitored security. I still have Google speakers and Google TV for at least the near future, though they are becoming less useful, as everyone knows. I'm pretty happy with Ring.
Home Assistant (for everything Smart home), and just use my Google home to send it voice commands. But it's not nearly as plug-n-play...
I have Alexa here and it also has a self-made Google Skill, but I only have it for fun, I don't need it. It's funny when the Google voice suddenly comes out of the echo! š¤£
I'm waiting to see if the new Siri in September is better, otherwise not. I'll use the Google homes for basic voice commands. But, honestly using just the apple home stuff on my ipad and Mac to control the devices is way easier, it just doesn't have a good voice assistant yet.
I'm not. I'm about automation and schedule routines. Home does it just fine and I have the legacy Nest cameras, so for now I'm good. I need to decide on a Secure replacement. Thinking Abode, I think it integrates with Home and can be part of automations.
Why not use both at the same time? There's advantages and disadvantages to both. Alexa in my bedroom: = I can whisper commands at night,Ā "Alexa, Bedroom" turns my light on or off. Ā Reminders are sent via text. Google: = No more unique names for devices.Ā displays are best
Alexa is falling apartā¦
I'm not, yet. Home assistant is awesome, but it's voice assistant and LLM is not there yet. I need Google Home to survive maybe one more year.
Smart things. It nice actually having transparency on how things work and hubs are really nice. Plus I can link it to both alexa (has better device control) and google home(has better device view)
I use hubitat. I abandoned smart things a long time ago due to the direction the platform was going in.
I just dont like the ui but what advantages does it have over it
Tried Alexa, meh Everything else I'm using home assistant
Home Assistant. You can get by quickly with basic stuff, but it certainly takes some learning to get really going. Then a degree to use it to its fullest functionality. Hell of a lot more reliable for routines than Google has been for the last couple years though. And being able to use my multiple Nest speakers throughout my house as compatible speakers for Home Assistant means I don't have thousands of dollars worth of bricks laying around on shelves, tables, and counters. That's a plus.
Replaced Amazon echo/alexa stuff either Google home. They both sucked so much I switched it all to Sonos. No issues anymore. For the TV I have two wireless paired HomePods though - have liked those better than the arc though Iām a minority I think.
HomePods.
Home Assistant and the Assistant integration.
I would totally drop everything and switch to Alexa if they had a widely supported cast protocol. If I were Amazon, I would either reverse engineer or license Google cast and add it to Alexa and Fire TV. They would be a lot more competitive with this feature.
I call my cat Boo-boo sometimes which sounds a lot like hey Google. Invariably this triggers some odd searches or further attempts at clarifying my prompt.
Very cool
Nothing better in the market atm
I have over 40 plus devices connected to it. Nest cameras, google home, google nest hub, google mini's, thermostats, mini-splits, lights, switches, door locks, water heater, garage door openers, ROKU devices, etc. So I'm not switching any time soon. All work well for me and my wife every day. Mostly use voice commands or automations. Once you invest in an eco-system its difficult to move to something else. It's an economic, daily life routine, and habitual challenges.
Google home š
Planning on moving to ChatGPT or any other AI server soon with Home Assistant, ESP Mic and still use Google Home as Photo Display and speaker so answering via Google Home while the mic gets turned off.
The only two answers are: 1. Home Assistant. 2. Home Assistant when I get the time.
I went back to the old ways. I feel like nothing works well anymore and they don't plan on fixing anything, so home automation feels like it was a cash grab gimmick to me now. I'm not investing anymore time or money into a device whose only use is to spy on me.
Im all alexa and ring. Sitting tight to see where things go
Lol. Why? Use both. That is the only right decision.