About LED strips in a smart home

I use different ways to control light and lighting using LED strips, in fact they are not always tapes, there are some lamps made on the basis of addressable LEDs, there are tapes that do not support addressing, but just shine a certain color, and there is also a tape that shines, RGB is used there and, accordingly, you can change the color in with a large enough range, I purchased two different drivers to control the LED strips, which are essentially 12 volt, that is, with a constant driver voltage, they use a tape that is precisely designed for constant voltage, and these drivers allow you to turn the tape on and off, they also allow you to dim the tape, that is, to make it brighter or dimmer, but in fact, of course, the range is not very large, that is, the lowest level is still quite bright, and the most Its high level is not enough for full-fledged lighting, but it can also be used as some additional illumination in the room.

You can also use such tapes as a night light, but of course the speed of switching on which drivers is not very stable, and sometimes it happens that it turns on with some delay, and of course it is not very convenient, that is, there may be a delay of a second or even two, which is not very clear, apparently the driver itself is most likely so it doesn't work very reliably, but in principle, for the most part, if these commands are rarely executed, that is, just turned on or off, or set some mode, then the operation goes quite well if some kind of adjustment begins, for example, color brightness, then in this case, of course, there are quite long delays.

The lamps that I use on addressable LEDs, they work via Wi-Fi, they have different lighting modes, that is, they can show some different effects, their brightness is also adjusted in a fairly large range, but the minimum brightness is still quite large, the control mode is also supported just like a lamp, that is, a certain light and color can be turned on to a certain brightness or a certain warmth, and in principle it also illuminates the room well and you can use it as a backlight and as a night light.

I also integrated the fixtures with the Yandex smart home system, it was quite difficult, that is, I had to register them first in OpenHAB, that is, I make there a certain set of different parameters responsible for brightness for other modes of operation of this lamp, and then to upload to the Yandex smart home system, I had to make a special description for the smart home system. at home, and then, in principle, they appeared in the Yandex application, and then it was possible to specifically control the parameters, but of course not all the parameters exist that are necessary, that is, volume or brightness, but I had to use volume control to control different effects, because otherwise it was quite difficult to switch, that is, I had to make a list of effects and describe specifically it was not at all easy, the Home Assistant system has a special component for these lamps, it allows you to change brightness, select color and select several modes, it also in principle, it's not bad to go to Yandex and from there you can already control this lamp quite well, but of course not all modes, but as an alternative management method, it's quite good, and I use it very often too.

To control the LED strips, they also work for me using the Zigbee protocol, I added them to the Home Assistant, through the MQTT integration, and they appeared there as a separate device, in principle everything works well, that is, it turns on and on, the brightness is adjusted, the colors of such LED strips change, and it is also possible to forward them through integration with Yandex in the Yandex smart home system, most of the parameters work correctly and are also quite convenient to use, there are some difficulties with the tapes, for some reason the driver itself does not allow you to set the operating modes, and when it is turned on, that is, when the power was turned off and then turned on, it always turns on the tape, which is of course inconvenient if the electricity is lost often, so you also need to check if the tape is on, and there is no need for this, then according to which script, scenario to turn off this tape forcibly, also to control the LED strips for I use the Aqara wireless remote control for dimming, and I made it so that when I hold down the button, the brightness gradually decreases, then it drops to zero and increases slightly by one step, and in fact, my tapes are all working in minimum mode now, but if I need to turn them on to maximum, then I just press this control button a few times, and my brightness is maximized again, maybe this is not the most convenient mode, but so far I have done just that.

Automation in a smart home should be useful and create additional comfort, but sometimes everything goes wrong… The reasons for this, and how to configure everything, see on my channel.

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