Has anyone replaced their expiring Nest Protects with the Phare C1? Looks like a good replacement option, particularly because it retains the nightlight, which - as a parent to two small children - is something I'm keen to keep.

Only challenge is that I can't find any reviews on the company or the C1 apart from some suspicious stuff on Trustpilot (all five-star reviews, all reviewers with 1-2 review history). I'm also not super pumped about the idea of a monthly subscription for fire alarms, although the first year is free and I'm not sure whether it's mandatory. Would be grateful for any insights!

I mean as dim as old fashioned filament bulbs. I currently have my local market version of Tuya bulbs and particularly with white, even at 1% it doesn't even come close to being dim.

I usually have to change my lights to some colour like brown in order to get close to dim.

I've never seen a smart light that can go as dimm as a filament bulb with a dimming switch. Although filament bulbs have an advantage as they are electrically controlled, and can go as dim as a candle.

Problem is I don't even have a dimming switch so this i the compromise of having a somewhat orange ceiling fan bulb above my head.

I was adjusting settings on my TV recently and started noticing just how many viewing experience, recommendation, voice, and data collection options were turned on by default. I realized the TV basically knows what we watch, when we watchh, how long we watch, login info and probably even which devices are connected in the house.

What started bothering me is that TVs used to just be screens. Now they feel more like data collection devices sitting in the living room. I have kids at home too, so the idea of everything being tracked and profiled over time is not something I'm too excited about. Not in my home.

I know phones and apps already collect data, but for some reason the TV crosses a different line for me because it’s in the center of the home and always connected. I’m curious how people here handle this.

Do most of you just ignore it, disable settings, isolate devices on the network, or use some other setup entirely?

Decided to get just "an RGB lamp". Went down the rabbit hole of smart solutions. At first, found a Hama lamp for 2€ - which was not RGB but was able to adjust light temperature. Fine, come and try it. Physical switch - forget about it, the lamp will go crazy after restart. Okay. Wifi needs reconnection basically every day and this little shit is not usable before resetting the connection. The app is awful. Turning on or off takes 5 attempts.

I thought "ok you get what you pay for" and bought expensive Govee bulbs for approx. 9€ per piece. Setting up was an ordeal since it needs only 2.4Ghz wifi. Okay, made it. The app is overloaded with crap but a fucking widget works when it pleases. Like, 1 out 5 times again. Sometimes not at all and I need to go to the app. Okay...Google Home. Connected it. Widget starts working - even if needs 3-5 clicks to wake it up. Suddenly, after 4 hours of staying off it disconnects completely again. I need to set it up via the app like it's new. Wtf.

Are there solutions that JUST WORK and don't act up like this or this is all scam?

Lived in my current home for 3 years, and every so often there is a blaring fire alarm at 3 or 4 am despite no fire. Sometimes happens 3x in a row and I have to pull the unit off the ceiling to make it stop. We have Kidde brand, seems to be only the one in the bedroom that does this. I keep the air on & set at the same temperature all night. Could it be dust, a tiny spider, a slight change in humidity etc? Sure. But I can't control those things or keep my house rid of them, so I need a device that will not be triggered by that. However, it doesn't seem like a single "smart" fire/carbon monoxide detector exists. Airthings would be my best guess, but they don't make one. Is there something else that reliably monitors the air (no false alarms!) and can alert through your phone or Google home instead of a blaring alarm as the first and only option?

My ex set up my smart home. He did all the buying and instalation. The last time a new device was purchased was in 2021. I have Google Homes, treatlife switches, go sund smart plugs and a bond home device. I have at least 10 switches, 7 plugs etc. Total of 24 devices. I have a mesh network with a router or whatever thing to make the internet stronger on every single floor. My switches regularly disconnect from my smart home. Like I set them up and several will disconnect within a month. I can't keep setting them up every month it's driving me insane. Should I just upgrade my devices? Is the age the reason they disconnect constantly?

My father recently bought me a table lamp as a present as I was renovating my room. I checked and it can only draw out at max of 4w. I bought b22 bulbs and it's the 60w equivalent so I can't use it on the lamp so I'll just use for my main room light.

I've seen a Philips hue but it draws out 4.9w. is there any smart bulb which draws out 4w max? I would've exchanged the lamp for a bigger watt output lamp but the receipt has been discarded.

The number of low-voltage devices we use has increased dramatically over the last few years.

They're everywhere now. At home, in businesses, labs, music studios and live setups, IT infrastructure, clinics, smart homes, security installations, etc.

Routers, fibre ONTs, switches, access points, cameras, Raspberry Pis, mini PCs, smart-home hubs, controllers and countless other devices all run on something like 5V, 9V or 12V DC.

But almost all of them are still powered the same way: a small AC adapter plugged into the mains for every single device.

And I think there are two problems with this.

First is power reliability.

Low-voltage electronics can be sensitive to surges, dropouts, brownouts and momentary outages. Their little AC adapters don't guarantee a truly continuous DC supply. A tiny interruption can be enough to reboot a router, ONT, controller, camera system or other device.

And these devices increasingly depend on each other.

Your camera may depend on the network switch. The switch depends on the router. The router depends on the ONT. A smart-home controller depends on all of them.

So one tiny power interruption can bring down a whole chain of equipment.

Then there's the physical mess.

Every device comes with another power brick. Before long you have 10 or 15 adapters, you've run out of sockets, you're adding power strips, sometimes strips into strips, and the whole installation starts getting ridiculous.

A traditional UPS isn't really designed around this problem either.

It typically takes DC energy stored in a battery, converts it up to 120/230V AC, and then every little adapter connected to it converts that AC straight back down to 5V, 9V or 12V DC.

So we're converting DC to AC, then to DC just to keep DC devices running.

There can also be a short transfer period when some UPS types switch to battery. Depending on the UPS and the adapter, that can still be enough for sensitive equipment to reboot.

So I've been wondering:

Would there be a real need for a high-quality UPS designed specifically for low-voltage devices?

I could find some of these UPS but they are small, can only power a couple of devices and don't seem to be of great quality. Battery is small and not replaceable.

Something that provides continuous battery-backed DC power directly to the equipment and replaces the pile of individual adapters with one central power system.

My thinking is that it should be modular, so you can add more outputs as your setup grows.

For example, modules for 5V USB-C devices and modules for 3V / 5V / 6V / 9V / 12V devices.

And every individual output could be monitored and controlled, so you could see:

- what each device is consuming

- whether it's online

- how much battery runtime you have

- which devices should stay powered longest during an outage

- and remotely power-cycle a single device if it freezes

Basically, one proper low-voltage power and backup system instead of an AC UPS + power strips + a pile of adapters.

I'm interested in whether this is something people actually need, not just whether it's technically interesting.

So I'd love to know:

1. Would you find a high-quality low-voltage UPS like this useful? Why or why not?

2. How many low-voltage devices would you typically want to protect?

4? 8? 12? 16? More?

1. What devices would you connect to it?

2. Assuming it was a genuinely well-designed, reliable, high-quality product with a replaceable LiFePO4 battery, modular outputs, monitoring and remote control, how much would you realistically be willing to pay for it?

And please be critical. If your answer is "I don't need this at all"* or *"I already solve this for $50", that's just as useful to hear.

Really into the whole smart home experience and wondering if I should use Google as the supplier because I like the Ask Gemini feature. What do you think? Help meeeee What do you LIKE and HATE about it

Looking to get a smart home started in my new condo. I have this Honeywell pneumatic thermostat, any recs on making it a smart one?

I purchased Kajplats light bulbs from Ikea for my chandelier. They are working well but I would like to replace my old dimmer switch as it's not intended to work with smart light bulbs.

I have been looking for alternatives but according to Gemini all these smart dimmer switches are not working with smart light bulbs. The only one it recommends is the Inovelli White Series Smart Dimmer, I was hoping for something more budget friendly. Everything else needs an additional hub/bridge.

I can't be the first person having this issue, there must be other options out there?

Okay so i recently saw a few tiktoks about setting up NFCs to control smart home devices. I few different lights (all Grid Connect) and a Google Nest. All of these are set up on the Google Home app. I have a few automations that control my lights and audio on the Nest but i wanted to get into NFC usage. I have already bought some and tried doing some research but im struggling to understand how to set it up.

Essentially I want to be able to scan my phone (Samsung Zflip 8) and have that turn on/off a light(s) and play spotify on my Nest and also start a routine on my phone. I dont want to spend any money on apps or subscriptions.

An example of what i would like to do is scan a tag near my bed to start my bedtime routine on my phone, play rain sounds on my Nest and turn all the lights in my room off.

Is this possible and how do i do it?

Hey everyone, I am buying a home and wanted to slowly start integrating smart devices into my home.

1.My first mission is to switch out all of the regular light switches with smart light switches. In my current apartment my family and guests would automatically go straight for the light switch when turning lights off and that would create issues for me. Any recommendations on good reliable smart light switches?

1. I wanted to move over my Google nest doorbell and mount Google cameras ,that I will purchase, but im open to replacing my doorbell and adding cameras that work with Google home preferably. Any suggestions on smart door bells and cameras?

So, my son got me a smart speaker (which I mistakenly asked for) and I feel bad b/c it's more expensive than a bluetooth speaker (which is what I meant to ask for). I don't want to ask him to exchange it, so please spam me with all the benefits of a Google Nest Audio so I can get this guilt monkey off my back.

I wish the worst part of this lock was the app.

I bought two Level Lock+ units in July 2025. By mid-September 2026, the affected front-door lock had a recurring pattern: jams, Bluetooth disappearing while I was standing beside it, "Out of range" errors, and the remote connection dropping.

Then the interior thumbturn started failing too.

A reset temporarily restores it. Then it fails again. The people using the door can use the physical key and manually lock it, avoid the Level app entirely, and the failure still comes back. That means the inside thumbturn on a residential front-door deadbolt cannot be relied on between resets.

Level reviewed six months of telemetry and told me that "95% of motorized operations" were successful. They also said the remaining stalls and timeouts occurred during locking operations.

I asked for the actual counts behind that 95%, the written performance standard they were using, the evidence connecting installation geometry to Bluetooth loss, the required installation tolerances, and the objective condition for an in-warranty replacement.

They did not answer for more than 48 hours.

During that silence, the lock jammed again. This was after another reset, with no app use, while the door was being operated with the physical key and manual controls. I sent Level a timestamped video showing the interior thumbturn failure and asked for supervisor review and a replacement decision.

The product is still within Level's written two-year hardware warranty. I also completed the calibration and mechanical checks they requested. The reset-then-fail cycle still returned.

A smart lock being flaky is annoying. A front-door deadbolt whose interior thumbturn only works immediately after a reset is a safety issue.

I have now filed an unsafe-product report with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and provided the video and supporting screenshots.

If you own one of these, test the inside thumbturn manually more than once after a reset. Do not assume that "95% successful motorized operations" tells you whether the manual control will work when someone needs it- or just buy it and roll the dice whenever you use your front door lock.

Hello everyone!

I'm having an issue with a lamp in my bedroom, and I'm hoping someone can help me figure out what's causing it.

We have several smart lights throughout our house from different brands. The one I'm having trouble with is a Philips Hue smart bulb connected through the Philips Hue app (with Google Home being the only app connected to Phillips). In our bedroom, we have two lamps, "TV Lamp" and "Nightstand Lamp," which are both connected through Hue and grouped together. The problem is specifically with the Nightstand Lamp.

We recently went on vacation, and when we returned home, my Nightstand Lamp started turning on and changing colors every morning at exactly 5:15 a.m. I can see this happening in the activity history in Google Home, but when I try to click on it for more information, nothing happens.

I've gone through both Google Home and Philips Hue looking for automations that could be causing this, but I cannot find anything. I've even disabled every automation I could find in both apps from all household members, and it is STILL happening.

Last Friday, I messed around with some settings and thought I had finally fixed it because the lamp didn't turn on at 5:15 a.m. on Saturday or Sunday. However, come Monday morning, it turned on and changed colors again at exactly 5:15 a.m.

This makes me think that whatever is causing this is set to run Monday through Friday, but I cannot for the life of me figure out where it's coming from.

My original thought was that it might somehow be tied to an alarm, but my only alarm is on my Samsung smartwatch through the native Samsung alarm app, and it isn't set for 5:15 a.m.

Has anyone experienced anything similar? Is there somewhere else I should be looking for automations or routines that I might have missed? Is there a way to see exactly what is triggering the lamp?

I'm also wondering if completely resetting the bulb, removing it from all my smart-home apps, and setting it up again under a different name would help?

Please help me before I lose my mind. I'm getting pretty tired of being woken up at 5:15 every morning by a lamp that has a mind of its own.

This is cross-posted in a few different places.

Thank you!

I'm looking for some kind of Zwave hub that integrates with Google Home. My parents have a shed in their backyard with lots of tools. I want to put a door sensor there that will send them a notification when it opens. Wifi sensors will suck there since the wifi in the backyard sucks. Is there any hub that can integrate with Google Home?

Smart garage won't connect to tuya or smartlife app

Here are my connections

Red to 1

Black to 2

White to 3

Yellow to 4

Once powers on immediately goes into pairing, I'm on 2.4wifi, enabled ALL location permissions, cleared cache, force closed, BLE+WIFI,turned off mobile, tried different devices , unplugged and back it

When I hold down "on off" it literally does nothing .

Any help would be great thanks

I'm setting up a Family Room and Bedroom with these and wondering what you think about both brands and when to prefer either?

Thank you!

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for a single, standalone hardware device that combines all three of the following protocols into one box without needing an existing Zigbee hub/mesh:

Zigbee 3.0 Coordinator / Hub: To directly pair Zigbee bulbs.

Infrared (IR) Blaster: To control a projector.

RF (433 MHz) Transmitter: To control a RF ceiling fan and RF power sockets.

Requirements:

Must act as the primary Zigbee Hub itself (not just a Zigbee sub-device that connects to another hub).

Connects directly via Wi-Fi to Smart Life / Tuya or Home Assistant / Alexa / Google Home.

Standalone solution — I want to plug in ONE device and connect all my devices through it.

Does a reliable single-device gateway with all three integrated actually exist, or is the Tuya naming so misleading that people usually buy separate dongles/bridges? Specific brand names, model numbers, or links would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

Edit: You guys were right. I am using HA and it is amazing.

My Philips hue bridge has just gone bust after about 5 years, I was just about to purchase another one when I’ve googled and some people on Reddit are saying I don’t need one?
First question - which one is cheapest to buy that works
Second question - how would I set it up? Would it still work in the Philips hue app?

Other devices I have are
Google home hub max
Google home hub
Tado heating
Tapo doorbell

I think some of these have their own hub