this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2023
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Home Automation

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Discussion about general home automation ideas and projects, home automation protocols like Z-wave, Zigbee, Matter, etc, and home automation software and hubs like HomeSeer, Home Assistant, OpenHAB, Homey.

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Does Matter matter (compared to devices flashed with third-party open source firmware)? (self.homeautomation)
submitted 1 year ago by grue to c/homeautomation
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I'm just getting into home automation, so I don't really know what I'm doing. I care a lot about supporting open standards (which is partly why I never bothered with it until now that Matter is coming out), but I also very much like the idea of having everything I own running Open Source firmware instead of whatever potentially untrustworthy stuff it comes with.

So anyway, I got some TP-Link Kasa smart plugs (KP125MP2), but have since been doing some more research and found that some folks don't think there's actually much, if any, advantage to Matter devices compared to older wi-fi devices that've been flashed with Tasmota or ESPHome. So now I've also got some Sonoff S31 smart plugs and a USB to serial adapter to flash them with, and I'm wondering which set of things I should actually keep.

I kinda feel like I need to try installing and using them to know which I prefer, but I'd also feel bad about returning stuff after it's got provisioning info stored on it (or worse, flashed firmware). So maybe I can decide based on advice y'all give me instead?

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[–] grue 3 points 1 year ago

If you’re sticking a single environment then it doesn’t really add much over things like Zigbee or Tasmota or ESPhome, which already have the benefits of fully local control. If you ever decide to transition to another environment it should make it easy to migrate though.

If you’re using something like Home Assistant which can use any of these devices and export them out to google, Alexa, apple etc. then the multi-environment argument doesn’t really matter.

I should've mentioned in my initial post that having any reliance on cloud services whatsoever is an absolute deal-breaker for me. I've just installed Home Assistant OS in a VM on my Proxmox server, but haven't done much with it yet since the only IOT devices I have are these smart plugs and some Govee 433MHz water detectors (that are a subject for a different thread).

The other argument is future proofing. Theoretically everything will eventually move to matter, until a new standard arrives to challenge the status quo again. So being matter-ready at least makes you future proof in that sense.

One idle thought I had was the idea of third-party firmware eventually adding Matter support to devices that didn't originally have it. Is that something the Tasmota and/or ESPHome folks would have any reason to care about doing, and if so, how likely is the possibility?

Another consideration is price. I haven’t looked in to it myself but wifi stuff is cheaaaap.

The Matter smart plugs came in a 2-pack for $30 ($15 each), and the non-Matter ones came in a 4-pack for $33 ($8 each). Obviously I prefer $8 to $15, but neither is outrageous or anything.