Smart Home Automation: The Ultimate Beginner's Guide

[00:02] automation but you feel it's super complicated you're not sure if it's for you well today we're going to do an intro to smart home automation and we're walk you through what you need to consider step by step how to get started

[00:16] decisions that you might need to make and we're going to look at how you can grow your system over time this video is going to have chapters so if you want to later when you're ready for the next step you should be able to jump around

[00:29] pretty easily now this is the perfect time for you to subscribe if you haven't already I'm always sharing Tech info smart home automation I talk about home assistant all the time review tech gear and

[00:41] gadgets and if you have tips you have tricks or ideas you want to share toss them in the comments below I think anyone new to home automation is quickly going to see that this is a very welcoming Community okay let's get down

[00:53] to business first off what is smart home automation well nothing magic I'll tell we're going to add some automation to everyday tasks typically this takes some sort of action and it results in a reaction for example every day at 7 p.m.

[01:10] time-based event and sends a command to a Smart Home light bulb or a switch and pretty much it and it's all you need to get started most systems simply grow over time from something that started simple like that you still here perfect

[01:26] let's talk about your new smart home I want you to take a look around make a note of any devices that you might already have gaming consoles appliances garage door openers audio devices think of anything that plugs in the simple

[01:38] stuff make note if any of those items are smart devices if you bought that might already have smart technology built in and you didn't even realize take a look and see if any of them have a label indicating something smart about

[01:51] system make a note if you do of the brand and the model if you know what it is now add any other smart devices you know of or you were thinking of buying interested in a smart home in the first place light bulbs light strips locks

[02:06] plug-in modules motion sensors how about a smartw watch are you an apple or an Android home you might even already have a smart assistant from Google Amazon or apple thinking of anything think of anything and don't worry if you've got

[02:18] nothing it's all good this list is just going to help us make some decisions if this video up here I take a look at a bunch of zigg devices and they're inexpensive and they work with most systems now let's talk smart home

[02:32] languages every smart home device or Gadget needs to communicate and there's a number of different languages they can speak the fancy name for this is protocol you've heard some of them before for sure Wi-Fi Bluetooth matter

[02:44] zigg zwave or they could simply have brand names on them like homekit compatible take a look at your list of devices and make a note if you know the speak very often it's just written on the box or the device itself now if you

[02:58] of the brand and we'll figure that one out in the next step okay all your homework is done and again if you don't really have anything on your list don't worry the following will help you decide how to make that first purchase and

[03:11] start building your system let's talk about the good stuff and we'll start devices take a look at your list and start with your big Brands companies like Samsung and LG they often have an app that you can download to control all

[03:25] to need at least one device like a TV that acts like the brain of the system and sometimes they sell a small device or add-on Hub that does this for you they typically make these apps super easy to use you can add devices by

[03:38] scanning a QR code or just pick them from a list after that they walk you through a few setup questions and you're done these brand apps will often even support other brands now they don't make it quite as easy to set them up but they

[03:51] do work they'd rather you stick with their app and use their ecosystem rather sometimes you're going to notice that functionality is reduced when you add a non-brand device or it's just not as simple to add and it does make sense

[04:06] since well they don't want to know all the details about other brands so they protocol your device uses and remember we talked about Wi-Fi Bluetooth zigg Etc okay I know you're sitting there now and you're thinking I don't have anything

[04:21] what should I get what should I buy well my suggestion if you're going to buy your first device pick a protocol and stick with it I would suggest zig be languages that smart home devices speak

[04:34] ecosystems these devices they're also pretty inexpensive I would start off with a light bulb a motion sensor and an Amazon Alexa device you can probably get all of this for under 100 bucks and it'll let you start to set up a system

[04:49] the best part is all of this can be used in any system you end up with or you throw some links down below take a look and see if you're interested so let's say you have lgtv and a Samsung washer and dryer well how should you choose

[05:04] which one is right well there really is no right answer try both in many cases many different apps and just see which one you like best or just start with the brand you have the most devices for the trick at this point is to find a single

[05:17] app that supports most of your devices and you're comfortable using it after all of these apps will have some way to schedule actions typically they call these rules or automations could even be something clever like recipes let's take

[05:30] a minute and talk about automations smart home automations are the heart of any system they allow you to build logic around what you want to do as I as something that happens at a specific time such as turning on those lights at

[05:44] that are triggered by another device for example you could have a motion detector past it it's just going to turn the lights on in your hallway once the say for 5 minutes it's going to turn the lights off again your first automation

[05:59] should should be something simple like this follow the simple rule of if this this follow the simple rule of if this then that if motion then light once you you'll realize you want to make little adjustments the example I just gave you

[06:12] turning on in the middle of the day but only at night so the real power of automations comes when you start to add conditions to those automations in this case everything would stay the same but

[06:24] when the motion was triggered it would first check to make sure it was between Sun sun set and sunrise if it is meaning it's dark outside well then turn on the go a step further as there's many devices that can measure the light

[06:39] levels in a room often the sensor is built into motion detectors so instead of using the time of day you could use the light level sensor in your motion detector as your condition and based on its level have the automation decide to

[06:53] either turn the light on or not with that you should have chosen an app added some devices and set up some basic automations you can stop here believe it or not you now have a smart home but you know what let's talk about the next

[07:06] completely happy with your smart home app and you may never want to move on to anything else but if you're like me you may realize some limitations fairly using just doesn't support a specific device you want to add or you may find

[07:21] that the automations are just too basic not enough conditions or flexibility you might want to add some sort of dashboard or other method of controlling your device outside of those automations or maybe even a control to turn on and

[07:35] when you don't want the lights to automatically turn on and off well it might be time to look at a purpose-built application an app or even a hub the ones I'm talking about are usually not specific to a brand so they try to

[07:50] equally sometimes they're sold by a company but very often they're large community of smart home enthusiasts they just want to automate their home so they share ideas tutorials like this video and the more people that

[08:06] grow you may find in time you even participate offer to help or contribute our solutions from companies like I mentioned before Samsung has a Hub that they call smart things now you can purchase this as an add-on to add

[08:21] additional products within the Samsung app and sometimes it's built into TVs or other appliances Google and Amazon both offer smart home devices that are very similar to this they usually offer voice control and some sort of automations

[08:34] Apple it has homekit this is their version of smart home automation system it's built into Apple TV and some apple homepod speakers and of course this can be a great option if you have an apple family but not so much if you use

[08:47] Android phones and the final option in my opinion it's the best is something like home assistant or openhab these are completely free open- source Solutions of computer expertise in order order to set them up but today you can buy ready

[09:02] too devices if that's the route you'd like to go for example you can order home assistant green it's a simple little device costs about 100 bucks and all you do is plug it in turn it on it'll boot up and most likely start

[09:14] detecting devices you already have once that's done you can easily start adding others now if you're a little bit more daring check out uh the video I'll link setting up home assistant on a Raspberry Pi or some old other old computer you

[09:27] may have lying around the house now why are these the best like I said before no corporate entity is guiding what they do it's simply home automation enthusiasts creating the perfect product to improve home automation it's just a community so

[09:41] that's it 101 the basics if you take only one thing away from this it's that you can start simple really simple home automation is really just a bunch of little tiny building blocks you can slowly add pieces one by one until

[09:54] sometimes I get to a point where I don't change a thing for months and then I from scratch I hope you found this interesting I have many other videos that dive into some of these topics much deeper if you're interested take a look

[10:08] specific you'd like to know or if you're having any trouble like I said I Source ideas for my content from the comments I like to try and help people out that's it I hope you like this one and I hope

[10:21] it I hope you like this one and I hope to see you in the next one