EISY - Insteon Switches work perfectly with Zigbee Hue Bulbs

[Darnok]

Now that I have upgraded to the EISY, I wanted to branch out from my primarily Insteon (and some Zwave) system and try some color bulbs. I got the ZWave / Zigbee USB dongle with my EISY, so I decided to try some Zigbee Hue Bulbs. I haven't seen much discussion about how the new USB dongle works so figured I would add my experience and learnings to the forum in case others were thinking about trying this.

My first reaction is WOW. I can't believe how well the EISY works with these Zigbee Bulbs. And the best part is I can run the smart bulbs and smart switches at the same time. No need to keep the light socket "Hot".

System

Eisy, Insteon switches, Zigbee Hue Bulbs

Zigbee

I was very surprised/pleases at how easy this was. With everything I have read in the forum about PolyGot and node servers, I didnt realize it wasn't needed. All I did was powered up the bulbs, clicked on "add a zigbee device" and all three bulbs showed up as devices. Did I say how much I love my EISY.

Hue Colors

The Hue bulbs have 2 different ways to set the color of the bulbs. HSL and xyY. I couldn't quite figure out how to use the xyY but the Hue Saturation (HSL) was easy. This site has a good color picker. https://hslpicker.com/#d0ff00

No Need for Hot Light Socket

So I had read that in order for the bulb to maintain its setting when not using the Hue Hub, the socket needed to stay hot. I didn't really like this idea as I wanted to be able to use the Insteon switches already installed. So I added the switch and the "Hue-Sat" into a scene. I set the color in the scene (don't forget it needs to be set for the controller and scene) and then when you turn the light on with the switch the bulb comes on at its default setting of pale white and then changes to the color set in the scene.

Changing Colors

But of course setting the color in the scene means only one color can be set. So I created a series of programs for each color I want. The program is just a set of commands to change the multiple spots in the scene to the chosen color. I can then run the program by spoken command to Alexa.

I don't know if any of this will be helpful, but had some spare time to write this out. If it has all been covered elsewhere feel free to delete my post.

[dbwarner5]

Nice summary. I have hues and the plug in. They are in so many scenes that I hate to have to go and see each of their settings for each scene and then add them to a new scene.

But someday maybe. 

One other idea you may consider is to run a "waterfall" of programs that change the hue bulb every time the light switch is hit. For example, the first one turns on the defined scene you have. then a program is then looking for that switch to be on AND switched on., and then changes its color / brightness etc, disables itself, and enables the "next" program in the water fall. You can add time elements as well which will force it to reset to the first color if no body has hit the switch recently, etc.

I have this set up for a. pari of hues and it works well. 

cheers.