In the Zone — Introducing Homey Portal

Nice! Like the design and the functionality. A nice addition to the ecosystem and my house.

But, I’m also feeling a little bit reserved about the price. 150-200 euro’s would be easier to accept.

I also like the UI very much. Is there a plan that this UI is becoming available as a “dashboard light” option? I would even be willing to pay a small amount for that. Would be a great usecase for my old iphone as a DIY portal.

Despite the high price, curiosity got the better of me and I ordered one too.

I’m planning to use it on the ground floor (main zone), which is split into several subzones like the living area, dining area, kitchen, etc.

How will that work in the Portal? Will I still be able to access each subzone individually, or will all devices on the ground floor just be lumped together?

Also, will there be any way to control devices on other floors, for example using shortcuts?

If not, I’m struggling to see the added value of the Portal compared to a simple—and much cheaper—tablet with a well-configured Homey dashboard.

Or just release a PoE version for £25 more

The promotional video literally shows the product stuck to someone’s wall

No one wants dangling cables.

I think it’s clear no? By design it will lead to more purchases

Why are Homey 2019 users like yourself, left out?

Probably because the Homey Pro 2019 uses Mini USB instead of USB-C, so the standard Ethernet adapter wouldn’t fit. Also the included power adapter is only 5V2A, where the Pro 2023 has a 5.2V2A power adapter and the Pro 2026 has a 5V3A power adapter.

For me it’s not an issue though. All of my Ethernet ports are already taken by all of the bridges :wink:

But PoE is not the solution for that. A better solution would be 220V mains power: everyone has it, and you would be able to build it into an existing box.

Home users don’t have Ethernet in every corner of the house (I certainly don’t), and PoE is usually only used in enterprise and corporate environments. The cheap router from your ISP doesn’t support it either, right? Probably more than 99% of households use their ISP router or any other cheap router that doesn’t support PoE. PoE devices specifically built for home use don’t exist, or are so niche that you can’t find them anywhere. All devices with PoE appear to be oriented at corporate environments.

From a company’s perspective, it’s just not worth all the effort to build an extra variation to serve the 10 users that might use a PoE switch

Will you be buying one after you’ve upgraded from Homey 2019 first?

Does it have an internal relay?

AliExpress is full of 8-10-12 inch cheap (compred to this thing) PoE Android tablets that are more than enough powerful to run the Homey app and it’s dashboards. They are literally mainstream and sold by thousands to ordinary people like me and you.

“Smart home people” are anything but your stock ISP router and “I don’t have a switch” people. I would argue that at least 6 out of 10 Homey usrs do have some kind of switch, and upgrading to a PoE switch is really not that expensive. I can’t speak for Europe, but here in Australia every home built in the last 10 years has at least one ethernet cable routed to every room, although I do agree they should have made it connectable to mains power, nobody wants a cable going down the wall.

Overall, in my opinion, this is a fail from Athom. Design, functionality and price wise.

No, I can’t afford €449 so I won’t upgrade.

Do you use these? Ever heard of the BadBox 2.0 malware? In case you haven’t, I would recommend to check your PoE displays since the article specifically lists connected displays. And I’d also recommend checking if they’re Play Protect certified

Actually, i personally dream about it on my wrist in watch… Designed for small screen, nice UI. And instead of walking to it i (mostly) always have it with me. May-be just little bit to work with automatic zone selection :wink:

PS. Long time looking something for my ( Galaxy ) watch, but not found anything usable and stable.

Or just release a PoE version for £25 more

Something tells me that you really have no idea how much effort is involved with releasing a product like this. :face_with_tongue:

I wonder, is there any motion/activity sensor or proximity sensor included ?
If not proximity, light sensor and any configurable settings, which will allow auto display switch off, eg. during night ?

Yes, there’s a light sensor, temperature sensor and distance sensor

Based on this picture on the product page it has:

@Doekse: If I understand correctly the Homey Portal has a built-in speaker. Can that also be used to have it play sounds or convert text to speech via flowcards? Or is is just a buzzer type of speaker?

Yes, it has a speaker. I’ve only found the “ring tick volume” though, so just a sound feedback when rotating the ring I guess.

For now it’s only used for audiovisual feedback when using Homey Portal, but “wat niet is kan nog komen”

You’ll never know :wink:

Not only the ring! We’ve actually spend a significant amount of time with an audio engineering team to have the whole interface feel really natural when it comes to sounds. You can hear some of it in the upcoming podcast episode.

Interesting! :blush:

Is it possible to display the camera image on the screen when someone rings my AQARA Hub G410 doorbell? And if so, is there a delay?