The quietest roller shade driver: Aqara E1

and this is shout out to steve mold if you don't know what to do with that spare beaded chain probably want to watch my next video hey guys today agara is releasing a new device which is well behind me on the wall oh here on the table i have three of them for a very important reason but more on that later we're talking about the driver for roller brains the verticals and other devices that use one of these chain bitter chain or chain links to be driven now i've reviewed a couple of those devices in here there is a bounce you want screaming like a bunch which is currently mounted downstairs and operating big verticals you can click through and watch that video and i recently replaced the xemi smart one which was a battery operated with aguero one for two reasons first it is much quieter and second it uses zigbee 3.0 so today we're gonna talk about this little device and i'll suggest you that you should really jump on automating your windows why because after automating your lights probably automating whatever is covering your window is the second most important or most flashy way to automate your home because after all you're still automating sunlight so agara released that e1 roller shade driver and it's much smaller and currently it's available in your local amazon well it's nice of them because up to now those devices were about available through xiaomi ecosystem while agari is continuously bringing new devices to western markets and they are zigbee powered so i'm super happy now i already talked about the different products uh from agara which use zigbee 3.0 including one of these hubs that i'm using right now and sensors i'm going to link them in here so you could take a look at the entire agara zigbee ecosystem and make up your mind but like i said we're going to focus on this particle device it's much smaller than other chain link drivers that i've been using which is also a benefit but it's also one of the quietest one it's not particularly fast it moves the curtain around one meter by 18 seconds but it gets the job done and the battery is advertised to last up to two months if you have a curtain which is 1.9 meter by 1.9 meter obviously your mileage might vary because it will depend on how many times you can operate the curtains and how big is the curtain and how long it takes to move it the device it's relatively simple it has two buttons to operate the blinds manually if you want to do so and at the bottom you have a reset button and the range checking button it's nice to actually see usb type-c for charging up until now all the devices i've been using didn't have that which means i would have to use some weird charging methods to supply the electricity via proprietary jack now thanks to usb type c if i run out of juice i can simply connect a portable battery level overnight and it's no hassle even though the device itself can be easily removed from the wall speaking about installation it only takes couple of moments to do it you can either opt out for the 3m sticker and attach the bracket via sticker itself or you can use the screws provided i went for the screws and there is a one thing that i didn't like that much you have to be quite careful with positioning this i like semi smart one and this agera driver doesn't let you adjust its position and i've made that mistake in the past when my screws were slightly too low and i had to use the adjustment system to keep the chain tensioned properly and i know you only have to do it just one but to take your time and the results gonna be just fine another kind of weird thing at first but totally makes sense later is the fact that you actually have to remove the cover and the break off the parts that are obscuring the chain now at first i thought like well weird concept i mean like why would you even want to do that but then i realized that you can actually mount this device in different orientations so you could have it vertical or you can mount it horizontally and those tabs are there to kind of provide you with options and options are always nice so i don't hate it and the tabs break off quite easily now pairing pairing is simple it takes only a couple of seconds to actually add it to a hub and then set up you'll be asked to set upper and lower limit and then you can start operating the device if you looked at the agara app before you know it's very much xenolike very clean interface without unnecessary features and it's no different with this although i was generally surprised that they've added four different interfaces to showcase different types of windows that you might have around the house just very handy one of the things that is actually missing is the smart small toggle on the card itself i wish they would add it so you could quickly open and close window without actually going into the app once you get into the curtain menu you get the slider in which you can choose a percentage value of your window being open and in case of verticals or different blinds you can even direct them instead of opening and closing it you can choose to move the angles of the individual blades and that is reflected in app which is very handy especially if you have multiple of those devices to direct your blinds this device just been launched and i'm on european servers now google support is already supported with voice commands however there is no designated panel for the curtains itself we'll have to wait for that a little bit longer and the same goes for alexa alexa isn't supported just now i've been told by agara support that the support for this particular device gonna launch within 24 hours so soon you should have it available via alexa too but for i've tested so far prior to the launch i had no problems using app and google voice activation works perfectly and it's quite fast close window [Music] device will cost you just under 60 pounds on uk's amazon your local price may vary now it's nice to have those devices via amazon so you can order them without waiting for similar devices arriving from china and should there be any problem you are basically subject to amazon terms and conditions and refund policies which is always nice because it can quickly resolve any problems and as you can see i've requested three devices to be sent to me for one reason alongside this beaded chain i have plans to actually automate conservatory blinds something that would cost me around 2 000 pounds to actually get professional solution deployed for the plants very expensive and if i'm lucky i'll save up a lot of money by using just those three devices and a little bit of 3d printing so if you want to see that that's going to be on my channel very soon so make sure you're not going to miss it but let's pause in here this is really nice sunset so if you're going to automate blinds or verticals like this choosing a zigbee based device it's actually a good choice for more than one reason first of all obviously it just works and you don't have to fluff about with extra wires so they're doing power because it's wireless etc but what other enthusiasts will absolutely love is the fact that you will be able to hook them up to a custom zigbee coordinator and this is something i'm going to look into it very soon as well so if you're interested in that part well just give me a little bit of time and i'll get that tutorial rolling so thanks to aguero for sending me the units at least i could have a quick look at them before they get released and if you interested in the project i'm going to use in my conservatory and save myself a lot of money then stay tuned i do not have a posting schedule so you know how youtube works not going to explain you that but i have a bunch of social media on which i share various stages of my projects so you probably don't want to mention that pick the one that is most relevant to you and follow me there so i guess i'm going to say thanks so much for watching and i'll see you next video take care bye oh i've changed the service yeah bollocks so there's going to be quick repairing though [Music] server region europe yeah sign in agree sign in accessory network reset successfully connecting [Music] she's very excited so on the remote control i want to add a new device which is this one [Music] [Music] accessory added successfully at least you can repair it within like five seconds [Music] you

Channel: NotEnoughTECH

Views: 31,951

Keywords: NotEnoughTECH, #aqara, smart blinds, roller driver, home automation

Id: MwngUXoAFFM

Length: 10min 18sec (618 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 22 2021