Caseta System at max Capacity

[MattS]

One thing you might consider if looking to add a bunch of shades .... put them all on another separate hub. That is what I did with all my outdoor. They can run on their own schedules and works well. I even got them into Alexa with my second indoor lighting Caseta hub by linking the outdoor switch hub to my Smartthings hub, then they all show up in Alexa app. Having a second Caseta does require to register with a second email address.

[AndyWa]

One thing you might consider if looking to add a bunch of shades .... put them all on another separate hub. That is what I did with all my outdoor. They can run on their own schedules and works well. I even got them into Alexa with my second indoor lighting Caseta hub by linking the outdoor switch hub to my Smartthings hub, then they all show up in Alexa app. Having a second Caseta does require to register with a second email address.

Interesting...so you are saying if I have my second caseta hub connect to a SmartThings hub, then Alexa will be able to trigger those switches as well? This may be what I am looking for, acknowledging that it's a hack which I would prefer not to do.


To be fair, if there is no way possible for Lutron to extend a hub and its network of switches beyond 50 devices...I could probably be almost satisfied adding hubs for each 50 *IF* they fixed the alexa skill to recognize multiple hubs and trigger everything. Currently I can with HomeKit, and is what I use for my scheduling for all switches across both my hubs, but Siri is not the voice activated assistant in my house. Right now Alexa can only trigger the hub linked to the email address you give it. I only use the Lutron app during setup, after that -- its HomeKit or Alexa.

Cheers,
Andy

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[MattS]

Yes, this is exactly how it works, Alexa sees both sets of switches because the second hub is connected through Smartthings. Quite possible may be able to add a third through Homekit if I needed.

[AndyWa]

Yes, this is exactly how it works, Alexa sees both sets of switches because the second hub is connected through Smartthings. Quite possible may be able to add a third through Homekit if I needed.

Cool, thanks Matt!

[AndyWa]

FYI I finally took MattS' advice and added the SmartThings hub. My goodness I have a lot of hubs now, but it definitely works! 50 devices on lutron hub connected to Alexa, 35 drives on lutron pro hub connected to smart things, connected to Alexa. Alexa now has all my devices, and HomeKit does as well (it didn't need the SmartThings). Well worth the ~$100 and now I can buy a few more switches!

[AndyWa]

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[inetjnky]

You can get around the 50 device limit with Hubitat as well. It's been discussed in their community forum. The nice thing about Hubitat is that it's all local processing where as Smartthings relies on the cloud. Hubitat does require the Lutron Pro bridge in order to communicate because it utilizes telnet to talk to Lutron.

[rhett7660]

You can get around the 50 device limit with Hubitat as well. It's been discussed in their community forum. The nice thing about Hubitat is that it's all local processing where as Smartthings relies on the cloud. Hubitat does require the Lutron Pro bridge in order to communicate because it utilizes telnet to talk to Lutron.

Holy smokes! Thanks for the suggestion. This looks outstanding!

[mmascari]

Do you have to add every Pico to the hub?

If I have a dimmer that's part of the hub, can I then pair a pico to the dimmer using the buttons on the dimmer and the pico directly instead of using the app?

Would that allow the pico to control that one dimmer and the dimmer to still be part of the hub? Or, would it get added to the hub behind the scenes somewhere or cause some other problem?


My goal would be a dimmer that's part of the hub, controllable via the hub/apps/integrations. But, then a Pico that the hub doesn't know about that is configured the old fashioned way directly to a switch and then can only control that one dimmer.

Not being able to manage the Pico in the app isn't a big deal. I have a bunch of 3/4 way locations where the Pico will only ever control 1 switch. If I can simply not add these to the hub, that would greatly reduce my device count at a very slight cost to managing them.

[SDR-Mike]

The dimmer or switch can operate with a direct Pico or the hub, but not both.