Easy & Affordable Smart Blinds in MINUTES!
Easy & Affordable Smart Blinds in MINUTES!
The Aqara Roller Shade Driver E1 is a retrofit device designed to work with your existing Blinds to turn them into Smart Blinds that can then be automated by your Smart Home no matter which platform you are using, they work with Home Assistant, Alexa, Google Home and Apple HomeKit. In this review of the Aqara E1, we talk about specs & features, battery life, ease of use and more!
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I tried using a tuya -based zigbee version of this but when I use zha. It only shows up as a device with no entities other than update status
Guys, "blinds" and "shades" are 2 different things.
What features are missing if i only use the app and do not use the Aqara Hub or Home Assistant?
Great review!
Just got a Zemismart curtain track. Excited to install it.
Can you still raise the blinds manually if you have this device installed?
Seems these haven’t been in stock at Amazon UK for a few days now. Shame.
Great review. One thing not mentioned is how it deals with the normal join you get in the ball chain. I have a metal ball chain cord and there is a big chunky plastic joiner which would have go through where the cog wheel would be for this smart device when opening or closing the blinds. I can’t see how that would feed through or how it would work around that. There’s no way for me to position the joiner in any location that doesn’t pass through the lowest point of the cord so it would have to go through the cog wheel. Any thoughts?
is it mount on the wall a must? or i can just hang it?
Does the blinds easily pass the motor when rolling downwards?
it appears the mounting is done at about half the window height position and it seems that the shade can only move down to this position then? why?
Did aqara stop selling these?
Are the batteries built in or replaceable?
Can you still use your blinds manually after installing something like this?
can you create a schedule for what time to open and close the blinds?
Can it sync three devices to operate as one? For example, can a bay window with three blinds be opened simultaneously with one click?
How do you install this device where you don’t have a recessed window space?
Amazon listing seems to be dead.
Great video as always!! Have you had any issues once added to HA? I’ve noticed some people have been posting the up arrow in HA is greyed out so they can’t open the blinds. More so with ZHA. Have you had this issue at all?
Who is already automating blinds? If so what are you currently using?
Oh and Aqara is providing a 15% discount for the next 2 days (starting tomorrow), use code RSDE1KOL at checkout!
from where to buy it
Did Aqara cease production of these? I’m not able to find them for sale.
Being quite frustrated at the moment. Watched this video and bought a first blind thinking it would work nicely in Home Assistant. Wrong wrong wrong. It’s not easy to do and I can’t get it working as yet. Running HA on raspberry pi using ZHA using ConbeeII. Blind us identified as a curtain and doesn’t work at all. Found various discussions on one that suggest I am not alone but failing to understand what I need to do to fix it.
Just making sure others know before diving in. Any tips would be greatly received.
Does this work with Zebra blinds?
Can you do a video with a Local Push blind? like Dooya?
Nice video, which convinced me to get one. However, could you give a bit more detail on your Homeassistant integration/configuration for this motor? I’ve just got one of these to replace a dumb 433MHz motor, but I’m having trouble with the Homeassistant integration. I do not have an Aqara hub but I do have a Sonoff USB ZigBee 3.0 dongle, simple to pair, it’s configured and working from the buttons.
Picked this motor up today. Connected it to HA, but the state isnt reporting back to HA. Did you find this or was the Aqara hub required for the state to report back to HA ?
Does this work with non beaded threads
so the need of a hub is a must to work with google or alexa? thanx
Could it open and close the blinds shutters?
This should be great for the vertical blinds where you only have to turn them 90 degrees ! I believe it would also increase baterry life considerably ..
Finally got one of those yesterday ^^ Already working in Home Assistant but i have an issue… always have to go to the device page in z2mqtt and click on the position refresh… any help?
Having order/symmetry OCD makes it hard to see a loose/tight chain 🙂 Will these smart blinds work when you tighten things up by lowering the device?
Can you leave my contact information
those are shades not blinds. They are very different.
Is it possible to grab string manually in case dead battery?
You mentioned 1.5kg extra load that it can handle, how much is your roller
Are these Europe only? Looking at reviews and seems they all seem to come from there. Can you use these in the US? Thanks
Rather than having a slide control on app, is it possible to have like 3 buttons like: open, 50% open, close?
What if you don’t have the beads and you only have the string pull chord? Will it work?
Does it work with Amazon Alexa ?
Affordable: 65 euro x10 blinds = 650 euro. No thanks XD
Does this work with strings
How to you overcome de "stop bead" on the akara?
I would pay up to 15 USD for one unit. Not more than that since I have 5 blinds to automate. Since this is the cheapo route, it should be cheap and not an expensive solution.
Hi, thanks for the video. My curtain chain has a plastic connector connecting the two ends of the chain. I don’t think it will go through the motor. How can I solve this?
Can’t find anywhere to buy this !
Would this be powerful enough to also power roman blinds, ratherb than roller blinds?
Is there one that works with blinds that use string?
If it’s ZigBee does it work with Philips hue as a switch or something?