If you are getting into home automation, you’ll find that many devices support the Zigbee protocol. This is an open standard (IEEE 802.15.4-based) that allows low-power devices to communicate with each other over low-speed data links. It was developed to be a less expensive alternative to WiFi and Bluetooth for home automation and other small projects with wireless radios. For home automation purposes, you need a hub to connect the Zigbee network to your Ethernet/WiFi network and that’s where the UZG-01 Zigbee Coordinator comes in.
There are lots of options for Zigbee hubs, but this one has some particularly nice features that make it a great fit for home automation and smart home data collection. It supports Power over Ethernet (PoE) which means it can be powered via the same cable that connects it to your network! This makes deployment a lot simpler. It also features one of the most powerful Zigbee transceiver chips, the CC2652P by Texas Instruments, capable of putting out up to 20dBm of transmit power!
It can communicate with your existing home automation setup in a couple different ways. If you run Home Assistant, you can use ZHA, which is very easy to configure and get working with an existing installation. For pretty much any other home automation setup, you can alternatively use Zigbee2MQTT which simply encapsulates the Zigbee information into MQTT packets, making them compatible with many different systems.
If you’ve got some Zigbee devices and want to add them to your home network, check out the UZG-01!
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