#ZHA vs Z2MQTT on a new build?

1 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

slender knoll
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My SMLIGHT Zigbee dongle arrived and I'm ready to integrate my Zigbee devices into my standalone Beelink HAOS build. I understand that ZHA is baked into Home Assistant and may be quite easy to implement, but I've also read that Z2MQTT is more feature rich and people wish they would have gone that route. What I'm not sure of is if the things I'm reading being over a year old may be too outdated. Has ZHA updated enough that it is the recommended Zigbee controller, or is Z2MQTT the way to go coming from a new build?

prisma ferry
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Hi @slender knoll,
Z2M has more buttons to push and more levers to pull. I like that and went with it first.
ZHA is more a part of the HA and is better integrated. No MQTT needed for it, for example. I also installed that because I support a number of blueprints that use it, needed a test bed, so there is a ZHA network in my studio. It works.
Where do you fall In the (I like to pull levers and see what it does) or (just make it work) camp? That will answer your question.

slender knoll
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Coming from Smartthings, I was used to very basic things like a sensor on the garage freezer door letting me know if the kids forgot to shut it. That being said, the more I dive into HA, I may want to get deeper into the levers and switches.

The SMLIGHT SLZB-07 I bought from Amazon had 2 radio options. I bought the one that had the EFR32MG21 radio which seems to be geared for ZHA. If I were to delve into Z2MQTT, I would have wanted to buy the dongle with the CC2652P7 radio, correct?

calm mango
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There's no difference between the two when it comes to radio support for modern chips

prisma ferry
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I have 2652's in a couple places, and that ZHA network uses a Tasmota WiFi to zigbee (because that's what I had in the box of shame) so it can live away from the HA server in the studio upstairs. Don't know about others.

slender knoll
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So the two radio options I listed will work the same if I want to use Z2MQTT? I have no issue getting the one that is know to work better if it will.

Is it pretty simple to "flash" the device to work with Z2MQTT? Any discord recommended guide?

prisma ferry
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There's an addon for flashing them now. I haven't tried it yet, but plan to..

quiet flower
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All I can say is that I'm using ZHA, and so far all my devices including some exotic ones worked with no issues.