Review: Aeon Labs Minimote

As some can probably tell from my writings, I’m very into home automation and have my whole house setup so that it basically runs itself (OK, not really). I have lots of “scenes” programmed to respond to various triggers such as wall switches, motion detectors and time of day. The way our house is setup, we have a very large sliding glass door leading to the backyard which makes it hard to mount any switch near it. At night we let the dog out and turn the light on for him; if the door was closed, opening the door at night causes the light to turn on. If the door was open like it has been all summer, the light only comes on when the dog passes the outside motion sensor.

Since I’m lazy (why else would I automate so many things?), I wanted an easy way to turn the lights on and then turn them off without getting off the couch. I saw a special on the Aeon Labs Minimote, so I bought 2. This is a Z-Wave remote that integrates into Z-Wave automation systems. This version was an older model that could have its firmware flashed to the new model; only difference being the markings on the buttons and possibly the plastic.

I was quite excited to get these remotes as I’d be able to put one near the couch and turn the outside lights on or off. My excitement was tempered as the version of VeraEdge that I was running didn’t work with the remote. The newer version of the firmware did, but reports were that there were issues with it. So when newer firmware came out, I upgraded my Vera Edge, crossed my fingers and paired the remote. Setup of the remote was quite simple and I assigned “scenes” to the buttons. The remote has 4 buttons and each button responds to a short and a long press giving me 8 possible scenes to run. I setup each button with an on scene (short press) and an off scene (long press) and put the remote by the couch.

Within a few days, I found myself regularly using the remote. The remote responded quickly and I haven’t had any problems with it. I knew I had a hit on my hands when my wife used it to turn the lights off; I haven’t labelled the buttons yet (that’s on my list), but she remembered that I said button 1 was for the backyard lights (button 2 is for the front lights; still trying to figure out what to do with the other buttons).

The remote is powered by a rechargeable battery and I have an Anker charger right next to the couch, so once it is time to charge, I just have to plug it in and won’t have to figure out where I put it.

Pros

• Compact
• Rechargeable
• Easy setup
• Works with the Vera Edge

Cons

• Feels cheaply made; I suspect the newer model feels a little better based on the pictures I’ve seen.

Summary

If you have a Z-Wave automation system, buying this remote is a no brainer as there are times that you want to control some scene, but don’t want to go over to the wall to a hard wired controller or you don’t want to pull out a phone to run an app. The only real problem I have with this is I have no idea what to do with the second one as there are so many possibilities!