I purchased an Eve Motion sensor and an Eve Energy plug/switch a week or so ago to use with an iPhone SE, AppleTv 4, and iPad Pro. Both the motion sensor and plug/switch are in my office, with the motion sensor positioned on a shelf overlooking my usual position at the desk and also looking across the threshold into the room, about ten feet away. The plug/switch is located under the desk on the lead that powers the desk lamps in the credenza.
I'm trying to get the Eve motion sensor to turn on the credenza lights, then turn them off 30 minutes later if no further motion is detected. So far, operation and reliability are very low. What's supposed to happen, and sometimes actually does happen, is that when I walk into the room, the Eve motion sensor detects my body heat and then through Homekit turns on an Eve plug outlet controlling the office light. Then after 30 minutes of no further triggers, the Eve motion sensor is supposed to send a CLEAR signal that Homekit uses to turn off the Eve plug and the office light. The two triggers are implemented in the Eve app, and both show up in the Home app on the iPhone. One problem is that the ON trigger looks the same in both apps, but the CLEAR looks like another ON trigger in the Home app. That leads to confusion when using the Home app, and I also think it causes some of the erratic behavior I'm seeing.
For example, if I sit quietly at my desk which is directly in view of the motion sensor, the lights will go out in about ten minutes, not 30. But waving my hands or whole body in front of the motion sensor won't get the lights to go back on, even though the iPhone Home app shows that the motion sensor has been triggered. Other times, I'll walk into the room and nothing will happen. Even when things work correctly, the lights actually take about five seconds to come on. That wouldn't support a scenario where I was walking through rooms hoping for night lights to come on and provide temporary illumination, but it's OK (if it works) to replace the usual stumbling around in the dark trying to find the stomp switch on under the desk to get the office lights to go on.
I have spoken with first level tech support at Elgato and the call was answered promptly by someone here in the US that spoke clearly and understandably, but that didn't have in depth knowledge of the motion sensor and Homekit. I'm hoping for a call back within the next day or two to continue troubleshooting with someone that understands things better. I will update this review based on the outcome of that call.
As a fall back, I went looking for an alternative for the Eve Motion in the Hue motion sensor, but Philips didn't incorporate Homekit into the Hue motion sensor.
11/30/2016 Update - I spoke with Adam Steinberg, VP Customer Experience at Elgato this morning about the Eve Motion and Eve Energy in my setup. He made it clear that Apple's HomeKit protocols expressly prevent direct device-to-device communication, which forces all signals to go through a HomeKit hub such as the iPhone, iPad, or AppleTV4. As such, even if the Eve Motion triggers immediately and reliably, the black box that is HomeKit may not always generate a timely or correct signal to the Eve Energy. My own testing seems to verify this, as the status square on the iPhone for the Eve Motion sensor changes state almost immediately when I walk in front of the sensor, but it's usually 5-7 seconds before the Eve Energy responds. The Eve staff is working closely with Apple to minimize these delays, and Adam said that the current iOS 10.2 beta shows noticeably faster response. Apple hasn't announced a release date for 10.2, but the rumor mills are predicting that it will be sometime in December.
Two days prior to Adam's call, I received email from a 2nd level support person at Elgato with a list of things to check. The note cautioned about performance problems with older iPhones and iOS versions (everything I have is less than a year old and running the latest versions), setting the duration of the trigger so short (~5 sec) that the Clear signal might turn the light off before it had a chance to come on (this one is set to 30 minutes), verifying that the Eve Energy responds to scenes and it's own accessory box (it does), cautioned about running beta versions of iOS (never loaded any), and specifies that Eve Motion is most sensitive to motion across the field of view, and much less so directly into or away from the sensor (the Motion here looks across the door threshold, not through it).
So as of now, the 5-7 second response lag and other erratic behaviors I'm seeing are most likely attributable to issues within the HomeKit environment itself, and are beyond Elgato's reach to remedy. The encouraging thing is that Elgato is heavily engaged with Apple, Apple seems to be responding, and Elgato is also providing timely and good quality technical support to their customers. That can't be said about many of the other so called HomeKit Enabled devices (just check Amazon reviews and sometimes laughable YouTube videos to see what I mean).
While HomeKit so far is much better than the X10 systems I'm most familiar with, it doesn't seem ready for deployment as a full time home control protocol yet. I believe there are still a few missing pieces of hardware as well, such as a wall switch featuring multiple programmable buttons to provide local control of other accessories, a contact closure sensor, a HomeKit controlled relay, and an ambient light sensor. My ultimate desire is to implement a motion and contact closure based alarm system for my home, but until HomeKit response and reliability is improved, I'll have to wait. But at least Elgato will have the sensors ready to implement such a system once Apple had cleaned up HomeKit's rough edges.
| Manufacturer | Eve Systems LLC |
|---|---|
| Part number | 10027806 |
| Style | Eve Motion |
| Item Package Quantity | 1 |
| Included Components | Hang Tap, AA battery (2), Booklet Safety Instructions, Sticker (4), Eve Motion, Quick Start Guide |
| Batteries Included? | Yes |
| Batteries Required? | Yes |
| Battery Cell Type | Alkaline |
| Weight | 0.19 Pounds |
| Length | 3 inches |
| Width | 1.5 inches |
| Height | 3 inches |
| Manufacturer | Eve Systems LLC |
| Item model number | 10027806 |
| Product Dimensions | 7.62 x 3.81 x 7.62 cm; 86.18 Grams |
| ASIN | B01MAV39M8 |
