in today's video we're going to be having a look at Aqara's roller shade driver we're
going to be having a look at what you get in the box running through its very simple setup process
and if you stick around till the end i'll be sharing with you my thoughts and letting you
know if it's worthwhile upgrading your existing drivers to one of these things check it out
what's going on guys i hope you're all doing well before we get started full transparency as always
i was given this product for free by Aqara but i was never paid or asked to create the video
so everything you see in the video are all my own personal thoughts and opinions
so with that said let's get on with the video the roller shade driver isn't a brand new product for
a cara but it is the first time that it's been available in the uk and in the eu after you
finish automating the lights in your house or at least you get to the point that you're happy
with because let's be honest we never really finished playing around with our automations
but when you do get to that point the next thing that you start to look at is automating your
curtains and blinds so we're going to have the blind section of that covered in this video but if
you are interested in finding out about automating your curtains then make sure you are subscribed
below because in a future video we're going to be running through how you can automate your curtains
so the roller shade driver e1 became available in the uk for the first time a few days ago and it
does seem to be going down well with smart home users and Aqara fans i originally created this
video to coincide with the drivers uk launch but the driver sold out of everywhere within a couple
of hours so i decided to hold the video back the driver is now back in stock in the uk and you can
pick it up from amazon for just under 60 pounds if you're not sure what this thing is essentially
it's a device that retrofits onto existing blinds whether it be a chain or a string and it allows
you to automate them you just simply attach the driver to your blinds and it instantly turns them
into smart blinds the drive is compatible with a wide range of different smart home systems
and also voice assistance so once you have it connected to your blinds you'll be able to make
use of your amazons and your googles and you'll be able to say things like hey open the blinds
now it does look like they forgot one system from their list oh yeah home assistant assistants
so you can add the driver directly into home assistant and then you'll be able to control it
and make use of it in your various automations the roller shade driver is a certified zigbee
product and it utilizes the zigbee 3.0 protocol if you're a home assistant user you can connect
to the driver directly by making use of zha or zigbee to mqtt now at the time of recording this
video the drive is currently not compatible with decons but i'm imagining it will be in the future
if you're in a car or user you'll need to add the driver to your Aqara hub in order to make
use of the full functionality and alternatively if you're an Aqara user and a home assistant user
you can add the Aqara hub into home assistant you can do this by making use of the homekit
controller which will allow you to access any of your car and devices within home assistant
you can view relative bits of information such as the battery life and also perform actions like
open and close out of all the integrations that the driver is currently working with
the home kit controller is the only one that's able to display the battery level at the minute
but i imagine over time zha and zigbee to mqtt will also get this feature you can use the driver
in any of your home assistant automations and if you're a node-red user you can also use it in that
using the Aqara home app you can write quick and simple automations to do things like open and
close the blinds at various times of the day or you can combine it with your other Aqara products
so you could combine it with a button and then on a button press it could open or close the blinds
so you've got three choices of control for the driver you can control it with your voice
you can control it with your Aqara home app or whatever home automation system you're using
whether that be home assistant or something else or you can make use of the two physical
buttons on the front of it so one to open and one to close the drive is battery powered
so you can't have a full wireless setup but if charging up your blinds isn't your thing
you can't optionally leave it plugged in to constant power and if you're not first about
having to charge up your blinds then you'll be happy to know that the driver features a usbc port
based on controlling your driver once a day so opening them and closing them
a car estimate the battery life to be two months but this is gonna vary depending on the size of
your blinds and the weight of them okay let's have a quick look at what you get in the box
inside the box you'll find some instructions as well as some double-sided 2m tape you'll also
obviously find the roller shade driver at the top of the driver you'll find a removable cap
and just underneath that you'll find a gear that's used to pull your blind string or chain on the
back of the driver you'll find the removable wall plate which the driver just slides nicely onto
and on the bottom of the driver you'll find the usb-c port which is used for charging and also the
reset button on the front of the driver we've got a very simplistic two button control you've got a
button to open the blinds and a button to close them in addition to the gear that's already on
the driver you also get three additional ones so you should have one that fits your style of blind
chain or string you then also get some screws and wall plugs and a usb-c to usb-a charging cable
so that's what's in the box now let's have a look at the setter before you actually go about doing
any kind of setup there's going to be two bits of plastic that you need to remove from the gears
cover now i think that this is a bit of a strange design choice and i haven't seen any official
reason for why this is like this but i think it's because you can have the blind driver in different
orientations so there's actually a couple of different tabs that you can actually break off
breaking the tabs off is very simple and they do just bend off but it can leave a bit of a
jagged edge which you may want to rub down the installation process for the driver is very
simple you've got two different choices you can make use of either the 2m tape that's provided
or you can make use of the screws and wall plugs as i'm in the process of moving house
i opted for the 2m tape and i've had this stuck on the wall now for a few weeks and it's super
secure and not budging anywhere you'll need to find the tension point in your blind string or
chain and the simplest way of doing this is to just put the driver on it and press the buttons
if you get it in the right spot pressing the button should make the blinds open and close
once you find that point you can attach the wall plate to it and then just freely slide the driver
onto the plate once you've got that in position you can move on to the device pairing which
is just an absolute breeze especially when you compare it to some of the drivers on the market
for example take the xemi smart driver which was actually the one i was using prior to getting
this one functionally it works perfectly and as expected but in order to actually get it into that
functional working state it is a bit of an ordeal both the setup process and the instructions for
that driver are very poor but it's not all doom and gloom and it does actually have a couple of
benefits over the Aqara driver and we'll be coming back to that a little later on the pairing process
for the Aqara driver is super simple you'll just need to link it to your existing Aqara hub and
once you've linked it there you'll just need to set the upper and lower limits for the blinds the
Aqara app holds your hand and guides you through setting those limits and once those limits are
set you can just open and close the blinds freely if you don't own a car or hub but you want to add
it to your existing zigbee network like with home assistant then you can do that instead of pairing
it with the Aqara hub you'll instead pair it with your gateway solution so zha or zigbee to mqtt
once that's paired you'll have full control over opening and closing your blinds and you'll also be
able to view the battery information of the device and as i mentioned at the beginning of the video
if you are in a car a user so you do make use of the Aqara app and the Aqara hub and you're
also a home assistant user then you can actually link the two together using the homekit controller
so you can control your Aqara devices with home assistant to wrap this up then let's have a quick
look at some of the things that i like and we'll also directly contrast this with that semi smart
driver that i spoke about earlier first of all i really like the size of the driver it's smaller
than the semi smart one and i actually prefer the top that's got the rounded edge as opposed
to the rectangle with rounded corners the Aqara driver is actually also much quieter than the zemi
smart driver for me personally this isn't an issue because i have it on the landing so i never hear
it anyway if that's a factor for you if you have it in your bedroom or something like that then
that's one thing to take note of something that i noticed which i probably wouldn't have without
putting both drivers side by side is that the Aqara driver is a bit more grey than it is white
so in comparison the Aqara looks a bit off-white compared to the zemi smart one which is white
the next thing that i really like about the Aqara driver is the fact that it utilizes usbc
the xemi smart driver utilized its own proprietary dc connector which was actually very annoying the
thing that makes it annoying is the inconvenience of having to go and find this particular cable
so these devices don't need to be charged up for several months so during those several month
period the wife would have done some tidying up and hidden the cable so you then got to
spend time going to have to find this cable just to charge up your blinds another thing
that i really like about the Aqara driver is the fact that the reset button is in fact a button
and it's not a pinhole button so what are the benefits that i said the zemi smart driver had
the first one is the fact that it utilizes three buttons instead of two so you've got the open and
close button and you've also got the stop button this can be useful if you're not making use of the
app and you're just manually controlling it with the buttons and you want it to set at a stop point
the next one is the fact that it comes with a remote now this one's not going to be for everyone
some people care about having a remote some people don't i personally don't care about having the
remote because you've got the inputs but it's an optional thing there if you want it the xemi smart
driver also has two different modes of speed in comparison to the Aqara's one the xemi smart mode
are fast or slow and this affects how quickly or slowly the curtains or blinds open and shut
and the last one for the zemi smart driver is the fact that the wall plates got little adjusters on
so the little adjustment notches allow you to change the tension of your blind's chain or string
without actually having to take the plate off the wall this can be useful when you're actually doing
the installation as you have to just get it in more of a general area than rather than getting
it perfect and there we go that's been a very quick look at the Aqara roller shade driver e1
so would i recommend getting this driver if you currently don't have a driver and you're
looking to start automating new curtains and blinds then i would definitely recommend it
if you've got an existing blind driver and it's working well and it's reliable then i can't really
see any reason why you'd want to swap unless you're really unhappy with your particular one
at the end of the day it's a blind driver with its primary function being to open
and close curtains and blinds if i could make one suggestion for an improvement for the Aqara driver
it'd be to include a solar panel some competitive products that are a similar price offer one of
these so it'd just be nice to have if you're currently automating your curtains and blinds
then let me know in the comments below what tech you're using also let me know what you think of
the Aqara driver are you planning on getting one if you've enjoyed this video don't forget to drop
me a like and if you're not already hit that subscribe button and ding dong the notification
bell you'll then be alerted to any future video that i do as always a massive thank you
to these awesome dudes these awesome dudes are my patreons if you're interested in helping support
my channel and becoming one of these awesome dudes then there'll be a link to my patreon in
the description below thank you for watching and I'll catch you in the next one. Cheers!