Harmony hub with Alexa

[mtagt56]

Hello,

I am looking at investing in a harmony hub to work with my smartthings and Alexa!

Has anybody used once of these?

Will I need to have a harmony remote for this to work (surely not).

Can I control all my TVs via Alexa with this?

Can I control my ps4 and sonos? Is there anything else that it will control?

How well does it work?

[lazarustx]

I have a Harmony Hub and Remote and there's very little support the Hub.  Using the skill, I can turn the system on and turn it off.  I don't have any other triggers (Channel Up or Volume Down) since it just isn't worth the effort.

Regards,
Rodney

[TheFallenAngel]

Hello,

I am looking at investing in a harmony hub to work with my smartthings and Alexa!

Has anybody used once of these?

Will I need to have a harmony remote for this to work (surely not).

Can I control all my TVs via Alexa with this?

Can I control my ps4 and sonos? Is there anything else that it will control?

How well does it work?

Logitech and Amazon are currently working on direct support. Personally I can hardly wait!

Cheers,
Alex

[kevb]

You can run Harmony "Activities" through the Echo via several hubs or IFTTT, but direct control of individual devices is limited. Depending on the Harmony hub you buy, you can control 8 or 15 devices (I think). No remote is needed, you can use the free app and your phone or tablet as a remote. If your TVs are IR controlled, the hub will need to be in direct sight or you will need to run IR blasters to each device. With the exception of turning a TV on/off or changing channels, I've found use of the Echo to control the TV to be inferior to a remote.

[Maff]

A Harmony smart hub just needs to be basically nearish your IR devices. The signal bounces off the walls, so you don't need to be in line of site as such. The extra in line blasters are more for if you keep all your AV devices are inside a cabinet door, so you can put the smarthub inside with them, & run an extra blaster outside the cabinet to also control your TV on top. You CAN get Alexa to do specific device commands, rather than starting merely activities etc, but it is a bit of a convoluted setup using multiple services, and an android device as a server. I'm a bit of a tinkerer and got it all to work, but hardly ever use it as there is a bit of a lag. It will be good if Harmony do make it directly compatible, but I hope it amounts to more than just triggering activities.