How to best split tasks between R2 and Home Assistant?

General
1

Hi.

I am migrating my home theater to IP control, and I am wondering how I should split tasks between Home Assistant and the Remote Two.

The main example would be starting and/or shutting down the different components like:

  • IP controller power plugs
  • AVR
  • Media player (Nvidia Shield)
  • Blu-ray player
  • TV
  • Projector

For actions like:

  • “Watch Shield on Projector”
  • “Watch Blu-ray on TV”
    …

I currently already implemented parts of it with Home Assistant and Node Red, but it probably could also be done with activities / activity groups on the Remote Two.

Especially when it comes to switching between similar activities, where only the output device or the media source has to change, it seems as if activity groups could make things easier.

How would you proceed?

Thanks.

2

I use a Remote Two to run my AV system and for the most part everything is in Home Assistant and the R2 simply calls Home Assistant scripts. However, the R2 does a good job on Denon AV and Apple TV, so for volume, app control etc. the R2 is used directly. I don’t use any of the IR capabilities of the R2. But as a Home Assistant remote control it is , most of the time, excellent. Still runs into bugs once in a while, but not very often. To answer your specific question, all the startup and shutdown routines are Home Assistant scripts called by the R2.

3

Already on my Harmony I did not create separate activities for watching something either on TV or projector. I created 1 activity with TV and projector included. I start always with the TV and have macros to switch between TV and projector depending on what I like to watch.

The IP integrations which are already there are working very well. Here is a list what is already available:

Ralf