Good but past time to make improvements – MyQ Smart Garage Control Review

2018.05.24 Set-up: - MyQ Smart Hub 2nd generation - HomeKit Smart Bridge Ours is set up in conjunction w HomeKit. Re. Smart hub: - was unresponsive when car was in garage; relocating it solved issue. - From my setup I can see that too few folks at Chamberlain eat their own dog food. The instructions were needlessly complicated while missing simple explanations for things like connection ports and buttons. - Much time and patience was wasted on what should be a pretty easy set-up. Chamberlain desperately needs to do some clinics aimed at improving their instructions. Re. Door Sensor: - Chamberlain should save money on the built in push to test battery feature and instead have the sensor report the battery strength in the app and possibly in each notification but at minimum in special warning notifications as the battery approaches empty. (Include the battery TYPE in these so owner mustn’t search or guess.) Re. notifications: - from both Apple Home and Chamberlain are missing key info. They tell the when, where, what, but fail to tell WHO. - Who opened/closed door? Name the person from their phone name, or something else, but tell me if it was triggered by Chamberlain or Apple Home app automation. (This wouldn’t save calls between family members of “who moved door?” Re. Chamberlain App: - I created notifications that after door is opened, every 10 minutes an open door notification comes. Problem is, the label in the app is not attached to the notification. I don’t know if this is the 10 minute or 30, 30, etc. warning. - Of all the notifications I set up, after saving them and then coming back into app, they are jumbled. This makes it very difficult to get overview. Re. HomeKit interplay: - I was rather hoping that by buying the HomeKit Bridge, this would take over all connectivity to the WiFi network. Instead there are parallel connections. From a security standpoint, I have much more confidence in Apple’s security protocols than in those of an IoT product vendor. - I’d like a way to have all functionality run thru HomeKit, i.e. connectivity and notifications. Re. General support - very disappointed that Chamberlain does not seem to have an active continuous improvement process. So many of my complaints and suggestions are reflected in very old comments from previous posters. Yet the chance to improve hoes unheeded. Summary: I have a 2-star rating because I think Chamberlain made a good start and got a 60% solution but has really failed to gather the low Hanging fruit to get to an 80% solution.
Review by Robert Huebi on MyQ Smart Garage Control.