While the ‘smart hub’ has fallen out of favor recently as smart assistants take over, there are a few companies that still produce quality hubs, and Samsung is one of these manufacturers. The Samsung SmartThings line is the company’s line of smart hubs and sensors, and most recently a decent mesh Wi-Fi router system, and everything’s on sale for 20% off at the Microsoft Store at the moment.
While the traditional smart hub isn’t on sale, we’d honestly recommend you consider the Wi-Fi mesh system anyway, and especially if you’re using a lot of smart home devices. All those connected devices are going to require good connectivity to work well — and mesh systems are the best way to achieve it.
If you live in a small home under 1,500 square feet, the single pack option for $100 will work just fine, but larger homes will need to purchase the 3-pack, on sale for $230 (and also a dramatically better deal per device).
From there, you’ll want to choose sensors to outfit your home with. While there are quite a few available, we’d most recommend the Multipurpose Sensor, which is a contact sensor that is used to detect the opening and closing of things like windows and doors. They’re on sale for $16.
Next, you’ll want to pick up smart plugs to turn devices on and off automatically, which are on sale for $30, and motion sensors, on sale for $20. This will give you a good basis to start and you can build your smart home out from there.
Samsung’s SmartThings is standards-based, which means you don’t necessarily have to buy Samsung sensors to use them in your setup. Almost any device that uses the Zigbee or Z-Wave wireless communication standard will work, and you can use this site to find out if SmartThings officially supports its use on the platform. (We’ll also note that a substantial hacking community has formed around SmartThings, and many have gotten just about any Zigbee or Z-Wave device to work, but it voids your warranty).
This latest deal is only one of many smart home-centric ones we’ve seen in recent days at the Microsoft Store: Tuesday we covered a great deal on LIFX’s innovative Tile light, and there are a few others on the site itself. The fine print says that Microsoft guarantees the price until June 23, however they’re also “while supplies last.”
Looking for more savings? We’ve found laptop deals, Chromebook deals, MacBook deals, and Memorial Day sales.
