Lighty with or without a SmartKnob: what you get and what you miss

Lighty also works without a SmartKnob. Your push buttons switch and dim, and the protection functions stay active. That makes a good starting point and a safe fallback in case the SmartKnob ever fails.

Much of what makes Lighty special only comes with the SmartKnob, though. Here you can see honestly what works without it and what you miss.

At a glance

Feature	Without SmartKnob	With SmartKnob
Switch and dim at the push button	Yes	Yes
Fine dimming from 0.1 to 100%, flicker-free	Yes	Yes
Protection functions	Yes, with fixed default values	Yes, freely adjustable
Which push button switches which light	Fixed: push button 1 switches channel 1 and so on	Wired push buttons stay on their channel, you decide which channels form one light. Wireless push buttons are freely assignable
Mixing colours	Only roughly by hand, channel by channel	Yes, any colour
White light from warm to cool	No, warm white and cool white are two lights	Yes, as one light
Scenes	No	Yes
Automations	No	Yes
Control from your phone (dashboard)	No	Yes
Double tap: all lights off	No	Yes
Wireless push buttons from Häfele	No	Yes
See the consumption of each light	No	Yes
Store brightness and colour	No, after a power cut every light starts at 100%	Yes
Updates with new features	No	Yes

What works without a SmartKnob

• Switching and dimming at the push button: a short press switches, press and hold dims. There is nothing to set up.
• Up to five push buttons: with Lighty Extension, each push button switches its own channel. You can connect several push buttons in parallel per channel, for example at the door and by the bed. Without Lighty Extension, a single push button only switches channel 2.
• Light quality: even without a SmartKnob, Lighty dims from 0.1 to 100%, silently and flicker-free.
• Protection: fuse, over-temperature, over- and under-voltage protection and reverse polarity protection keep working, but with fixed default values.

How the push buttons respond in detail is explained in "Lighty without a SmartKnob".

What you miss without a SmartKnob

Colours and white light

Without a SmartKnob, every channel is a light of its own. With an RGB strip, one push button switches red, one green and one blue. You only get a mixed colour such as a warm orange roughly, by dimming several channels one by one by hand. Warm white and cool white also stay two separate lights.

With the SmartKnob you mix any colour, and warm white and cool white become one white light that you set from cosy and warm to as bright as daylight. One push button then switches the whole light in exactly that colour.

Scenes

A scene switches several lights at once, just the way you like them. For example cooking with a bright kitchen and a dimmed ceiling, or evening with only the ambient light. You create a scene in about two minutes and call it up with a single tap.

Automations

The SmartKnob has its own sensors, including presence and brightness. That lets your light react by itself. An example: it is after 10pm, it is dark, and someone comes into the vehicle. Instead of the bright ceiling light, a soft red night light comes on at 1%. Once nobody is there any more, it goes off by itself. A sunrise to wake up to, where the light slowly gets brighter over several minutes, also runs on the SmartKnob.

Control from your phone and on the SmartKnob

With the SmartKnob you control every light on the dial or in the dashboard on your phone, tablet or laptop, with no app at all. Every light gets its own name there. Without a SmartKnob, you only have the push buttons.

Double tap for all lights

Tap a push button twice and every light in the vehicle goes off, including those on a second Lighty or on Ampy. Your goodnight switch with no extra wiring. Because it switches several modules at once, it needs the SmartKnob.

Wireless push buttons, no cable needed

You mount the battery-powered wireless push buttons from Häfele wherever you need them, with no cable at all. They only work with the SmartKnob, and not just during setup but all the time. Without a SmartKnob they do not respond.

Which push button switches what

Wired push buttons stay tied to their channel, with or without the SmartKnob: input 1 is R, 2 is G, 3 is B, 4 is WW and 5 is CW. With the SmartKnob you decide in the dashboard which channels belong to one light, for example warm white and cool white as one white light. Its push button goes on the input of one of these channels. Wireless push buttons are freely assignable with the SmartKnob, even to other devices such as the water pump at the sink.

Consumption and settings

Lighty measures current. With the SmartKnob you see in the dashboard what each individual light uses, and you set fuse values and voltage protection to suit your lights. Without a SmartKnob, fixed default values apply that you cannot change.

Storing brightness and colour

With the SmartKnob you store the brightness and colour each light comes on with, even after a power cut. Without a SmartKnob there is no stored value, and after a power cut every light comes on at 100%.

New features by update

Lighty gets new features by update, and you install it through the dashboard. That runs on the SmartKnob.

Who is Lighty without a SmartKnob enough for?

Without a SmartKnob you are well served if you have single-colour light, want to switch and dim your lights at the wall and would like to start small.

You should plan in the SmartKnob if you have coloured light or white light from warm to cool, want scenes and wireless push buttons, or want your light to react by itself.

Good to know: nothing you do now is wasted. Everything you connect now stays exactly as it is. If the SmartKnob comes later, you simply pair Lighty with it, without pulling a single new cable. Then create a light widget in the dashboard and switch on Push button in it, and your push buttons switch again.

If the SmartKnob ever fails

Even with a SmartKnob, your lighting never depends on a single device. If the SmartKnob fails, your push buttons keep switching and dimming, just as you set them up. More on this in "What happens if the SmartKnob fails?".