Will a Zigbee adapter act as a Zigbee extender?
No, the Zigbee-Adapter is the coordinator.
If you need to expand your zigbee-network, you will need a router or an AC powered device acting as a router.
I've a router in my zigbee-network based on CC2530 + CC2591
Thanks. Thought that was the case, just wanted to check. Once we are allowed out again, I'm planning to get a couple of Ikea Zigbee devices that will act as extenders - cheaper than the Drayton Wiser ones. Eventually I'll get one of the adapters as well but I don't really need that at the moment since the Wiser controller controls all of the Zigbee TRV's & I have plenty of remote controlled wifi and 433MHz plugs.
As I posted above I'm testing the Sonoff ZbBridge, in this network I use Moes-devices as routers:
Hi
I use wemos D1 mini's, with tasmota firmware and DS18B20 sensors connected ( up to 8 can be connected to a single pin i think!). You need to flash the wemosD1 with the tasmota-sensors.bin. I personally use "The Tazmotizer" for this as you can enter all the Wi-Fi and MQTT Credentials after flashing. reboot it and it will be there on your network. I have several of these all over the house, monitoring boiler flow and return, Hot water tank temperature (top middle and bottom) Hot water flow and secondary return. hot water tank primary flow and return......etc. I am a heating engineer so i made several 'portable' ones with two sensors on, that can be clipped to radiator pipes in several different rooms to make balancing heating systems easier. You could use any ESP based unit flashed with tasmota. Sonoff Basics are good, as they have the power supply built-in, but are a bit lacking GPIO pins. and the Sonoff TH series, has a 3.5mm Jack already built in, for the sensors to plug in. so you shouldn't need to solder. To connect multiple sensors, simpley paralell them all up, each one has its own unique ID which will be part of the MQTT topic apearing in Node-Red.
Every thing you need to know is in the Tasmota wiki. Hope this helps
Chaos.
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To be clear, it isn't a question WIFI (ESP, Tasmota) vs. zigbee devices,
IMHO it depends on the use case.
Generally I use the DS18B20 with AC-powered devices.
(ESP8266 like wemos/lolin, Sonoff, Shelly). I tried all of them but what I like most is the Shelly 1/1PM with the temperature sensor Addon.
I don't use WIFI-devices with battery.
I use the zigbee-devices for single temperature, door/window, motion, vibration, button (all with a cell battery).
aren't all the zigbee devices wireless? Not using WiFi but still wireless...
Concerning the data transfer they are wireless, I mean every device needs power (AC or battery).
WIFI devices need more power than zigbee ones, so the zigbee-devices can operate longer with a small cell battery, there are also AC-powered zigbee-devices.
Hey @cflurin I am curious which devices you use & how long these cell batteries last. Very interesting.
Xiaomi/Aqara are really a good choice.
I use:
https://zigbee.blakadder.com/Xiaomi_WSDCGQ11LM.html
https://zigbee.blakadder.com/Xiaomi_DJT11LM.html
https://zigbee.blakadder.com/Xiaomi_WXKG11LM.html
https://zigbee.blakadder.com/Xiaomi_WXKG02LM.html
The cell batteries last approx 2 years.
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Thank you very much for the links. One last question if you dont mind, would you recommend a zigbee gateway? router? or whatever would be required to get up and running (I currently have no zigbee devices & unsure of what is needed)
PS, sorry if I am hijacking the thread everyone (this is at least tenuously related to the topic 
)
Yes, it's Off topic, sorry about that.
I would start reading the doc on zigbee2mqtt.io
See my post above about zigbee-adapter
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I use a USB dongle connected to a Raspi Pi. (CC2531 Zigbee2MQTT Firmware with Antenna - 15 quid from Amazon UK, ready flashed). You may also need a USB male to female lead so that it can be positioned away from the Pi.
Runs with Zigbee2MQTT & MQTT on the Pi.
I like it because the Xiaomi Aqara Smart Temperature Humidity Sensors are teeny-tiny, so accepted by SHMBO.
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Recognise you have used the Texas Instruments CC2531 to interact with the devices; assumed to be plugged via usb into your old Raspberry Pi 2, then your using the zigbee2mqtt as your protocol exchange.
Is there an ethernet version that can be configured to communicate with the devices? If so has anyone any recommendations?
Thanks,
Ant
Probably there are some coordinator-devices working over ethernet, never used.
An option is the sonoff zigbee bridge (zigbee <-> wifi):
But I prefer the zigbee2mqtt solution, there are more benefits, one of them is the practical frontend:
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