Ah I must’ve missed that while reading through all those. Indeed, Device Ready shows No. I’m using Z-Wave JS (not the MQTT one). At first I thought the Re-Interview was completing, but looking at the logs again yeah it looks like it indeed doesn’t complete (getting stuck on querying node info):
08:34:01.968 CNTRLR [Node 017] Beginning interview - last completed stage: None
08:34:01.969 CNTRLR [Node 017] new node, doing a full interview...
08:34:01.971 CNTRLR » [Node 017] querying protocol info...
08:34:01.979 SERIAL » 0x0104004111ab (6 bytes)
08:34:01.980 DRIVER » [REQ] [GetNodeProtocolInfo]
payload: 0x11
08:34:01.984 SERIAL « [ACK] (0x06)
08:34:01.986 SERIAL « 0x0109014112960001010133 (11 bytes)
08:34:01.988 SERIAL » [ACK] (0x06)
08:34:01.990 DRIVER « [RES] [GetNodeProtocolInfo]
payload: 0x129600010101
08:34:01.995 CNTRLR « [Node 017] received response for protocol info:
basic device class: Controller
generic device class: Remote Controller
specific device class: Portable Remote Controller
node type: Controller
is always listening: false
is frequent listening: false
can route messages: false
supports security: false
supports beaming: true
maximum data rate: 40000 kbps
protocol version: 2
08:34:02.000 CNTRLR [Node 017] Interview stage completed: ProtocolInfo
08:34:02.001 CNTRLR » [Node 017] querying node info...
In poking around, the best advice I have seen is to do the Re-Interview and continually wake the remote up by using the join or blank button (underneath the cover). I’ve gong through a few cycles of Re-Interview and keeping it awake and nothing yet. I recall reading it can take several go rounds (which means it takes several minutes to do). I’ll report back if I have any luck.
To make sure, how long does re-interview last? I was getting flashbacks from those Lost episodes about having to constantly press a button before something bad happens I was doing that for at least 15 minutes after firing off a re-interview. Alas, I never saw the process complete though I understand it might be a bit finnicky to get this right.
It can take a few seconds to a few minutes, depending on the device. Locks, for example, seem to take a long time. A battery device that goes to sleep could take hours or days unless it’s manually woken up. I would suggest watching the driver logs and seeing if you are actually waking up the device, it sounds like it might not be happening.
It’s definitely waking up - I can see the button presses in the Z-Wave JS logs. Those are both very consistent and speedy as well. It’s the communication over to HA that seems to be the problem (which I suspect is related to not fully being able to re-interview the device - I haven’t seen that fully complete in the logs yet)
AHA!! Ok yep. I wasn’t holding the button down long enough. The 3 second hold immediately caused the interview to complete (even though it had been waiting to interview for at least an hour). And now “Device Ready” is Yes AND I see events in the event view! Woohoo!
For other folks, while there’s blueprints for the minimote, my config predates all that stuff and I kinda prefer the old school way of doing it (I know HA is moving further and further away from using the configuration yaml files but I really enjoy them). Anyways I thought I would prefer another example on how to use the Minimotes with the newer Z-Wave JS stuff:
Just some hints for those that also had the same problems as I did when converting to zwavejs from the old zwave integration…
Try as I might, I could never get the Aeotec Minimotes to complete their interview process. Perhaps if I woke them up by pressing and holding the “Join” button for 3 seconds, that would have done the trick? But I didn’t learn that until later. So I removed the devices and re-added them, and they completed the interview process during that process. (Though I had to try a couple of times with one of my 2 Minimotes…)
Then I had to go through the process described to set the modes for the 4 buttons. I had forgot about needing to do this until I discovered this post. These setting must have been cleared when I reset the Minimote to re-pair it.
These devices work really well… once they’re working. Otherwise, these seem like fairly crappy z-wave devices as compared to the 30 others on my network. Oh well, the pain seems to be over by now…
The one bit of information that seems to be missing is how do you wake up the device? Until I had read it here in this posting, I didn’t know that pressing and holding the JOIN button for 3 seconds was the way to do this. Had I known that previously, maybe the Interview process would have completed and I could have avoided the re-pairing?
Thanks @kan84, years later, for your very helpful post.
I don’t have the issue of joining but Converting the buttons. I can’t seem to finish that process and every time I think I have completed it, it doesn’t work. I have 4 of these remotes and it would be awesome to keep using them. They were flawless on my Hubitat, as long as I kept them charged lol.
By “converting”, do you mean setting the modes for the buttons? That took me a few tries to get through the process, but eventually succeeded. You might try pressing the “JOIN” button under the slider to keep the remote awake while setting the mode.
And yeah, the batteries don’t seem to last very long. I think the ones that I got were the first version of the minimotes and old stock. I ended up buying replacement LiPo batteries and soldering them in, which improved things a bit but a few years later, they seem to be getting “soft” again. Seems like I need to charge them every couple months?
So, I got them online, I even got buttons 1-4 and the “mode” to scene. I have done refreshes, pushed the join button for it to pull the config from the remote and it all looks good.
However, Not a SINGLE button press is registered in the ZWave2MQTT logs or even dev mode sub to zwave_js or zwave_js_notification or any of the other ones I have seen. The debug mode does show the remote when I wake it up (holding for 3 sec) but there is something else to mention.
Look how fast the system is putting the device to sleep, not sure it matters though:
2021-12-20T19:02:56.643Z CNTRLR « [Node 074] received wakeup notification
2021-12-20T19:02:57.645Z CNTRLR » [Node 074] Sending node back to sleep…
So Im lost what to do at this point, just sell them with my hubitat since I have pretty much moved away from that, or if there is anything else to try? To be clear, I have them paired (done this multiple times and yes interview complete), buttons 1-4 and controller mode (250) is scene mode.
This is running on an dedicated NUC Hassio build using a (Homeseer Zwave USB - Silicon Labs Z-Wave 500 Series Controller ACC-UZB3) everything seems to work except these. Any other ideas to kick around I haven’t run across I’m willing to try, if can’t get them going prob just package them with sale of the hubitat.
aside from the 5-8 mine looks identical to that. So I’m not really sure either. I have 4 of these and they all seem to be reacting the same. I can add it, get them into scene mode, just weird nothing is coming though the debug which is odd - On any of them, when I hold the learn for 3 seconds it does stream a bunch of info, but no button does anything after that.
For other folks, while there’s blueprints for the minimote, my config predates all that stuff and I kinda prefer the old school way of doing it (I know HA is moving further and further away from using the configuration yaml files but I really enjoy them). Anyways I thought I would prefer another example on how to use the Minimotes with the newer Z-Wave JS stuff:
Late to the part here, but with this being the last release of using the old zwave integration, move to the new integration your post was what helped me getting the minimote working again.
THANK YOU @kan84! I’m relatively new to HA and just added a Z-Wave/Zigbee stick yesterday to migrate my SmartThings devices to HA. I have two of these minimotes that were just sitting in a drawer unused for years because most of my devices were not in SmartThings. I added them to HA fine but couldn’t do anything with them until I found your post here. That worked perfectly for me, and now I can control ANY of my smart devices with these remotes. REALLY appreciate your detailed response here.
I was doing that for at least 15 minutes after firing off a re-interview. Alas, I never saw the process complete though I understand it might be a bit finnicky to get this right.