Problems with one of four Third Reality door sensors

Configuration Zigbee
1

I bought a four-pack of Third Reality 3RDS17BZ battery-powered Zigbee door sensors from Amazon. I use a Sonoff Zigbee 3.0 Plus (not the E version) as the coordinator in a Zigbee mesh of about 120 devices. Most of these devices are plugged in to wall power and work as routers. I use the ZHA integration for Zigbee.

Three of the new door sensors paired up without complication and look like this in their respective device pages:

The last sensor had some kind of issue during initial pairing. I had to remove the device and start over. No matter what I do it ends up looking like this:

The binary sensor is called “IAS zone” instead of “Opening” like the other devices. The battery level sensor says “Unknown” instead of a number, and the firmware version doesn’t appear in the top-left Device info box.

The firmware in the box labeled “Configuration” says “Up-to-date”, but when I click the firmware button for more info, a modal pops up that says:
Installed version: unknown
Latest version: unknown

I can live with a mis-named entity, but the non-working battery level sensor and the inability to track or update the firmware are problems.

I have tried removing the device by clicking the three-dots menu and selecting “Remove”. I restart Home Assistant and then re-add the device, but it comes back this way. One of the times I removed and re-paired the device it re-populated without the three-dots menu, so I couldn’t remove the device.

I removed all references to this device in core.device_registry, core.entity_registry, core.restore_state and then rebooted the Home Assistant machine. I was able to pair the problematic sensor again, but it still only partially works (mis-named entity, non-functional battery level sensor and firmware management).

What do I do here? The other three sensors are installed, so I don’t want to take them down and send the whole pack to Amazon. Is there some way to “really, I mean it” delete the device from ZHA?

2

Did you replace the battery with a brand new battery that checked have good voltage?

Obvious question but you did not say if tried re-pairing it again with a new battery.

Also follow these best practices tips → Zigbee networks: how to guide for avoiding interference and optimize for getting better range + coverage

3

I bought a four pack of these and ended up returning them. In general I like ThirdReality and use quite a few of their products but found the door sensors to be very unreliable and had issues with them dropping off and never reconnecting to Zigbee - which defeated the security usefulness of the devices. I tried replacing the brand-new batteries, re-pairing them and even pairing them directly with the Zigbee controller and it just never worked right. I ended up putting in Fibaro Z-Wave sensors on all my windows and Ecolink Z-Wave sensors on my doors and it’s been rock solid.

So far these and their automated shades are not only the ThirdReality exceptions I have tried that have been problematic but in both cases the worst home automation devices I’ve owned, and I’ve owned hundreds.

In general I’ve found the Zigbee battery operated devices to be a bit iffy for me, with the exception of some ThirdReality Temp/Humidity sensors that run on AAA batteries, my experience has been that Zigbee battery devices have a harder time keeping in communication with HA than Z-Wave across the board. YMMV, but that’s been my experience.

4

Forgot to say that you should definitely first pgrade to the latest Z-Stack Zigbee Coordinator firmware if you are using ITead’s “Sonoff Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus” (model “ZBDongle-P” based on Texas Instruments CC2652P - ITead's "Sonoff Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus" (model "ZBDongle-P") based on Texas Instruments CC2652P +20dBm radio SoC/MCU as later Z-Stack Zigbee Coordinator firmware have many bug-fixes → Z-Stack-firmware/coordinator at master · Koenkk/Z-Stack-firmware · GitHub

You should just need to factory reset the device and then delete the device from inside ZHA UI.

Then the standard procedure for troublesome devices is just to try re-paring it over and over again. See → https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/zha#best-practices-to-avoid-pairingconnection-difficulties (and related steps here → https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/zha#how-to-add-support-for-new-and-unsupported-devices)

Tthat assumed that you are already following the best practices → https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/zha#zigbee-interference-avoidance-and-network-rangecoverage-optimization

Again, suggest start by replacing the battery and make sure follwing best practices before trying to re-pair the device again and again → Zigbee networks: how to guide for avoiding interference and optimize for getting better range + coverage

I too prefer Z-Wave for battery-powered devices, but I have had some problems with such as well :stuck_out_tongue:

5

What’s the process for that? I replaced my Sonoff dongle last week because I feared maybe my old one bit the dust (now I’m 50/50 on if it was that or something else) and I did get the P version and my old one is a P version as well. I would like to try upgrading my old one’s firmware that’s 18 months old and see how it goes and if it doesn’t require jumping through hoops then do the “live” one that’s on there now and keep this as a backup (maybe even a second for zigbee2mqtt).

Same, but far fewer and they generally resolve after a while of finding the right network path.

6

I’ve had really flaky service from a bunch of Aqara door sensors I have sprinkled through my house. They always pair up nicely, but the battery life is nowhere near what I would like. The battery level reporting is not accurate/not helpful on them either.

I decided to try out the Third Reality door sensors because I’ve had good results with the company’s power monitoring smart plugs and because these door sensors use AAA batteries. The AAA batteries make the sensor unit bulky, but I don’t care. Third Reality has also done the legwork to make battery replacement easy.

The Aqara sensors require a little flat screwdriver to remove and are pretty easy to reinstall backwards.

The door sensors I have had EXCELLENT results from are the units from YoLink. They use Lora. The range is incredible, the readings are extremely reliable, and they use AAA batteries. I have a YoLink sensor in my pickup and it can send readings back to the base station from well over a mile away.

I would have my house filled with YoLink stuff if only the company offered some local reading/control. As it stands, all sensor readings go into YoLink’s cloud infrastructure and then back to my Home Assistant box. This makes the readings slower than Zigbee and also means the hardware is all junk if YoLink goes out of business.

I’m also curious about upgrading the dongle’s firmware. Here is how it appears in my setup currently:

I’m not entirely sure where to get new firmware from or how to install it. Some of my devices are stuck in some difficult-to-access places, so I don’t want to do anything that would require me to dig them all back out to re-pair in the event of a problem.

7

My experience as well. I have 2 temp/humidity sensors whose batteries are down to less than 50% after just about 10 days and when they go off line I have to press the little button on them to get them to go back online again. I still have the packaging and am strongly considering sending them back.

The very thing that got me hooked on ThirdReality, I have about 30 of their smart plugs that I use for nothing other than power metering because they are cheap and reliable.

Why I don’t use anything that is cloud dependent, for this very reason.

I found a video of it being done, I just don’t know if it actually screws up HA if you do this after you paired 73 devices :flushed:

8

Flashing firmware image update is easy today, you just need to first stop the Zigbee application using it or temporarly move the dongle to different computer, there are different tools for flashing, see → ITead's "Sonoff Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus" (model "ZBDongle-P") based on Texas Instruments CC2652P +20dBm radio SoC/MCU

Then it sounds like both you guys also have problem with EMF interference and/or not enough Zigbee Router devices, so make sure read and follow this → Zigbee networks: how to guide for avoiding interference and optimize for getting better range + coverage

Battery drainage is a common symtom of EMF interference and not having enough Zigbee Router devices.

9

Do not worry, both the ZHA integration and Zigbee2MQTT does automatic backups of the Zigbee network if using Texas Instruments based adapters so you can always restore from backup if something would go wrong.

10

My issue is not routing, of that I’m certain. I’ve been very precise with my mains powered routers with both Z-Wave and Zigbee to ensure proper coverage. It’s possible there’s interference but I have multiple Zigbee battery devices and the only one that sucks power like this is the Aqara.

11

I have Zigbee smart plugs spread out all over my house.

I did look at my server and the dongle in the basement. There was a 6’ USB 3.0 extension cable connected to the back of the computer. The other end of the extension cable was connected to a bus-powered USB 3.0 hub. There was also a Z-Wave.Me dongle connected to the USB 3.0 hub.

I put another 6’ USB extension cable between the USB hub and the Zigbee dongle. I specifically used a USB 2.0 cable this time. I think I used USB 3.0 stuff before because 3.0 tends to have better power delivery than 2.0. I also added a 6’ USB 2.0 extension cable between the USB hub and the Z-Wave dongle.

At some point the misbehaving Third Reality Zigbee door sensor straightened itself out. The Device information page now looks exactly like the other three. The battery level sensor works and the firmware information is now present.

I don’t know if the sensor unscrambled itself first or if that happened after I revised the USB cabling, but in either case, things are working better.

I have been experiencing a weird thing with some Philips Hue bulbs that would randomly blink twice for no reason when they were turned off. I had always assumed it was a Philips-specific issue. I searched and searched but never saw anyone else complaining about it with Hue bulbs.

After posting this thread and reading responses, I changed my search terms to ZHA and blinking bulbs and found threads mentioning a variety of bulb types. The constant in those threads was advice to get the Zigbee coordinator away from other RF emitters. So maybe the cabling change will also fix that.

I had also been struggling to push firmware updates to some of my Zigbee devices. After changing the cabling almost all of the devices that weren’t “accepting” the firmware updates took firmware updates on the first try.

12

That’s an interesting cable solution, I might try that and see if my updating works. I never thought of running from the computer to the powered USB hub over an extension cable and then again an extension from there to the dongle. I have the hub plugged into the computer and 6’ extensions running from the hub. USB cables are pretty cheap, it is an easy test, thanks for the idea!

13

Well, it isn’t all sunshine and roses. I saw one of my Philips Hue Zigbee bulbs flash last night. The door sensors that are the main topic of this thread work fine though.

I’m going to try flashing the firmware on my Zigbee dongle. I have an extra one that I will try first.

14

I flashed the firmware on my spare dongle without issue. I then flashed new firmware onto the unit in use. There were no problems.

I still get some random flashes from the Hue bulbs. It seems like less often, but I can’t say for sure.

15

I’ll try to add an extra extension to my system and see if my results mirror your own

16

That exact problem and scenario is covered and explained in the guide I already linked to → Zigbee networks: how to guide for avoiding interference + optimizing using Zigbee Router devices (repeaters/extenders) to get best possible range and coverage

…including reference to this whitepaper → https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/327216.pdf as well as to this blog post → 2.4GHz Intra-System (or Self/Platform) Interference Demonstration - Unit 3 Compliance

Always use a long shielded USB extension cable to get it far away from all other electronics/appliances or electricity, and if your computer does not have a USB 2.0 port then the recommendation is to connect to buy a powered USB 2.0 hub, (yes you can alternatively just use a USB 2.0 extension cable as that will also convert it to USB 2.0 but the shielding in cables made for USB 3.0 is much better and it is hard to find USB extension cables with good shielding so it is more practical to just buy any long shielded USB extension cable and simply connect it to powered USB 2.0 hub or directly to a USB 2.0 port if your computer has one).

Zigbee interference avoidance and network range/coverage optimization

Interference

Before you get started with Zigbee, or at least before starting troubleshooting any issues with Zigbee, you should be aware that all Zigbee devices, and especially the Zigbee Coordinator, can be extremly sensitive to EMF interference, and practically all sources of Electromagnetic Interference (EMI, also called Radio-Frequency Interference or RFI), are infamously known for sometimes leading to serious Zigbee transmission/reception loss or connection problems. Therefor you should always take the actions suggested in this guide to avoid keeping any sources of EMF/EMI/RMI interference close to the Zigbee Coordinator adapter or vice versa!

Symptoms

Symptoms of radio and electromagnetic interference commonly show themselves as reoccurring intermittent failures and errors when sending or receiving Zigbee messages/signals and can cause anything from significant communication problems to weird issues and random degradation in performance that either permanently or temporarily prevent devices from communicating properly with the Zigbee Coordinator, or sometimes even completely block/stops all Zigbee communication.

Sources

While Wi-Fi routers and WiFi access-point are probably the most well-known sources of interference, you need to understand that all electric devices/appliances, especially computers and computer peripherals, do generate electromagnetic interference (also known as EMI/EMI/RMI, or signal noise in layman’s terms) , which can jam or interfere with signals transmissions on the 2.4 GHz radio band frequency, and degrade the wireless communication with your Zigbee adapter/devices.

For example, interference from USB 3.0 ports and unshielded USB peripheral cables are especially infamously known to affect 2.4 GHz radio reception for low-power/low-bandwidth devices. Therefore you should always place your Zigbee adapter far away as possible from any potential sources of EMI/EMI/RMI, preferably by using an adequately long shielded USB extension cable connected to a USB 2.0 port.

Home Assistant posted a video to clearly show Zigbee’s symptoms with electromagnetic interference:

Demo: Zigbee interference caused by USB 3.0

1 Like