Replacing CC2531(zigbee2mqtt) with Sky Connect (ZHA)

[edwineve]

Bought a Sky Connect recently. My old configuration was a Raspberry Pi4 with a CC2531 stick with Zigbee2MQTT.

I plugged in the Sky Connect, installed it with ZHA. Over a few days, moved all my devices by repairing them to ZHA. Stopped Zigbee2Mqtt.

This all worked perfectly, the connections even seemed faster.

Now I thought, I don’t use the CC2531 stick anymore… so I can plug it out… result was that some devices became unavailable, and I could not pair any device anymore. Rebooted, Hardware rebooted, etc, nothing seemed to help.

Until I plug the CC2531 back in… and everything works again.

What could be causing this?

[Hedda]

Probably coincident in combination with interference being the real culprit and reason why can not pair, read and follow → Guide for Zigbee interference avoidance and network range/coverage optimization

Slightly off-topic; Tip! Can convert CC253x sticks into Zigbee repeaters by flashing it with Z-Stack Zigbee Router firmware (then using in a USB-charger for mains-power) so can pair it after that. See ex:

• https://community.home-assistant.io/t/use-cc2531-as-a-router/339804/
  • https://github.com/Koenkk/Z-Stack-firmware/tree/master/router/Z-Stack_3.x.0/bin
  • https://donnlee.com/2020/06/26/cc2531-router-operations-zigbee/
  • https://www.zigbee2mqtt.io/advanced/zigbee/05_create_a_cc2530_router.html
  • https://ptvo.info/cc2531-based-router-firmware-136/

[edwineve]

Thanks for your advice, I will try a longer and shielded cable first.

I still don’t understand why plugin out CC2531 stops my entire zigbee network and pluggin it in starts it immediately. While I installed ZHA with my SkyConnect stick…