Hi everyone,
I wanted to just share my experience with these two Zigbee coordinators. Now, of course this is just my experience with my network and my environments and my devices. I have read and watched many videos regarding the SZLB – 06 coordinator and about how great it is and I was curious so I did purchase one. Now I must say right off the bat the management interface for flashing and for configuration was very nice. It was web base and getting it up and running was amazing.
However, for me, there was a massive difference between the link quality of the exact same devices in the exact same locations between the SZLB – 06 and the Sonoff dongle the difference in quality was about 30-40% different. The same devices would show a link quality of 150 to 180 with the Sonos dongle and a link quality around 80 and 90 with the SZLB – 06 dongle.
Now both devices do have their latest firmware and the same configuration when it comes to power transmission. I do understand that many people are saying do not pay attention to link quality, but this post is really about the connection strength, and the quality when using and comparing the two dongle. Space.
I would be curious in hearing others experiences and opinions, of course but for me here the Sonoff dongle was the clear winner when it comes to seeing the strength of the link quality .
You are comparing apples to strawberries. The db measurement scales would need to be calibrated.
IE take db’s on one device for 10 recievers scattered around for both and compare them. Use one as the standard and scale them to be on the same scale, like currency conversion. Then see if one drops off more than the other.
If you want to compare, measure things like how many devices it controls, is the mesh stable, etc.
SLZB devices run circles around Sonoff USB dongles for so many reasons in my opinion. Don’t get me wrong, the Sonoffs are good!
If you can relocate the ZigBee dongle away from interference without the need for an extended USB cable attached to your HA’s physical device, its not a fair fight.
The SLZB UI, Ethernet capabilities and the ability to add additional SLZB routers in your Ethernet network convinced me to switch.
I started with a Sonoff P and E but eventually converted them to repeaters.
The Dongle-E uses a Silicon Labs chipset, de SLZB-06 uses a Texas Instruments chipset.
These 2 chipsets calculate LQI in a different way, and a Silabs chipset will always show a higher value.