SONOFF ZBMINIL2 not working well with SONOFF ZBDongle-E + ZigBee2MQTT?

Hi,

I have about six light switches ZBMINIL2 (and plan more), which have issues with ZigBee2MQTT & ZBDongle-E controller: the switches work, but every few minutes they leave the network and reconnect immediately.

Interestingly, all of the ZBMINIL2 eventually connect to router TuYa TS011F_plug_1 and work just fine. They seem to prefer the TuYa router even that the link quality is lower (50) compared to link quality with controller (190).

Just wondering: could this be because of experimental support of ZBDongle-E by ZigBee2MQTT?

If so, I would probably undergo the manual migration to ZHA, whose support for the controller is supposed to be stable.

If it may be a weird hw issue, I just live with it as is and possibly buy more TuYa plugs for routing.

I think it might indeed be because the E variant of that dongle was only in ‘experimental’ support with Z2M, but works fully with ZHA. But that info might be out of date.

See:-

I think it might indeed be because the E variant of that dongle was only in ‘experimental’ support with Z2M, but works fully with ZHA. But that info might be out of date.

To the best of my knowledge, support is still indeed “Experimental” for the EZSP-based sticks with z2m. I recently tried to move from ZHA on Conbee II to z2m on ZBDongle-E but had so many issues that I ended up with z2m on Conbee II.

I’ve ordered a Dongle-P and will reflash my Dongle-E (x2) with Router firmware and put them in a couple of strategic places around the house to improve mesh coverage.

I hadn’t used z2m before, but won’t be going back to ZHA as the feature set is richer on z2m.

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Sorry to hijack the thread, but I have been searching everywhere for an answer.

I have the opposite issue: The Sonoff ZBMINI-L2 will only connect to the coordinator, even though there are plenty of Sonoff repeaters nearer with a much better link quality.

The signal to the coordinator is so weak that the switch will often go offline and never come back.

I have no experience with binding in Zigbee2MQTT. Any thoughts on whether I could force a connection to a repeater?

I’m using a Sonoff coordinator.
/dev/serial/by-id/usb-Silicon_Labs_Sonoff_Zigbee_3.0_USB_Dongle_Plus_0001-if00-port0

I’m using a variety of Sonoff, OSRAM, and LEDVANCE plugs as repeaters.

While adding to network, try “permit join” to the repeater/router only rather than to “All”. Anyway, the devices later tend to re-connect to routers or coordinator as they see fit. Not sure, if a device can be locked to a particular router.

P.S. As I am the OP: after a year, I have 30+ devices in network, the same controller Dongle-E (EZSP) and router TuYa plug and newly another router IKEA L2112 (LED strip) and Z2M.

None of my ZBMINIL2’s connect to Dongle-E till today - luckily, TuYa plug router can handle all 15 of them.

Aquara magnets seem to be fine with either controller or TuYa / IKEA routers. Overall, the network is stable and responsive. (Apartement of cca 130 sqm, brick and concrete walls.)