I have two identical Zigbee devices bought from same vendor at same time. These are door open sensors from Sonoff SNZB-04. Both devices are connected to Zigbee smart plug - exactly this one:
One of those devices (door open sensor) is working perfectly fine. Second one stops reporting its state every day or two. And if I open it and close dozens of times in short period it can even stop reporting it’s state after 10 minutes. What helps is to either reboot smart plug to which it connects or remove battery and put back in the door sensor itself.
So one identical door sensor works fine from month now being connected to the same smart plug while other door sensor constantly stops reporting it’s state.
However tho - if I move this failure door sensor so it can connect directly to gateway (instead through smart plug) it works perfectly fine. You may say that this is a fault of smart plug itself but as said another identical door sensor works just fine being connected to mentioned smart plug from month now. I even bought boths sensors at the same time, on same auction and got delivered in one package. Any ideas?
Sadly you might find, just like have & many others in this forum too, that these Sonoff SNZB sensors (03 & 04) are shit. Sometimes they work, sometimes they dont. I’m phasing mine out because of this exact same kind of issue.
In total I have 6 Zigbee devices. Signal is strong there according to visualisation. I don’t get it why once device connected to this plug works while other not.
Might be Nickh66 have the answer. I do not have any SNZB sensors, hence no real expierence and the devices might be less optimal.
The LQI numbers are somewhat artificial, hence you can not conclude you have a strong working mesh based on this.
Your devices, how many are mains (powered and working as routers)? Only one? Can they all see each other? Are the coordinator on a long USB extender cable? Which zigbee coordinator, and are the firmware upgraded to latest version?
Remember, it might be to no avail, if the devices are not good.
Device mark as red is SNZB sensor which is failing. Device mark as green is identical SNZB sensor which is working just fine. RED device is failing only when connected to WIFI plug which you can see on picture. If I move RED device closer to coordinator and let him connect directly to coordinatior then it’s working perfectly fine. Other end-devices (battery devices) on picture are also SNZB sensors also working perfectly fine. So in other words this RED SNZB is failing only when connected to WIFI plug (instead coordinator) while other device GREEN is working fine with WIFI plug. Doesn’t make any sense.
Coordinator is CC2531
EDIT: I do not know firmware versions since ZHA doesn’t allow to update firmwares and doesn’t even show firmware version of devices. Actually it was my different question in different thread called “How to check firmware version of devices in ZHA”. Got no answer
Was thinking about it but didn’t done that yet. According to my visualisation screenshot I will try to swap RED device with GREEN one and will see what will happen. Indeed GREEN is closer to WIFI plug but still signal is strong for RED one. Anyway will swap it and observe.
OK - so I didn’t switched devices but turns out this is signal strengh issue… however very wierd. Previously I was restarting either zigbee plug or door sensor itself which worked. Today I just took the sensor closer to zigbee plug and it also started working. Then I took it back to the original place… and it still works!!!
If this is signal issue then why restarting zigbee plug or sensor helps?
If this is signal issue then why after moving it closer to zigbee plug and then moving it back to place it normally operates it still works?
Another complete nonsense. Zigbee is a wierd thing.
Some days before I tested another thing. Moved 20m from plug - works, 25m works, 30m doesn’t work. So I started moving back 25m - still doesn’t work, 20m - still doesn’t work, 15m works again.
Maybe I’m not physicist but this is not how radio waves works.
Translating it to human language it works like this:
Zigbee plug: I talked to you whole day but your signal strengh is so weak that I decided not to talk to you anymore.
[You move sensor closer to plug]
Zigbee plug: OK - now I can hear you clear and loud. We will talk again
[You move sensor back away from plug]
Zigbee plug: OK - I was listening to you for few hours now because I thought you speak clear and loud again. But seems like again you talk like moron. Won’t talk to you anymore.
Before i started to have bulbs in my zigbee network, I was not having a lot of mains. I was having some similar issues with 2 sensors outside the house. I just got 2 additional aqara plugs, and put them into the network. They were cheap and works well. Others mention the IKEA range extender is also working well.
Probably will. This problematic sensor is actually on my garage door and I would actually need another plug in garage which would extend my mesh there.
Good thing is that now I know it is signal issue. Strange tho it works this way. However that explains why restarting zigbee plug solves the problem. Probably plug saves information about week signal of end-point device in it’s RAM and once restarted it simply “forgets” that, so again tries to talk to this end-point device (sensor) until again comes to conclusion that “this device has to weak signal to talk to it so I will simply ignore it”.
