Has anyone tried plugging their Zooz stick into a powered USB hub? I saw somewhere it solved this problem for them, but haven’t pulled the trigger on buying a powered USB hub yet.
Also I started a similar thread, but I noticed mine related to these specific log lines, anyone see them in their logs too before their controller stops responding?
2024-06-24T13:25:46.157Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:46.197Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:46.280Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:46.575Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:46.681Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:48.399Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:48.448Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:52.251Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2024-06-24T13:25:54.714Z CNTRLR [Node 011] failed to decode the message, retrying with SPAN extension...
2024-06-24T13:25:55.023Z CNTRLR [Node 011] failed to decode the message after re-transmission with SPAN extens
ion, dropping the message.
Are you saying that a powered USB hub fixes the issue on the 7.21.3 firmware? If so I can upgrade my device and test it out since I have a USB 2.0 powered hub.
I just ordered one, it’ll be here later today. I’ll test this theory out - I’m not personally sure I just saw it mentioned in my research. I ordered an Anker, didn’t want to try anything off-brand or less reliable.
Not exactly the same thing, but I’m using a 35 ft USB extension cable that’s powered at the end. I haven’t really noticed any difference since I put the extension in service.
If anything, upgrades to Z-Wave JS have only made things worse for me lately.
I haven’t upgraded the firmware on my ZST39 yet. I just got another ZST39 delivered today for backup in the event of bricking. At this point I’m just chicken. I have like 60 Z-Wave nodes. No matter if nvm restore works or even restoring my SmartStart file, I’m not in a position to spend a couple of days getting everything back to normal.
In terms of you ordering an extra ZST39, doesn’t Z-Wave support a secondary controller? I haven’t tried it but I thought it may do a primary/secondary backup option?
No luck, mine still crashed on the Anker USB hub.
I turned off log to file so I could watch in the UI but didn’t have debugging log enabled, so not much helpful:
2024-06-25 11:54:58.074 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 005] Ready: Zooz - ZEN72 800LR (Dimmer Switch)
2024-06-25 11:54:58.133 INFO Z-WAVE: Next update scheduled for: Wed Jun 26 2024 00:00:00 GMT-0400 (Eastern Daylight Time)
2024-06-25 11:55:19.677 INFO APP: GET /health/zwave 301 3.003 ms - 191
2024-06-25T15:55:28.094Z CNTRLR The controller is unresponsive
2024-06-25 11:55:28.095 INFO Z-WAVE: Controller status: Controller is unresponsive
2024-06-25T15:55:28.095Z DRIVER Controller missed Send Data callback. Attempting to recover...
2024-06-25T15:55:28.377Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload:
0x012800a800000100031a9f038700bae212bd9d7c6a20cc1bb0cda17f72b79fcbb62a1e0200b2
007f7ff7
2024-06-25T15:55:28.419Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload:
0x012800a800000100031a9f038700bae212bd9d7c6a20cc1bb0cda17f72b79fcbb62a1e0200b2
007f7ff7
2024-06-25T15:55:31.287Z DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload:
0x012800a800000100031a9f0388009b7a41dbe74c366969dd863602ed52f2f00900a9814d00af
007f7f84
- So I have an update about the 7.21.3 firmware. I put Z-Wave JS UI in bootloader mode and flashed the ZST39 with the 7.21.3 firmware that way.
- I’ve been running 12 hrs and haven’t had any issues. Since then I’ve also upgraded Z-Wave JS UI to the zwave-js-ui: 9.14.4. I did notice that the devs made some updates to address the controller locking issue.
- Not sure if the issue was resolved by me upgrading to a newer version of Z-Wave JS UI or by me using bootloader mode.
- I wanted to post this information so others could verify.
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Yes they have enabled the hardware watchdog in the controller. Which means if the controller locks up, it’ll automatically restart itself. Since this is new, there’s may be some edge cases that’ll need to get worked out. However, on the surface it seems like a step in the right direction.
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I have my USB dongle centrally located in my attic on the end of a 50ft run of cat5e cable with cat5 to USB adapters on each end and it works great.
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Until it locked up within 24 hours. 
Back to square one.
Sorry about the late update.
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I just noticed that zooz released the 1.40 SDK 7.22 firmware. Like mentioned above, it doesn’t seem to fix the problem though. I didn’t see 1.40 last week when I was looking to upgrade my ZST39’s firmware.
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I upgraded to the 1.40 SDK 7.22 firmware for the ZST39 and after a few days I am having much better results than the other 3 firmwares. It seems to work okay and no dead nodes yet.
Edit: Still having problems with nodes occasionally going dead. Found an automation around here that pings them back to life. I don’t know when they will have a solid fix for this. I’ve let go of expecting anything.
At this point is it worth upgrading? I’m on 1.20 SDK 7.19.3 and don’t seem to be having issues.
That is my view as well. My HA ZWave works well and, having seen so many comments on upgrade issues, for the time being I don’t upgrade the firmware.
If your network is working fine, do not upgrade the firmware. You only upgrade firmware if you are having an issue and the firmware update fixes it. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”
2 Likes
I took the plunge myself recently. My ZST39 was soft resetting maybe 4 or 5 times daily. Keeping my fingers crossed, but for a couple days now I’ve had no crashing or soft resets. With this new found confidence after flashing successfully, I tried to flash my other ZST39, also running firmware 1.2. Well that one went to about 1% and stopped. Brick. I’ve ordered two more figuring at least one will successfully flash. In the meantime, the good one is running great.
I’ll join this club. After running an Aeotec 500+ for years with good reliability, I tried the Aeotec 700 stick a couple of years ago. Disaster, rolled back.
Couple of months ago, thought maybe upgrading to a zooz 800 series would be wise. I think v1.20 was the latest firmware at the time. I have 66 nodes.
After the nvm restore, all looked well for an hour.
Then everything started dropping off like it was out of range. Errors all over, controller with cannot transmit errors etc. Total disaster, even close wired devices went offline (including all my heating controls)
Had to revert back to the Aeotec 500 stick. Immediately everything could be contacted again, although had to reinterview a few devices which messed up during the 800 controller being used.
I’ll happily try the latest firmware again once the majority aren’t still reporting disasters with 800 controllers
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I managed to successfully flash my bricked ZST39 using the bootloader mode in Z-Wave JS UI. Can’t believe it took until last week for me to discover that trick. I’m running firmware 1.40 on two ZST39 controllers now. I put all of the LR capable nodes on one and everything else on the other. Z-Wave hasn’t been this good to me in a very long time.
I can’t remember the last time I saw numbers like that. The only issue I’m having is running two of the same controller. Both controllers show identical
usb-Zooz_800_Z-Wave_Stick_533D004242-if00
Z-Wave JS UI allows me to specify a /dev/ttyACM0 but the Z-Wave JS supervisor addon seems only take the by-id addresses. For the time being I made an automation start the supervisor addon 2 minutes after startup.
FYI, there has been a new firmware release by Zooz that is said to take care of the problems with lockup issue:
" Great news!
Silicon Labs has released firmware 1.50 for the ZST39 800LR Stick, which has resolved the lockup issue in most cases. You can download the file here, and I’ve included the OTW instructions below:
How to Perform an OTW Firmware Update on Your ZST39 800 Long Range Z-Wave Stick
Please let us know if you have any questions!"
I hope this one works.
4 Likes