Various communication errors, but only on certain devices?

[palacekeeper]

I've got more than 50 z-wave devices added and working on my ISY994, and for the most part they work fine. There are several that I had to bring closer to the controller in order to add, and there are a few that seem to work, but they don't seem to respond back to the controller. And lastly there is one that doesn't work at all unless it's very close to the controller, and even then it's not totally reliable.

I've read and reviewed lilyoyo1's tips and tricks which were generally helpful, but I was wondering if i could get some more suggestions on how to strengthen the mesh network, especially since there are plenty of active devices.

Update neighbors doesn't seem to do anything to help from what I can tell. I've also tried the Repair option, which once in a while brings one back from ! to the lightbulb icon.

I also tried adding the Aeotec repeater v7, but that actually seemed to make it worse. A bunch of devices started having communications problems. It's certainly possible that I didn't optimize it correctly, but the directions were very minimal.

1. Is there a way that I can just tell the whole mesh to heal or recalculate? Or is update neighbors the only way?

2. Is there a recommended repeater or multiple repeaters that I should consider? I don't mind spending some money to make it more reliable, but just need to know what is actually going to work.

Thanks!

 

[asbril]

35 minutes ago, palacekeeper said:

Is there a recommended repeater

I  have about 80 Zwave devices in my network. A lot depends on the brand that you are using. Generally I prefer Homeseer and GE/Jasco, though recently I have added Zooz devices.  I have become less positive on Inovelli devices, thoug sometimes they have features that other brands do not (yet) have.

If you have 50 devices, and if most of these are non-battery, then you should not really need repeaters, as all non-battery Zwave devices function as repeater as well.

What is the device that gives you grey hair ? (What brand ?).

 

[palacekeeper]

Well I'll been building the network for several years, and initially had all the devices on my alarm.com controller. I migrated most of them over to the ISY over the last year or so. 

As far as brands, I have a variety, but most of the ones I've bought recently are GE. The ones that are giving me trouble are an outdoor Honeywell outlet (but I have several and only one has an issue where it works but doesn't send confirmations) and also two that are GE - one is a wall outlet and the other an in wall dimmer. For both of those I have many others of the same brand and type that work fine, which is why I'm thinking it has more to do with the network than the device brand. But that is just a hunch at this point because I'm not sure of the best way to diagnose the actual reason they aren't communicating well. 

[asbril]

50 minutes ago, palacekeeper said:

Well I'll been building the network for several years, and initially had all the devices on my alarm.com controller. I migrated most of them over to the ISY over the last year or so. 

As far as brands, I have a variety, but most of the ones I've bought recently are GE. The ones that are giving me trouble are an outdoor Honeywell outlet (but I have several and only one has an issue where it works but doesn't send confirmations) and also two that are GE - one is a wall outlet and the other an in wall dimmer. For both of those I have many others of the same brand and type that work fine, which is why I'm thinking it has more to do with the network than the device brand. But that is just a hunch at this point because I'm not sure of the best way to diagnose the actual reason they aren't communicating well. 

As you have several of the same Honeywell devices, have you tried to exchange locations and see if you may have a defective one ?

[palacekeeper]

I could try swapping two of the outdoor outlets (Honeywell). I also tried moving the controller from the basement in my server/network area to the home office. At first it seemed like the problem was fixed, because the outlet in the laundry room that almost never worked started working. But then, the same ones seemed to have problems again after I tried controlling them from the mobile app. I don't think it would be related to the mobile app itself because when I got back to the java app on the computer it has the same issues. 

Today I tried the repair links option on the "bad" devices and that didn't seem to do anything, although it appeared to run successfully.

Edit: The other thing is that the ones that have issues do seem to work for the most part, except that I get the "bad message" error but yet still works. When that happens the console and mobile app don't show the status (on/off) yet it still managed to work. It's like the message makes it but the controller doesn't know it.

It does seem like it is slightly better with the controller on the first floor, which makes me think it's still a signal strength issue. 

Is there any way to increase the signal and/or antenna strength on the controller itself? Mine doesn't have any kind of visible antenna like on a wifi device...

Edited October 15, 2021 by palacekeeper
adding additional details

[palacekeeper]

I was reading some other threads and it does seem like there used to be an antenna but it was removed from more recent models and was not very effective. So I'm guessing the increased signal strength idea is a dead end.

Regarding the other question about the network mesh:

1. Is there a way that I can just tell the whole mesh to heal or recalculate? Or is update neighbors the only way?

[lilyoyo1]

13 hours ago, palacekeeper said:

 

1. Is there a way that I can just tell the whole mesh to heal or recalculate? Or is update neighbors the only way?

Update neighbors is the only way unless. 

[palacekeeper]

Update neighbors is the only way unless. 

Sorry did your answer get cut off? You were saying, unless?

Thanks


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[lilyoyo1]

Just now, palacekeeper said:

Sorry did your answer get cut off? You were saying, unless?

Thanks


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I meant to delete that. But i was going to say unless you downgrade your firmware which presents it's own set of issues do not something I'd advise

[palacekeeper]

Oh okay thanks. Are there any ways to verify the causes of issues in the logs? Error interpretation etc?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[lilyoyo1]

14 minutes ago, palacekeeper said:

Oh okay thanks. Are there any ways to verify the causes of issues in the logs? Error interpretation etc?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Not that I've seen. The logs can only say what happened not why. 

From the looks of things I'd say environmental. Not every house is great for rf based devices. 

If it's always the same devices, I'd look to see who the neighbors are to those devices as well as the location as stated earlier. If you take a device that works all the time, swap with a bad one and update the neighbors. What happens? If the good device continues to work in the bad location and the bad device continues to have issues, then you'll know it's the device. If the behavior stays the same in the location, then you know it's environmental

[palacekeeper]

Not that I've seen. The logs can only say what happened not why. 
From the looks of things I'd say environmental. Not every house is great for rf based devices. 
If it's always the same devices, I'd look to see who the neighbors are to those devices as well as the location as stated earlier. If you take a device that works all the time, swap with a bad one and update the neighbors. What happens? If the good device continues to work in the bad location and the bad device continues to have issues, then you'll know it's the device. If the behavior stays the same in the location, then you know it's environmental

Thanks I’ll definitely try that. Ordered some new devices, easier than removing wall dimmer for the test. I can try the swap with the bad outdoor outlet that is portable. Thanks much for the help!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk