I am sorry to hear of your frustrations. If I was experiencing the same problems I would likely feel exactly the same way. My C5 has always just worked, never had much of any problems with it.
I think it is obvious now that they rolled out the C7 without the appropriate testing. I imagine they realize this. What I do hope, is they realize where their testing failed them. I have no idea how they tested the C7 to determine it was ready for consumer release, but hopefully all the testers weren't power users with set-ups that simply do not mimic the typical hubitat installation and device list.
For example, a large number of very active people on this forum implement a Lutron bridge for their lightning. You would think from the number of posts on this subject that 75% of hubitat owners have a Lutron lighting system. It is probably more like 2-3% of hubitat owners have a Lutron lighting system and 75% of very active people on this forum have a Lutron lighting system. Have the testers come from this 75% and there is your problem.
Don't want to pick on Lutron, it is a great lighting system. But I do wonder how they missed all the zwave problems on the new C7?
I am sure this is bang-on. But one would think this would have been the strategy before the release of the C7
Lest we forget, the C-7 was certified by the Z-Wave Alliance. So Hubitat developers certainly did everything necessary to pass certification - which I guarantee you is not easy.
Just goes to show that certification doesn’t translate very well to real world use. But I’m confident that @bcopeland and @mike.maxwell will have this fixed (and soon).
My future plans are to mimic the Lutron method with my zwave switches. By the Lutron method I mean to have one HE hub just to attach my zwave light switches to (primarily from all the same manufacturer) and use hubconnect to connect to another HE hub that runs all my automations. This is essentially what Lutron users do, I would just have another HE hub as opposed to a Lutron bridge.
You may want to try this method, and simply put all your zwave devices back on your C3, have that hub do nothing else but manage your zwave switches. Use hub connect to run the automations on the C7.
Just a suggestion, but is the route I am looking at going.
Or...just use Lutron switches, dimmers, fan controllers, and Pico remotes! They just work!
Yes, I know it is a very costly transition for users with many Z-Wave switches and dimmers. But my home automation systems has never been more stable since I ditched Z-Wave...
I have lots of Pico remotes and a couple of Casetas. Agreed that the Lutron stuff is great, but I’m not willing to swap everything out to Lutron when I have solid devices which worked great on ST and some also worked great on the C3.
Remember that Hubitat is the first hub to ship with the new 700-series Z-Wave chip. There are going to be "growing pains" with these new chips (Inovelli's 700-series switch had them as well), but this is the cost of being bleeding-edge.
FWIW, my C7 is still in the shipping box until the growing pains have passed.....
If that is the solution then you can say goodbye to hubitat as a company. They have no chance of being a competitive hub without a solid zwave implementation. Why? Its simple math:
Determine the total number of devices (excluding virtual) that are installed on all hubitat systems (User 1 x devices + User 2 x devices + User 3 x devices ....)
Now you have the total number of devices hooked up to hubitat for all the hubs in existence.
Fill in the following: Percent of Lutron Devices: ________, Percent of Zwave Devices: ___________, Percent of Zigbee Devices: __________, Percent of LAN Devices: _____________
If anyone thinks the percentage of Lutron Devices would be anywhere near the percentage of zwave devices they are clueless. If hubitat can't offer a solid zwave implementation, I along with many others will for sure leave. The 3-5% of Lutron users will stay and they can go on singing the praises of Lutron.
That can't seriously be the solution. If it is, goodbye.
As usual I am thinking it will take about 6 hours for the same Lutron choir, to chime in and say the solution is to go Lutron.
Rather than give up on the C7 give up on Z-Wave? Like @ogiewon says!
I'm not technical enough to be able to explain it, but Z-Wave just performs poorly compared to competitors. The new 700 series chipset might offer some theoretical advantages. But they are yet to materialize in real life other than easier replacement and battery life. The baggage of backward compatibility, "repairing network", re-pair devices still remains. These issues were prominent even pre-C7. There's a reason that no high-end home automation companies use Z-Wave. Try telling the owner of a $5m house to run a network repair.
High-end automation companies are tending to use 2.4 GHz standards as part of their wireless products. Control4 uses Zigbee, Crestron use some version of IEEE 802.15.4 communication (same as Zigbee). Even Lutron is starting to offer products that use EEE 802.15.4 communication (Clear Connect X).
And, of course, like @ogiewon says, the gold standard in lighting controls is still the Lutron Clear Connect A 434 MHz standard.
Lutron dominates the installations of professional systems vs Z-Wave. Z-Wave is the commodity or cheap option used only when necessary in pro installs. However Z-Wave IS the dominant protocol used in hobby, DIY home automation due to primary factor being widely available and relative cheap cost. Zigbee has been growing which has really been the HE target to dominate because there really aren't many Zigbee hubs. So if you dominate with Zigbee early and people have no other options once they have a house full of devices...well there's nowhere to go to.
Nah I won't say you need to convert to Lutron because of this. Lutron is a better lighting system but it's also an expensive option when you already have a lighting system deployed. There are known and have been known issues with the 700 series chip that are being fixed but the Z-Wave problems and HE go back a long long time.
I really don't think the users on this forum who are continually suggesting Lutron as a solution to zwave issues, realize the damage they are doing to the Hubitat brand.
Consider the following: John Doe is interested in getting into home automation. He does some browsing on the internet and ends up on www.hubitat.com. Once there he sees:
He purchases a Hubitat and based on the advertising and information on Hubitat's homepage he purchases some zwave devices. He then has some difficulty with these devices and decides on posting his problem in the hubitat forums. Within a few hours (often within a few minutes) he sees many responses like this:
He naturally thinks:
Hubitat lied to him
They promote a capability that they do not have, or at least do not have a good implemenation of
If Lutron or Zigbee are the only protocols that should be used for lighting, why was this not stated on Hubitat.com?
All of these very reasonable responses are terrible for the Hubitat brand. It amazes me that people don't realize this and try to help the user solve his problem as opposed to suggesting he get rid of his devices and go with Lutron.
Yeah.. I don't think it's the community users responsible for doing this brand damage. Also to note most if not all of the HE founders and staff all use Lutron and Zigbee and Z-Wave has always been the redheaded step-child of Hubitat.
I think people should research a product before purchasing it. However HE isn't really an expensive product to test the waters of home automation with either. The community posts information here about "What Works" and what has issues, and about problems. This real world information you aren't going to get in the marketing material of most products.
Even a very quick search for z-wave on the community will show tons of posts about problems. Do a search for Zigbee and wow it's mostly roses and rainbows. Search Lutron and the savior has arrived!
Fair enough, I have never had a single problem with any of my zwave devices, but this is obviously not the case for many other users and I probably wouldn't be able to say this if I had bought a C7 and moved everything over.
There are tons of posts about problems with zigbee devices, just search anything related to Xiaomi or Hampton Bay Fan. I agree Lutron almost exclusively gets top rated.
If you agree the problems with the C7 are causing brand damage, who do you think is responsible?
Well this just isn't so, without delving into super specifics.
we have staff with more than 90 Z-Wave devices, mostly actuators
we have staff with more than 100 Zigbee devices, mostly actuators
we have staff with more than 80 Lutron devices, mostly picos
The remainder have mixed networks, mostly Z-Wave in composition.
Currently we don't have any staff running Lutron exclusively for lighting.
I believe I'm the only staff running multiple HE hubs in production...
Looks like you're getting specific.... so keep going.....
Not lighting....
Not lighting....
Oh love the Pico candy!!!
Nobody knows how many "staff" you have or how to evaluate this... nor sizing information so this is not relevant.
I think I remember Bruce was all Lutron, Chuck was all Lutron, Patrick was Lutron with Pico's at least maybe mixed with Zigbee.... well I suppose Patrick and Chuck don't count anymore though.
You're supposed to have multiples along with Bryan as you're doing lots of development. I would think Bruce has multiple for development as well... but I dunno... I know I have multiple of systems for development otherwise I get the "What is going on" from my wife
Bruce is not all Lutron, as I said, no current staff is.
Actuators == switches and dimmers for the most part, so yes the counts I mentioned are predominantly lighting devices.
How on earth could one have a home automation setup with near 100 devices and none of them being lighting?, I didn't think i needed to specify that...
My general point was Z-Wave isn't the ignored Hubitat step child that you claim.
