So, after nothing but issues the last couple of weeks with zwave, including a ghost node and random devices suddenly “failing” and causing automations to break, I’ve come to the conclusion that I just need to move on from the C7. I know I’m not the only one seeing these issues despite being on the latest firmware.
Before I give up, is there a firmware update coming In the near future to fix these issues? I can’t understand why a fairly static zwave network (I haven’t added devices in weeks because I have zero confidence they will work) just suddenly stops working. Maybe I could add zwave repeaters and maybe that would help, but at this stage, it seems like throwing good money after bad.
Version 2.2.4 is supposed to help with a lot of C-7 zwave issues. It has a lot of changes/improvements in it specifically targeted at C-7 zwave in any case - hopefully they fix a lot of issues. I'm optimistic they will.
No ETA on timing for it, though, that I've seen. Could be a day, could be a week, could be a month. Depends on how fast they squash the bugs and get it to a quality that is ready to publish.
I’ve supported Hubitat during their entire journey and want this platform to succeed, but this is getting to the point where I can’t make excuses for it any longer. Being extremely busy at work and not quite motivated enough to move the existing 145 devices off of the C7 (at least not yet), maybe I’ll wait and see what happens with the next firmware. If that doesn’t do it, I think I’m done and will move to another platform.
I still have my old C3 and could fall back to that (at least for Zwave) or even back to SmartThings if necessary. I just need this stuff to work reliably. Case in point, just a few minutes ago - I have a Minimote in my office to control things. I clicked a button on it to turn off a light and........nothing. Earlier tonight, I toggled the Inovelli switch in my wife’s office, which controls 2 other lights from Simple Lighting and.....nothing. I have an Aeon nano switch in the gang box for my porch light. I have it also triggering an automation to turn on patio lights. A decent percentage of the time, the patio lights don’t come on. Other times, there’s a large delay. When it works, it’s absolutely awesome but the wife is not happy with some of these issues and as much as it pains me to say, I had more reliability for these things with SmartThings back in the day.
I bought the C7 a few months ago for the express purpose of consolidating the devices on my C3 and SmartThings onto one hub and taking advantage of the upcoming hub backup service. The migration went pretty well. It all went downhill fast once a ghost node appeared and I had to rip it out because it was wrecking my Zwave network. No ghost node now, but the thing just isn’t stable.
I don't think that is what most people have been seeing. It was pretty bad at first, but the last couple bugfix updates appeared to have made things stable, and much better, although far from perfect.
I wonder if you possibly have a device that is dying, or maybe some particular device is just not playing nice with the Zwave? Something weird is going on there.
I am not sure it is worth a lot of troubleshooting at this point, but it might be worth digging into things a little bit. A fresh set of eyes (or hundreds) on your devices or network might spot something.
I haven't joined the C7 club yet, so I haven't had many of these issues, but there definitely have been "quirks" with the 2.2.3 series. The upcoming 2.2.4 looks promising, from all the hints that have been thrown about around here. Hopefully it is arriving soon.
I am getting this by reading into what staff has said on this board, and by the Zwave firmware update that was rolled out. So take the following for whatever it is worth.
It appears that there were some or many issues with the base Zwave firmware itself. If that is true, some or much of this was out of Hubitat's control. If you follow the Zwave standard, and the standard is wrong/broken/bad then what is the root cause of the fault?
It is almost like Zwave organization was beta testing on Hubitat, and in turn we as users were getting a double blind beta testing or something. Oh the joys of being an early adopter.
I am running into similar issues and come from a similar background.
So far, reboots clear the issues for me and get the system responsive. While not ideal and people have said it’s not necessary, even with no changes, the system becomes unstable and unresponsive for me about every 4-5 days (zwave specifically). I’ve replaced all zwave with zwave plus, doubled the wired devices and added 4 repeaters so at this point I think a weak mesh is ruled out.
There is another post where I ask how to make a backup to a google drive and reboot rule which is not easily done but can be hacked together. I have not done it yet but need to do that and get the hub on a UPS....
BTW - I really wish they would make it a clean and simple option to cleanly backup, copy said backup to an external/internet drive optionally, reboot, reset the zwave antennas (without having to unplug/via software) and restart.
I think there is an issue with chatty S2 devices potentially bogging down the system.. I am experiencing similar issues to yours. Fingers crossed for the next update...
Part of my issue I think has been outdated firmware on my Zen 23/24 V3's... I've updated a few "troublesome" switches and they appear to be working better but have to verify this over the next few days.
I use the Rebooter app to reboot it every Saturday at 3 AM. Maybe I should see if it gets worse towards the end of the end and improves over the weekend.
I only have 1 S2 device which is the Inovelli switch and I did not pair it with S2 security because I know they were having firmware issues at the time. I will say, that switch does seem to have many of these issues in my environment, so perhaps I should look into a firmware update.
I have 7 Inovelli switches to install once the next firmware comes out and is, hopefully, stable. I added another Zwave leak sensor last week and the entire Zwave network went crazy until I rebooted the hub. That simply shouldn't happen of course. But that is what made me hold up on any more devices until we get this resolved somehow. It is frustrating that it is taking so long to get resolved and a progress report would surely be appreciated by many of us.
Coming from a ST environment which had over 230 devices, the Zigbee devices had far more issues than Zwave. Why? Well, one reason is the frequency - I think many of our homes are flooded with 2.4 Ghz interference. 900 Mhz signals have greater range. When I was on ST, I eventually had to replace two of my Zigbee contact sensors with Zwave because the Zigbee sensors just kept dropping. Once I put Zwave there, I never saw another issue.
High-end automation isn't relevant to the conversation. I'm not outfitting a 20,000 ft mansion or I'd be inclined to go another route. If someone advertises that their hub works with Zwave, it needs to work - no ifs, ands, or buts. Zwave was solid on my SmartThings hub. From what I recall, it was pretty solid on my C3 hub. It's only the C7 that has these issues. I'm aware it uses a new chipset and there may be growing pains, but it has been on the market long enough that they need to be resolved.
I'm also aware of the advantages to Lutron, but I'm not prepared to make a wholesale switch yet and it's irrelevant to this conversation and thread. This thread is about the constant zwave issues with the C7.
I'm always surprised about this. Lutron has so many form factors of every device and they don't have one that attaches to their lighting systems. My in-laws were building a house with Home Works and I saw a combo unit. I thought, wow, neat, I wish I could get a smart one for my home. But no, it was just a plain old "dumb" combo.
But anyway, I'm not here to argue if zwave/Zigbee are "good enough" for lighting or not. It is for me, and I have quite complex mode, default dimming settings, and ramp rate configurations.
I send close to a 400 commands to my zwave lighting devices a day, and receive well over a thousand events from them a day (some days 2-3k) - and it works. And works every time.
People can make up their own minds on that topic though.
I'm optimistic they will.
Depends on how fast they squash the bugs and get it to a quality that is ready to publish.
