Was using Zooz 4in1 sensors for motion. These eat expensive CR123 batteries about once a month with temperature reporting off. Had a bright idea to use rechargeable CR123A batteries. The sensors still ate batteries but it wasn’t such a hit to my wallet. Rechargeable batteries tend to report 100% then drop to nothing in a day. Those sensors reported correctly but got relegated to the drawer with my other unused smart devices.
Next sensor I tried is the Aqara/Xiamoi/Mija. Bought 4 of them. Two of them refuse to stay connected. The other two are fine.
I have excluded and included these Aqara sensors many many times. When they are not reporting, I start the Zigbee inclusion, press the button on the side of the sensor and then HE says it found an existing sensor. Now the sensor will report motion for a while. Knowing enough to be dangerous, I read my Zigbee mesh might have a problem. Shut down the hub, and disconnected from power for 20 minutes. Powered up the hub and let everything sit for 48 hours, and these doggone Aqara sensors are still flaky. They report motion for a few hours then nothing. I can wave my hand right in front of a sensor that was reporting correctly earlier and nothing is reported in the event log, and no change is seen in the device information.
Using the built in Xiaomi Aqara Miija Sensors and Switches driver. Tried the drriver from Oh-La Labs with no change. For now I am just leaving the lights on.
Any suggestions? Different driver? Another sensor recommendation? Run for the hills?
The WAF is in jeopardy. She can’t just walk in the kitchen or down the hallway and have a light turn on.
Aqara/Xiamoi work best with Ikea plugs for repeaters. There may be other repeating devices that work with them but that's all I've had experience with and for they have worked well for a couple of years.
Aqara are not officially compatible as you should be aware. You need a compatible repeater to have even a hope of keeping them directly joined to HE without dropping. But I can tell you from much experience, they still will drop off on occasion when joined directly to Hubitat. There are ways to use them with Hubitat that is very stable, but it involves using an Aqara hub and either Home Assistant or a HomeKit hub.
IKEA TrĂĄdfri outlets and repeaters are an inexpensive repeater option that is compatible with both Hubitat and the Aqara devices. However, Aqara and Mijia devices are not the same as the listed compatible Zigbee devices.
For an inexpensive motion sensor that works well, check out the Third Reality sensors. They are not in stock at Amazon.com right now, but if you're in Canada like I am, they are available from Amazon.ca
They do pretty well without repeaters, but you should know that all of these wireless device will operate much more reliably with a compatible mains powered repeating device.
Wow! I have 3 of those installed on my C5 and I don’t think I’ve changed the batteries more than once every 12 months… and with all functionality turned on. I wonder what would cause this difference in battery usage…
For the Aquara and Mijia, the Tuya Zigbee 3 signal repeaters also work great and they are very small! I have a lot of those around the house.
So now I get to tell the XYL I need to buy more stuff. Great. Assumed because there was a driver for the sensor, it was supported.
Might be a good idea to change this to why my Zooz 4in1 sensors eat batteries. I have used rechargeable and Duracell 123A batteries. Will go back to alkaline for now because they work, although a bit hungry for batteries. I will put fresh Panasonic lithium batteries in the Zooz and post back when they report low battery (again, assuming battery reporting is accurate)
Just a report of my experiences with Aqara devices. I've ended up with what must be a very stable Zigbee mesh. I started using iharyadi's Zigbee sensor then converted to devices based on TI's cc2530 Zigbee chip. Both were/are compatible with the Aqara sensors. I have multiple Aqara temp/humidity/pressure sensors and multiple contact sensors. I have 3 repeaters placed at various location. The Aqara devices have been operational for > 1 1/2 years with absolutely no dropout issues. I even have one inside my refrigerator.
Battery life is generally 12 to 14 months on the temp units.
Agreed, my first thought is what are your parameter settings causing such high battery drain. Unless you have the very old V1 Zooz ZSE40, I think I heard those has battery problems.
In my case (and quest for reliability) I have gone from Z-Wave to Zigbee (mostly) and Aqara’s motion sensors are my favorites. I have added some cheap IKEA outlets as repeaters and no Aqara has fallen in months.
This was my experience: I have 4 of Mijia light sensors and 2 of the Aqara TempHumidity sensors and have not had an issue with them since I added 2 Tradfri outlets nearby as repeaters.
EDIT: I've not had a problem with the Mijia light sensors. I just realized that both of the TempHum sensors had fallen off my mesh and had to rejoin them today. The light sensors are part of active automations, so I'd have noticed if they went away. Not so with the TempHum sensors. Now I need to wonder why neither Device Activity Check or Device Monitor noticed they were gone.
There are no "built in" drivers - these were written by @chirpy. Exactly which xiaomi or aqara motion sensor do you have?
Just to be pedantic, there is no exclusion/inclusion process for zigbee (it's a zwave concept). You need to delete/remove the device and re-pair. This is generally only needed if you are looking to change the placement of the device as xiaomi sensors don't generally re-route themselves.
What other zigbee devices do you have in operation? How far away from the hub are these xiaomi sensors located?
Losing connection is almost always due to excessive distance from the hub or an intermediate device/router that the sensor does not like (the list is numerous and includes many power plugs, bulbs and other mains zigbee devices)
Alternative zigbee devices are hue motion sensors (excellent but pricey) or sonoff. In the US you do have a bit more choice (eg plenty of used but excellent iris sensors from a certain ebay seller)
I've switched over mostly to Tuya repeaters (@aaiyar will vouch for these too) as these seem to work better then ikea's (the ikeas tend to suffer from poor range) and a couple of home built CC2530 based repeaters (which include a CC2591 RF amplifier) for reaching down the driveway).
Initially I did, too. But they seem to go through batteries (CR2450) really quick: I get 6 months out of them. Same thing with their Multipurpose Sensor. I get about 6 months in either device. Maybe it's the CR2450s I got from Amazon causing the problem.
