INNR bulbs over Sengled bulbs

💡 Lighting
#1

I have a job that required colored bulbs and fixtures installed on a dock, resulting in 10 post lights. I put in Sengled colored Zigbee bulbs and I had issues with some bulbs not reacting properly. I then put a few Zigbee plug sockets around and that improved things but on occasion I would still have issues.

I did some homework on the Sengled colored bulbs and discovered that they are end of line devices and do not have repeaters. That is probably the issue. I also noticed that they generate a lot of Zigbee traffic.

I just put in 2 INNR colored bulbs, which do have repeaters, and they worked perfectly. The other 8 bulbs work much better but if I push them hard (on/off/on/off) then some of the 8 Sengled will not respond.

This is not a request for help but an information post for others who are buying colored bulbs. I have to say the INNR bulbs are great and should be purchased over the Sengled.

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#2

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#3

In general Zigbee 3.0 bulbs make good repeaters. They still suffer from the issue of partially destabilizing a mesh if power to them is cut off.

I’ve switched to using LiFX WiFi bulbs instead of zigbee bulbs. Natively supported, no cloud required, and a very high CRI.

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#4

I never thought about LiFX WiFi. Do they work local or over the cloud?

#5

The Sengled bulbs do not repeat :frowning:

#6

Full local control with Hubitat. If you have an Android phone, then bulb setup requires the cloud. If you have an iPhone, then setup is also fully local.

Other locally controlled WiFi bulbs include YeeLight (built-in integration) and Wiz (community integration).

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#7

Good to know. I am going to work with INNR Zigbee bulbs for this project but will consider those bulbs in future projects.

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#8

I just discovered another advantage with the INNR bulb over the Sengled. The INNR bulb allows you to configure it to turn ON, OFF or Last State with a power outage. I set them to Last State for this application. The Sengled are stuck on "ON after an outage".

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#9

Load of other hidden advantages to them aswell, from my experience if your looking at ZigBee they are your best choice.
They worked with other ZigBee 3.0 device directly for one.

Sunricher for all other ZigBee stuff aswell.

Ajax online is another good one but not seen any "extras"

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#10

I have to agree 100%. The extra money for them is more than worth it.

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#11

I have now replaced all the bulbs with INNR bulbs and I no longer have any failure rate. The reason I post this is to help integrators choose the right product. We do not have the luxury of experimenting while in a customers home. We must have 100% stability and that is why I now recommend the INNR bulb over any other Zigbee bulb.

The particular house has Caseta Lutron, Z-wave blinds (ZRTI) and Homeseer water valves, an ELK M1 alarm system, Zigbee plug sockets and INNR bulbs working with a Hubitat. 100% reliable (with or without internet).

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#12

How did you do that? Using an Innr hub?

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#13

For folks out there using INNR color bulbs, is "Avanced Zigbee RGBW Bulb" still the winner these days for driver/Type?

Ah, now see your edit @danabw - thanks for confirming!

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#14

S/B a setting in the driver preferences. There was some back and forth on this recently w/Sengled bulbs, and some honor this setting and some don't. I don't remember which behaved which way. I use Sengled as I don't want/need any repeating from them, but I only have a few and they are all inside my house so there are zero mesh issues w/them.

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I would not say "always use INNR instead of Sengled" - you could say at a high-level to use INNR if you need repeating Zigbee bulbs for your application, use Sengled if you want non-repeating Zigbee bulbs.

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#15

I'm not using INNR bulbs, I use that driver w/Sengled as it gives me the best results w/those bulbs...they are perfect for me w/that driver. I would definitely suggest trying that driver if you have INNR bulbs.

#16

ahhhh this is not a RGB bulb, just a "white" bulb using the "Generic Zigbee Dimmer" driver that it paired with. Testing now with Advanced Zigbee Bulb and seems to be working better. Thanks!

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#17

I found an older post from Borris that also confirmed that was the best driver for INNR -- it certainly seems like the most applicable fit, so I'll give it a whirl when I set those up sometime in the next couple weeks. Thanks!

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#18

FWIW, Feit purchased LIFX recently so the long-term availability of the LIFX wi-fi bulb line isn't clear at this point, AFAIK. Feit could decide they don't want to keep that product line going...

HOwever, since you can set them up w/local control, and do initial setup all local via iPhone, it's probably relatively safe to "stock up" and put them into customer installations where price is not an issue. As opposed to my house where my wife (child of immigrants and grew up very poor) would sound the alarm "Thirty-four dollars for ONE LIGHT BULB?!?!?! Are you INSANE???" :wink:

#19

Innr doesn't have a color version of their BR30 bulb.. and LIFX is like $40+ a bulb - which means we're into Lutron cost territory here. Would need 8 to replace my existing setup.. :man_facepalming:

Otherwise Innr has great prices and is def worth a look. I might grab a set for our bedroom sconces which are currently Sengled but in the past have been Inovelli (ZW+).

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#20

The INNR bulb is a Zigbee device. I configured it in Hubitat device settings.

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