Plug Repeaters, Repeating Status

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1

Do the various Plug Repeaters such as the ones from ST, Sylvania and Ikea ALL repeat the ZIGBEE signal when the plug is switched off?

I know the ST repeater also has a Z-Wave repeater functionality, and that the Z-Wave repeating functionality is only there when the plug is switched on...

Thanks in advance
J

2

The zigbee router functionality of a plug is not affected by the on/off state of the switch. By definition all routers must be 'always on' devices.

This should also apply to any SmartThings repeaters, be they Z-Wave or Zigbee , AFAIK. What particular ST device are you referring to that only repeats when it's controlled switch is turned on? I have a SmartThings branded outlet, but it is Zigbee.

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3

The ST device is a 3210-L. The Z-Wave repeating functionality a) required a special driver to be enabled/controlled under ST, and b) I am 99.9% sure Z-Wave repeating functionality was only operative when the plug was switched on. Assuming I am correct, there is no reason to believe the device behaves differently under Hubitat.

The main issues is the Zigbee radio repeating regardless of on/off state. And if they all do so (knew the ST one did so), I'm good. Thanks!

J

4

That's the Iris V2 Plug model number; I've used it on ST and Hubitat.

Details of Z-Wave repairs (visible in logging on the IDE on ST) show that it participates as expected in a Z-Wave repair without loading a special driver for the Z-Wave repeater function: include the 3210-L's Z-Wave repeater (via the quick 8 button press within a couple of seconds method) in ST, initiate a Z-Wave repair, the new Z-Wave node is shown in the IDE logging; repair should/will complete successfully. Unplug it from the wall, do another Z-Wave repair, you'll get a failure message calling out that same node (cause its unplugged from the wall). Plug it back in, initiate another repair & it will complete successfully. That's how you can tell it's working in the Z-Wave mesh (well, that, and it should actually extend your Z-Wave mesh assuming you don't have one of the early firmware versions that had Z-Wave issues; that has been discussed in several old threads on the ST Community). You can also try this (repair with the plug plugged in) and you can see that it will complete successfully regardless of the 'on/off' state of the plug.

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5

This is incorrect. The Lowes Iris 3210-L outlet (made by Centralite) repeats for Zigbee and Z-Wave Plus all the time, regardless of whether the Zigbee controlled outlet is on or off.

Now, getting both the Zigbee side and Z-Wave Plus side to pair with Hubitat (or SmartThings) can be challenging. The Zigbee portion is simple. Pairing the Z-Wave repeater side is a bit of a pain. Hubitat has built-in drivers for both the Zigbee and Z-Wave sides of the 3210-L. I have about 6 3210-L's paired to my HE hub.

As for the question regarding mains-powered Zigbee outlets... Yes, they pretty much all repeat, all of the time. However, some are good repeaters and some are poor repeaters. There are numerous threads that discuss which devices make for good zigbee repeaters.

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6

@GatVlieg Securifi Peanut works really well and not expensive. A little larger than most but still allows lower outlet to be used.

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7

Thanks for all the replies guys.

J