I have a C5 hub, and all it does it handle Z-Wave and Zigbee devices and I'm having endless issues! The hub itself seems fine, however sometimes some "far" devices will stop working, despite not really being that far
Can anyone suggest a path forward? I would just rip them out and replace with WiFi switches, however these Z-Wave switches are intended to help my Z-Wave deployment so that my Z-Wave Smoke Alarms work well
Even a device 10ft from the hub would work, but had not reported to the hub in 2 weeks. I did 2 Z-Wave repairs, no dice, updated, nothing, did another repair, and now I seem to be in a working place
If I'm having simple range issues, do I just need to add more Z-Wave devices in the middle? Would upgrading to a newer hub make a difference?
I'm using the GE Enbrighten switches, those are the only powered Z-Wave devices. The other devices are smoke alarms which are battery
It's not clear to me if this is a problem or if you are just concerned about the reporting. This alone is not a concern. Some devices do not generate "activity" (events, etc.) on the hub unless there is actually something to report -- so that could be normal.
If there are actual problems: upgrading to a newer hub alone may not solve your problems. However, upgrading to a C-7 or newer would give you more diagnostic tools to get a better picture of what might be going on with your Z-Wave network, and upgrading to a C-8 or C-8 Pro would get you that plus external antennas that might help if it's really a range issue (though I'm not sure I'd say it is given that it sounds like you have repeaters and not much distance in the first place).
A common cause of Z-Wave problems is "ghosts," a broad term often used to mean Z-Wave nodes without real devices behind them, sometimes the result of forced removals or failed pairings, The C-5 lacks tools to show you. A secondary controller might if you have a Z-Stick and a PC or some other way to see this. It can also make the automatic migration difficult if you were planning on using that.
I've had good luck with my relatively new ones (3 years old), knock on wood.
I've replaced all my dumb wall switches with them.
I've heard old ones can crap out, but maybe more overtly, rather than radio.
I think it may help if you could give what number of each device you have, the basic construction of the house (block stick framed, plaster, drywall, etc) how large of an area are these switches spread apart, and whether these switches are in metal or plastic boxes as well as metal or plastic wall plates.
The C8 hubs have external antenna, which possibly may help, in some situations. But if your home has metal wall boxes, metal wall plates, and thick plaster walls, nothing much will help.
Like mentioned above, the C7/C8 hubs have much better Z-wave stats to help diagnose issues.
I am not trying to sell you a hub, because it may or may not help to upgrade. We don't know why you are having issues from the information available. What I am saying that the C5 isn't helping when we can't see what is wrong exactly, and it may be tough to diagnose.
Simply migrating hubs (I.E. mirroring the C5 onto a C8, for example) may bring your issues to a new hub if it comes down to bad devices, ghosts, environment, and so on. Starting over, at least for Z-wave, may be a better option if you choose to upgrade for whatever reason. Again, I would see if the community can run through a few basic steps to see if there is anything obviously wrong.
I think your biggest problem is just a lack of devices that repeat. That appears to be a large area (couple thousand square feet?) with just a smattering of repeating devices.
You can either start adding more switches, which can smarten up other areas of the home, or go for a repeater. The downside to a dedicated repeater is they don't do much except repeat, but you can sometimes place them to get a better signal and/or move them around more so than you can do with a switch.
Oh, and I would suggest either Zooz or Inovelli for switches.
The 2016 "generation" would be 8 years old...I expect you don't likely have any that old if your's are "several" years old. I'm still running some GE switches I did purchase in 2016-17-18 and they are running fine. (I did have some of my oldest fail years back and GE replaced them under their five year warranty.)
If you have the Z-Wave Plus models you're likely fine. I have a house full of GE/Jasco/Ultrapro switches from 2016 up to purchased last year, and they do not (aside from a few of the oldest) randomly die. You really have no need to replace any of your switches unless you do run into a random failure.
And just because, here are a couple threads that give some context to my claim that some era of these Jasco switches are just bad. Not all Jasco ever produced fail like what these posts are saying. Again it is pretty specific to a certain production run. But when they do go bad, they wreck havoc on your Z-wave mesh.
"They" = any repeating device in your Z-Wave mesh. And truly not fun.
I am of the mind that anyone who has one of those older GE switches that still hasn't failed is as safe from it dying as any random electrical device failure. The oldest ones I have that are still around have gone through multiple power otages over the years and are still humming along.
Could the fragility of the z-wave mesh have something to do with the fact that the latest-and-greatest Z-Wave Long Range only communicates directly to the hub?
(That's my impression, anyway.)
So, these are Z-Wave smokes only? No CO?
While I have only one in the garage, it is a modern, battery only-powered smoke/co detector, with a life of, what, 8 years?
I'm new to that game, and don't know the evolution of the z-wave smoke detector.
Perhaps someone else does and can chime in.
How are the smokes powered? Battery. Are they fresh?
I think you should find out what you have.
Maybe take one down, take pictures, and put it back up.
Same for the Enbrightens.
Maybe look at the device page for clues.
The C8's external antenna really made a difference for me, getting a Z-Wave signal out to the end of the driveway
LR and mesh ZW utilize separate/unique frequencies, so LR devices do nothing to either improve or hinder mesh since they don't participate in it at all.
If an LR-capable device was originally paired non-LR and was also serving as a repeater, but then is re-paired LR, that removes a repeater in the mesh. In that case, I guess you could say the mesh becomes more fragile, but that's the fault of the owner's misunderstanding of things (not the LR device).
My point was that z-wave mesh is inherently fragile.
Z-wave bought out a new technology, Long Range, that in LR mode communicates only with the hub and not a mesh.
Perhaps the reason that Z-wave brought out this new technology was the inherent fragility of its mesh.
I think the best place to check first is at the Zwave devices details page and look for ghosts. As I understand it if you have any failed pairings ghosts will wreak havoc. Having a device with a failed pairings and being in the list twice will cause more problems then a device simply not connected as well. If you have devices on the list and you exclude and then re-pair them and they still have spotty device status updates to the hub you likely have a reception issue so more repeaters or better radio on the hub like getting a C8 with external antennas is needed.
Once you have ensured zero ghosts then look at trying to expand your mesh. Zwave and Zigbee will just get more reliable the more devices you have in the mesh. I have 56 Zwave devices of which probably half are repeaters. Of those devices the most heavily used repeater prior to getting a C8 was the Aeotec Siren that wasn't in a electrical box. My general thought is that Switches are ok as repeaters if you have a bunch of them, but when you only have a few there ability to repeat my not be as good as you would expect. Newer switches that are Zwave 700 or 800 will also function better then older models. I use to have 4 Jasco switches. They were the first Zwave switches I bought. They have all but one been replaced with Zooz Switches that are Zwave 700 or better. I did that because there was just some really flaky stuff with my Jasco switches. In generally they did ok, but sometimes they would just quit talking or were slow to respond. They did work though.
As stated by others the C8 has external antennas and greatly improves the communication ability of the hub. The C5 and C7 were ok, but needed a decent mesh to ensure communication if the distance started to get far.
I don't generally agree that the Zwave mesh is fragile per se, but you can get yourself into conditions that make it less then reliable. It is generally related to a device blowing up the Zwave mesh by either failing and spitting bad data, or being a ghost and not participating properly. My mesh with the number of devices I have tends to be rock solid unless I do something kind of stupid like using beta firmware, or loading a device that is known to cause overload.
One bad device can knock out the mesh. It's happened to me.
I personally don't know if Long Range Z-Wave has the same vulnerability, but I'm thinking, edit: and hoping, lol, not.
2 - Light switch that has never had issues
3 - Light switch never had issues
4- Newly added switch, endless issues
5 - Light Switch never had problems
Clearly, if it must be the 4th light switch I added that is causing these problems. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the C5 has zero way of me actually troubleshooting any of these issues?
So, the path forward I think is this
Replace switch 4 with a WiFi Switch
If nothing settles down, possibly get a C8 hub
I'm hesitant to get more Z-Wave switches, since they don't work! My WiFi switches are all flawless
Its frustrating that switches that used to work fine, now do not
