What happens to a zigbee power outlet that is left unplugged for a few months. Does it lose all its memory and have to be re-paired again, as a new device? I am asking as I wish to place some inline switches on the power cords to some convector heaters that we put away in the summer - as they seem to be safer for more hungry appliances like heaters.
I routinely have zigbee devices unplugged for extended periods of time and have no issues plugging them back in. They pickup where they left off.
1 Like
It would be far better for your zigbee mesh to unpair them before putting them away.
3 Likes
Then I have to keep making new devices and changing them in my rules 
While unplugging a zigbee outlet can effect the "mesh" I've never had issues in the years I've been doing it. Your mileage may vary. You could also opt for using zigbee outlets that don't have repeater function.
It would be lovely if that was a configurable option!
The settings relevant to the mesh are retained in non-volatile memory of the paired device. Even if the device forgot them, just resetting the device and putting your Hub in pairing mode would quickly recover them.
It shouldn't hurt a Zigbee mesh to remove a router temporarily unless it's the only means of bridging to a portion of it. In that case you'll lose connectivity to the devices at the periphery and plugging it back in will quickly resolve the problem.
4 Likes
I have also asked Frient if it would be possible to make their repeater function configurable 
Thanks everyone I know more now than I did half an hour ago!
2 Likes
I haven't seen anyone else do this. But it would be a very nice feature!
1 Like
The only time I had an issue is when I changed the Zigbee channel while the switch was un-powered. By the time I powered it up again I'd forgotten about the channel change. It was taking "too" long to show up so I re-paired it and it was back in all it's glory without any problems. I'm pretty sure it would have found the new channel and joined the mesh eventually but that can take as much as a full day. Even if I'd remembered the channel change I would have re-paired it to eliminate the wait.
Bottom line is that it is not a good idea to just power down a zigbee device indefinitely without removing. If you have a rule lets say that uses a zigbee outlet called X-mas-tree. Create a virtual device called Virtual-ZB-X-mas-tree. and use device swap to swap it out then delete the actual device from hubitat. This is the safest and cleanest way to do it. Trying to find ways around isn't recommended by those who work on the stuff at the hardware level on a daily basis. If you won't heed my warning, heed theirs. They know of what they speak.
1 Like
The Zigbee network recovers pretty quickly after a routing device is powered off. You may miss a single button press or a sensor single reading report, but I don't remember if I have ever noticed that. The battery-powered Zigbee devices find a new way to HE ZigBee coordinator very quickly.
2 Likes
Why not leave the zigbee outlets plugged in and just unplug the heater cords? This way you don't have to worry about whether or not it will hurt your mesh by removing them. The power draw is negligible so what's the downside?
2 Likes
As I said in top post I was thinking of using inline switches which are the sort you wire into the cord length, these typically can safely take a higher load. When I am using standard zigbee plug-in outlets I do leave them in, empty.
1 Like
Ah, I get it now. I wasn't envisioning this correctly.
1 Like
