Anyone else have these sensors? I have 2 inside the house on window duty where the battery life has been acceptable (LQI 83/134 currently), but I also have one outside (LQI last reported of 105) as a mailbox sensor that took over the duty from an Iris Gen 1 contact sensor that does not seem to last for more than a day without killing it’s battery. Same batteries as the inside ones and they are on the same reporting schedule (although since it is outside I assume it reports temperature more since it is above and below that threshold at every minimum interval I assume).
Any ideas why this might be? I have been thinking about just swapping it out thinking maybe it is a dud of a sensor, but these were brand new in box never used with the battery tabs still attached, so I doubt that will actually help.
No the Iris Gen 1’s used to be on mailbox duty and we’re pretty rock solid as far as battery life and connection came. When I swapped them out to these Visonic sensors I have had nothing but issues with battery life.
Ohhh … my bad. The latest complaint with iris was battery life. So I definitely read that wrong. My apologies. But, the same answer. Material, distance or even substandard parts.
“You get what you pay for.” But IMO that sucks. You can source good parts for a reasonable price, but they always need to mark them up so much. Look at the smartthings water sensors. $15 bucks. Great price. Worked well. Now they’re Aeotec and they’re like $40 or $50 per now. Same parts. Maybe Visonic is using really really cheap parts? not such a great radio in them?
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Also, remember the Xiaomi and Aquara? They had some models out there that used a unique precursor that made it difficult to connect to anything but their own hubs. Maybe something in the firmware causing an issue. It’s really hard to tell.
The thing I don’t get is that the two indoor ones which have a similar LQI are not having issues, but the one outdoor one just eats batteries. Do you think it is reporting related?
I do. I would imagine it’s got a lot to do with the quality of the radio. There’s an explanation around here about why you shouldn’t turn up the radio past a certain point and I feel like that story fits here as well. Communication to it might be great because your radio is good and your mesh is strong, but get a bit further out and the device might be hearing from the house fine, but is having a difficult time communicating back to the radio causing it to continuously try until it gets a ack. Rob described it much better in his post from some time ago, but yes. I do attribute it to the complexity of communication, and you might just be a bit too far for that particular device to reach home consistently. Is there a place you could put a pushy repeater between those two points? Innr plugs are reliable. I have two outside in IP rated boxes and they’re solid. In IOWA! One is buried under 24 inches of snow or better.
But my issue is that if it is a communication issue, then wouldn’t it’s LQI be low? It has about the same LQI (when it was connected) as the other two.
The map will also show devices are not communicating when they’re talking just fine. I can’t say that lqi is correct as I’m not 100% on how those numbers are communicated. I have devices that are working just fine, but show off line on the map as you can see in my photo below.
What I do know is that the key signs of interference or poor communication is either noticeable latency or dead batteries. @Cjkeenan, I don’t have a solid answer on this one for you. I can only speculate what the issue is. As you can tell by my map, things aren’t perfect either. But you should only use that map for reference. It looks cool, but I think it’s about as reliable as battery life reporting.
I forgot to mention that my lqi was recently showing 255 for every device. I think that would be a miracle in the making if it was actually communicating that well. I showed it to Markus and he laughed and said “Yah, I think that is not correct.”
It is also a possibility that it’s reporting good lqi when it can get through. But I doubt we’re that lucky. As a test, I’d take that sensor and move it closer to the house by half way if you can find somethign to attach it to for comparison and see if you’re experiencing the same issues.
As far as it can be usefull, the outdoor devices in my experience, often got lot of problems.
For instance, my outdoor aqara termometer drops out after few hours, although It is really near a repeater. I replaced the unit twice to be sure it is not a hardware fault. I suppose it is due to the metal framework I stick it on with a magnet (tested even withou magnet), or somehow the Faraday effect of metal grate of my door/window.
