Homey Pro 2023 Zigbee Issues

Questions & Help
1

I’m really starting to get fed up with this overpriced hockey puck now. I had a really cheap Zigbee hub for quite a while and it mostly worked great, save for some issues with some Zigbee battery switches (which also don’t work properly with Homey Pro).

So I bought the Homey Pro in the hope of creating a more intricate smart home with one device that was able to control all of my smart home components.

Mostly I try to use Zigbee where possible though. I recently got a bunch of Aqara blind motors that use Zigbee, to control the blinds in my home automatically to allow the sun and free warmth into the house during the day, then close at sunset to keep the warmth in and give us privacy.

However, this makes it very obvious when the Homey has decided to crap out, because either the blinds don’t open in the morning or don’t close in the evening.

And this happens ALL THE TIME!

Now, for example, none of the blinds have closed this evening, so it’s not just a single blind motor failing. I can get onto my Homey through the app just fine and tell the blinds to open and close. But nothing happens.

The blinds open and close manually if I press the buttons on the motors and the Homey seems to work again after I unplug it and plug it back in.

Mine is hard wired to my router as well, so it’s not a WiFi issue.

It just seems like recently since the update the Zigbee just craps out almost every day, so I’m constantly unplugging it.

I also have issues with a light that I have on a sensor. It seems to come on, then just stay on until I unplug the Homey again.

Had I known this very expensive Homey hub would be so unreliable I wouldn’t have bothered.

If anyone has any idea how to fix my issues, I’d be very grateful.

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2

Don’t think much help will or can be given because you provide very little useful information to even try to help. And if some help is given it probably won’t be useful since obviously you already made up your mind about the Homey.
I suggest returning it and buy the other all-in-one-and-everything-always-works-fine-without-any-problems hub on the market.

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3

Oh dear.

I apologise if I hurt your feelings by pointing out the weaknesses in the Homey, but unlike you, yes I do expect an expensive product like this to actually work as promised and not just constantly fail all the time.

And to that end, I absolutely will call out when it repeatedly fails to complete exceedingly basic routines in a very light smart home setup. I’m not sure why you feel the need to defend it, as if I shouldn’t expect-it-to-always-work-and-be-reliable-all-the-time-like-it-clearly-should.

In fact, reliability is probably the most paramount quality of a smart home hub. Without that your home isn’t very smart.

I thought I provided plenty of information, but please do enlighten me as to what information you require in order to be helpful rather than defensive.

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4

Where is your Homey located? Close to walls etc.?
How far is the range from Homey to rhe Zigbee blinds?
Do you have zigbee routers (230v connected) devices in between Homey and the blinds?

You say that you can push open/close in the Homey app, but it will not respond. Are there error/messages shown?

If you goto developer.athom.com to zigbee, does it show a lott of failed commands?

Do you have other zigbee devices like lights? If so, do they do work correct all the time?

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5

I buy it from you for 50 euro’s

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  • on top of Arie’s question, which firmware you are on @RJUK ? Some of the users do report issues on 10.3.0. I have myself 70+ Zigbee devices and they works fine.

Also when you check https://tools.developer.homey.app/tools/zigbee, is your Zigbee version 7.4.0-0 ?

Which error do you get ?

We will enlighten you but there is some way of asking for help and you did not start well.

Last but not least, in the meantime, diag. logs created and Athom support contacted ?

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7

Wow. So Homey is weak because you don’t provide any (!) details about what’s not working.
I understand frustration, we all have it sometimes. But you are just ranting.

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8

As with any technical device, there are a few things to consider with the Homey Pro 2023, e.g. how to set up a stable Zigbee network → Creating a stable Zigbee network with Homey Pro (Early 2023)
Additional general information about Zigbee ca be found here → What is Zigbee?

If you have problems, you can also use the following topic as a guide to find out what information is or could be important:

Are you using the original USB power supply and cable?

Of course, it’s also possible that your Homey Pro 2023 is faulty. So if you think that the problem is not due to your setup, flows, etc., you should contact Athom support.

4 Likes
9

Where do I find the logs? I need to see what happens with an IKEA blind.

10

That’s all you can see unfortunately + you might see some errors popping up there, eg. Zigbee not ready, but not logs.
zigbeecommand

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You can try to create diag. report from IKEA and then contact Athom support, as they are developing it but… expect at minimum delayed answer.

12

Hi Arie,

The Homey is fairly close to a wall, downstairs in the lounge. I don’t think the location is relevant though, as once I unplug it and plug it back in again it works fine for a while.

Some of the blind motors are in the same room as the Homey, others are downstairs and some are upstairs. All are affected equally, so again I don’t think it’s a signal issue.

It all used to work fine, but recently the Homey seems to be very unreliable.

I don’t have any Zigbee light switches, but I have some Amazon Echos with Zigbee in. I’m not sure if they would mesh with the Homey though?

13

Sure thing. Shipping is £500 though. :slight_smile:

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14

I’ll check the firmware now, but I believe it’s set to aut9-update. Perhaps that’s the problem though. Updates aren’t always stable and break things that previously worked.

That’s the point, I don’t get any errors when it doesn’t work. I move the slider in the Homey app to open and close the blinds and the slider moves, but the blinds don’t. No error, it just doesn’t make the blinds move.

Unplug the Homey, plug it back in and voila, everything works again. Not ideal to have to do that every day though just to make very basic routines work.

I get that I didn’t start in the right way, but it’s clearly frustration. A product that’s supposed to be very user friendly ought to work better.

It’s a shame that smart homes seem to be the reserve of techie people. If they could be made more reliable and more cross-compatible and easy to set up, then more people would get involved. As it is, smart homes often seem to make life more difficult than easy, due to a litany of reliability and compatability issues.

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15

I didn’t provide any details? Er… OK.

No, it’s weak because it constantly fails. As detailed in my first post.

Not sure why you’re being so defensive… You work for Homey?!

16

Hi there Dirk, thanks for the info - I’ll check out the zigbee thread you mentioned.

Yes, I’m using the OEM power supply, via the network dongle, so the Homey is hardwired.

I don’t believe my flows are the issue, as they work fine most of the time, then everything suddenly dies and the Homey needs a restart.

I still have my old little Zigbee router set up, as I haven’t gotten round to adding every device to the Homey yet.

Could I maybe re-position that upstairs to help strengthen Zigbee coverage? Or would it not likely mesh with the Homey?

17

You should get at least Timeout error or something like that, when controlling via GUI… when Aqara misbehavers, what about the other Zigbee devices, do they work just fine? Eg. lights or temperature sensors nor updating values either etc

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I don’t call that detailed. It’s like going to the garage and telling them you’re car does not work at all…
So you are already absolutely sure it is not the devices themselves or bad connection to the nearest repeater?

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19

Nah, same thing. My sensor activated light acts odd as well, either not coming on at all, or coming on and staying on when it should auto switch off after 30 secs.

I don’t see any timeout error on the app. I move the slider and it shows as if the blinds have reacted. The blinds just don’t do anything. Perhaps I need to wait a minute or two for the timeout, but I don’t have time to sit there staring at my phone for an error, so I just go over and push the button.

All told, it’s not a very seamless or rewarding experience.

20

Hardly, I gave the circumstances around it occurring. I didn’t just say “it’s broke”.

Sure? No. Fairly confident? Yes. I don’t need to reset the devices to make them work. I just reset the Homey and it all works again.

The likelihood of all the Zigbee devices failing at once is slim. The likelihood is that it’s the Homey, which is why resetting it fixes the issues immediately.

But what’s the point in having automations if they frequently stop working and you have to then reset the hub and close/switch everything manually?

I, just as I imagine most people do, just want to be able to set up a bunch of automation with smart home products and it just works and continues to work.

That’s very much not what I’m finding though. I hoped the Homey, being such an advanced, expensive and full featured hub would have things picked and make creating a smart home easy, but in reality I had less issues with the super budget Chinese zigbee hub that I bought as cheaply as possible to get me started whilst I was waiting for the Homey Pro 2023 to be released.

That said, just because I have frustrations with it doesn’t mean I’m giving up entirely. It is annoying that it isn’t more reliable though and easier to add certain devices.