Zigbee not pairing, athom not responding

Questions & Help
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Hello everyone…
I have Homey Pro 2019 and since august, I’m having troubles, mostly with zigbee… as Athom support is now ignoring for more than 2 months, want to see if someone else is experiencing the same issue and could help…
I opened the case sometime in august, first I was told me they had a fix coming in new firmware, but that “new” firmware contained just some language versions… 2 new firmwares since and still the same…

Issue is, that I basically cannot pair new devices - when I try to pair, homey does not detect the device in any timely manner. It’s just looking for device, for 10+ mins till it tells me it timed out.
From time to time, it detects the device and tries to pair it - about once, it was like within 30s, mostly it takes few minutes. After it detects it and tries to add it, I’d say there is like 70% chance it will timeout again and I have to try again…
Sometimes, after a LOT of tries, it pairs. I’d say it takes me about 1-5 hours of trying to add a single device… And that’s for powered devices that are plugged in, wait for pairing for long time. Battery powered devices are out of the question, as they timeout much sooner and I don’t really have time to press buttons on those to keep them in pairing mode…

Athom also suggested, that no device in the zigbee list should be 2-3 characters long, I have resolved that by removing device and adding it again, now all my devices have 4+ char long address…

I have also tried full reinstall from recovery, multiple times, no change there…

I have 5 devices router devices connected directly to Homey, eveyrthing else is connected via some other device, ~25 devices in total, so there should be no issue with Homey device limit (also, as I said, sometimes it pairs).

Distance to Homey also does not play any role in pairing… I can have a device literally touch homey and it will not pair, but I have happened to pair it even through router device in another room…

I use only Zigbee and RTS (for somfy blinds) in my smart home… not sure if it might be connected, but sometimes my automations did not work well with blinds as well, resulting in one blind not being closed when it should have been - it started happening at about same time zigbee issues started.

Currently I have 18 apps installed. Storage is around 30% full, memory is fully used by homey itself eating 736MB, apps being around the same.

Basically only thing I have not tried is full factory reset or zigbee network reset - and I can’t do that, because if it did not fix the issue, I’d be doomed… also fixing all devices and flows… ugh…

Thanks, hope someone can help

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Hello Pitris,

OK, after reading your post, to me they are not ignoring you, but they apparently don’t have a standard solution.

Are you keeping the distance between H. and the zigbee device within 10 cm?
You are aware of the wifi - zigbee interference possibility? Did you tune the channels?
Any neighbors with strong 2.4GHz wifi signals?
Your issues sound like wifi interference to me…

It works best when you pres the pair button briefly every 2 s to keep them from sleeping.
I don’t understand why you don’t have time for this. When waiting for a device to pair, you sort of have no other option than to hold the device close to the nearest router device for that one minute.
Are you sure you put brand new batteries in those devices (just to make sure a half rotten battery is not the issue…)

I really have no clue what that even means. Can you share screenshots?

OK, I just suggested that to your post here

In theory this should work, but you really need to add more router devices (preferrably prior to any battery powered device) in my opinion.
The device limit indeed is no issue with ~25 devices;
While you don’t mention your H. model:
A Pro 2023 should be able to handle up to 250 zigbee devices, but it’s zigbee implementation is still not 100% stable / bug free, as I understand from Emile (Athom creative director).

2.4GHz vs. 433MHz, they cannot affect each other.
Keep in mind when closing/opening more than 2 or 3 blinds at once, it can occur random ones don’t always respond. Try to operate them with a second in between.

I’m afraid it’s the only option you have, unless support comes up with a cunning plan…
Make sure to fix your wifi channel to 1, 6 or 11 prior to resetting your zigbee network.

I´m happy to announce you gonna have to spend some time to do some pairing again (START WITH ALL ROUTER DEVICES), but you’re not doomed, while @martijnpoppen made this wonderful script to replace your devices and thus repair your flows:

(Not sure if it helps to brighten your mood, but I have had to reset Homey’s zigbee twice, and had to start from scratch with Home Assistant zigbee 3 times ( I bricked one zigbee dongle, bought another one, and later on my NUC died on me, along with it’s SDD. So I decided to start over with setting it all up).)

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Please share (screenshot) the Zigbee network overview of your HP19.

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OK, after reading your post, to me they are not ignoring you, but they apparently don’t have a standard solution.

well, possible, but would expect a reply at least…

Are you keeping the distance between H. and the zigbee device within 10 cm?
You are aware of the wifi - zigbee interference possibility? Did you tune the channels?
Any neighbors with strong 2.4GHz wifi signals?
Your issues sound like wifi interference to me…

As said, tried that, no change… literrally touched devices together. Regarding wifi, I’m safe here, as my flat is like a bunker, so basically no other networks except mine. Also all already connected zigbee devices work well…

It works best when you pres the pair button briefly every 2 s to keep them from sleeping.
I don’t understand why you don’t have time for this.

well, as I said, connection is completely random… I was doing exactly that… pressing button on Aqara Cube for few minutes, no connection. I was doing this like 10-20 times till I got it paired. So at least an hour of sitting, pressing button and “hope”… You understand why I don’t have time to do this with every device…
Issue is not with batteries, same thing happens with powered devices like switches, etc… And all of those are kept in pairing mode for a long time (few minutes) as pairing light is still blinking.

In theory this should work, but you really need to add more router devices (preferrably prior to any battery powered device) in my opinion.

More than half are routere devices…, screenshot at the end.

2.4GHz vs. 433MHz, they cannot affect each other.

I was not pointing to interference, but more likely to some HW/SW fault in Homey…

I´m happy to announce you gonna have to spend some time to do some pairing again (START WITH ALL ROUTER DEVICES), but you’re not doomed, while @martijnpoppen made this wonderful script to replace your devices and thus repair your flows:

well that looks good… but main issue here is, I’m afraid that issue might be HW one and I’ll be doomed if I do that as I won’t be able to pair the devices… and in that case I’d be royally screwed as almost everything at my home runs on zigbee :smiley:

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People are offering you solutions that, in the past, have worked for others. I understand that you’re weary to do a reset, but on the other hand, it’s probably the only thing (aside from replacing the power supply of your Homey, especially if you’re still using the original one) you can do at this point.

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yeah, forgot about that, not using original power supply for quite some time, nor original cable… and tried few different ones, again, no change.

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Apart from the devices with the question mark, which I also had with my HP19, everything looks good so far.

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if you mean those 2 routers, garden lights, both were added with the issue (actually powered Homey on power bank to bring it outside to pair it on close distance and still spent hours pairing it…). One is actually unplugged as part of the light strip broke down, just did not remove it for the time I fix it so i don’t have to pair it again :))

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I mean node 7 and 13, both are end devices, and the one :question:in the routing of node 25 (Garden Light).

Did you already a PTP?

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All these devices are working fine, not sure why the ?..
Yeah, tried PTP several times actually, no change…