I’ve been using a SmartThings motion sensor on my front porch with pretty good results. It’s nicely protected from the elements, and seems to work well enough even at low temps. But I realize I am out of spec on this - it is an indoor only device.
My back porch is more exposed, so I thought I would try the Aeon Multi-Sensor, which is indeed rated for outdoor use.
So far so good, but I have one huge issue with this device - the battery life is terrible. It takes 4 AAA batteries, and I have had times when they have run down after less than ten days.
I’m wondering if anyone has any info about reconfiguring the device so that the batteries get better life? I don’t think you can adjust any settings via SmartThings, but I assume it has some way to change this via the USB connection to a PC.
To be honest, I’m not sure. But im I work in IT and in most cases you want to be on the latest firmware before you decide whether you have an issue or not. Try updating the firmware. The info can be found on the aeon labs website.
I’ve been using the Aeon Multi Sensor on the front porch for almost 6 months, battery life is down to 20%. I just added a new one to the back driveway area last night.
I updated firmware on both, I did have to remove and re-add them both to get them to report after the update.
6-7 months is not great battery life but I guess it’s way better than 10 days.
Note the firmware 1.18 has been released since January 2013, if not even earlier. The firmware tool will keep updating the firmware over and over, but it is the same version unless you have a really old Aeon Multi!
Interesting. Mine just plugs in. Start firmware tool and execute the same 1.18 update successfully each time. It gives me no details about firmware version or being updated to the latest. I just used the firmware updater tool from the AEON site.
I have 9 of these sensors with only two using batteries. One kept running through batteries quickly like yours. I also noticed that it would fail a Z-Wave repair. I now have this one plugged into power and no longer have the Z-Wave issue.
You may want to try a Z-Wave repair.
At least Aeon Multi-Sensor has a powered option whereas SmartThings removed this in their latest version. I understand the setup convenience of batteries, however, in the long run it is a pain.
What I have noticed since just recently adding one outdoor at a vacation house, is that it seems to register motion alerts every couple minutes. I wasn’t getting any messages on that, noticed from the activity page only. Curious if that would impact battery life (likely) and whether turning the senstivity way down just defeats the purpose of the motion capability. I’m already about 15 or so feet from the front steps. Thanks.
This will kill battery. Same principle if you had an app that turned your cell phone screen on every 30 seconds. That would kill your battery too. I’d try and optimize the sensitivity to reduce those false positives.
Yep, makes sense if it is waking it up when otherwise would be in some other mode, I think the temp and humidity are more of an occasional polling. I guess the recording of the event takes some juice as well. Thanks, Jeff
So I updated the FW on my sensor, will be watching to see what happens. A few notable things about this device:
The firmware updater has a faint smell of lameness - there is apparently no way to tell what version you currently have installed. The updater runs to completion and announces success regardless of what’s in there.
At least in my case, I must have had an earlier version. After updating the firmware, my device was no longer seen by my hub. I had to add it as a new device.
Removing the old, no-longer-visible device leads to some bad UI on my iPhone app. There were instructions to remove following the device instructions - I have no idea what those are or where to find them. Failure to do whatever I was supposed to do there (still don’t know) meant doing a forced uninstall, which carried some warnings that used terminology I didn’t understand regarding dire consequences. Said consequences must not have been too dire, as the device is now operating properly.
Opening the device to replace those oh-so-quickly depleted batteries brought an unpleasant surprise: a small pocket of rusty water in the battery compartment. This is an outdoor-rated device, and I have it mounted properly. There is no doubt that it will eventually suffer horrible battery corrosion and die unless this is some kind of strange one-of-a-kind leak, which seems implausible.
Anyway, all that aside, I will be eager to see if the one-week battery discharge improves with the new firmware.