GE link bulb troubles

[pswired (Patrick Shoemaker)]

I bought a batch of GE PAR38 floodlight bulbs to use in a few fixtures outside. I’ve read some past threads about these bulbs having various issues falling off the network, but haven’t heard any recent updates.

I’ve been out of town for a few days, and lo and behold, one of my link bulbs is stuck on, another is stuck off, and the remaining two are responding properly. They’re solidly within my Zigbee mesh, so the problem is not signal strength.

Is there any new information on these regarding firmware updates from GE? Any solid information on whether pairing them to a wink hub temporarily will do anything?

The problem bulbs are listed in the IDE as ZLL profile bulbs, not the newer daylight devices, by the way.

[ZebraBlinds (Neal (www.zebrablinds.com / www.zebrablinds.ca))]

As far as I am aware, they still have the firmware problem. I had 2 GE bulbs that I used as a test and failed on me in a week. I currently have the philips hue whites and so far after 3 months I have zero issues.

[JDRoberts]

Nothing new. It’s a known GE problem (nothing to do with SmartThings) with no resolution as yet.

FAQ: GE Link Bulbs Dropped Offline

GE Links are the least expensive big brand zigbee bulbs you can buy, and, for whatever reason, they seem to sometimes have trouble reconnecting to the SmartThings network after power has been cut, whether it’s from a whole house failure or just someone flipping a switch. Or even just randomly from time to time. (SmartThings staff have confirmed in the forums that the reason the GE links are not on the official “works with SmartThings” compatibility list is that they have a firmware problem which causes them to stop responding to the Cordinator from time to time. Supposedly GE is aware of the issue and there may be a firmware update from GE in a few months, but no specific timeline and they can’t be certified as compatible yet. Meanwhile, they’re very inexpensive, but they do drop off fro…

[chickwebb]

Some of us have had better results pairing them with the Hue hub. You might try that if you have one.

[scottinpollock (Scott)]

Mine are paired with my Hue v1 Bridge. A few go offline from time to time, but simply removing and reapplying power to them makes them come back.

[Stephen_Johnson]

My par38’s are the same way. At least once every 4 or 5 days one of the three will go offline. The only fix is to break out the long pole (they are in a high ceiling) and unscrew it a few turns then screw it back in. If I could find another brand of par38 or 40’s I would replace all three.