My thinking was that HA was still working because they were going through Wifi for that (my only Thread hubs are the Smartthings ones and HA doesn’t have access to them). And they were going offline in Smartthings because that’s using Thread and it’s out of range. I had thought only certain Matter devices were extenders and I thought that was the point of the extra hub being part of a group.Is that not effectively extending the range of the mesh in the direction of the secondary hub. Are you saying that’s not the case?
If Smartthings is not able to reach a Matter Thread device through Thread but it is through Wifi does it not fall back to Wifi?
I had thought only certain Matter devices were extenders and I thought that was the point of the extra hub being part of a group.Is that not effectively extending the range of the mesh in the direction of the secondary hub. Are you saying that’s not the case?
That’s correct, only Matter over Thread with Thread router capabilities can extend your network acting as “repeaters” so to speak. But most do, like the Nanoleaf lights, Eve plugs, etc. I believe even the Onvis plug updated the firmware to be a router too.
Another hub would act as Thread router in that case just like a $15 Matter over Thread smart light, but since HA was able to access the device, it was never a signal issue.
No, there are no Matter devices with both WiFi and Thread, it’s one or the other.
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I suspect for whatever reason, that the group is just not working for me then. Maybe I’ve got some of the less common non router bulbs as I can have one in a group of five outside lights (all within a couple of feet of each other) connected and the rest offline.
I’ve tried a different approach…abandoning the hub group and just connecting these troublesome devices to their own dedicated hub
Just out of curiosity, what devices are those? Are they actually Matter over Thread? If they’re WiFi we’re looking at a completely different scenario. Or if they’re bridged, then what counts is their bridge, not the SmartThings hub.
Linkind Matter Smart RGBTW bulbs
Just noticed in the description on amazon that they say they dont support thread but it cant be a wifi signal issue as they are right by a wifi mesh node and also they seemed to continue being controllerable whilst my wifi was rebooting when i was trying to fix them the other day.
Crazy that a new standard isnt that standardised. What does matter add to a wifi only matter device then, just the requirement that it now needs both wifi and to connect to a hub of some kind?
Those should be Matter over WiFi, I think they don’t sell Matter over Thread lights yet. It should be in the description or the specs anyway. And that’s why adding another hub did not help, nothing changes in that scenario.
But, again, if HA was able to control them, the issue was not the network or the connectivity or the mesh, it could be a firmware issue with Linkind and the multi-admin, a bug in SmartThings, etc.
Matter is just a common language so local devices can communicate without depending on clouds somewhere on the Internet or even in another country. Non-Matter WiFi lights are usually cloud-based using proprietary protocols, that’s the advantage. Although it’s true that it’s still something new and sometimes the experience is not as seamless as it should be. And the hub is a requirement because, before, everything run in a server somewhere in the world, now automations and other things can run locally in your house.
Edit: LOL, right now one of my WiZ lights went offline in SmartThings (Matter over WiFi). It works fine through the WiZ app so it’s a problem with the Matter communication, or a bug in the SmartThings beta firmware that I’m using. It’s not the first time that happens with the same light but last time was long ago.
the funny thing is, that I went for these Matter ones as I was fed up with my normal Wifi Meross bulbs being offline in Smartthings whilst being fine in the Meross app. At least with them, I could usually refresh the bulb in Smartthings and it would come back online, so, for me, Smartthing’s Matter is a bit of a step back, apart from the local execution
So I recently bought a new SmartMonitor M7, which has Hub functionality not via Dongle only. I was able to connect/use it as primary hub for some Sonos speakers AND an Aqara Hub E1 and its connected Matter (!) devices.
But it is still not accepted as Secondary Hub, although mentioned in the “supported devices” info the Smartthings Android App?!
Online, I cannot find any more information in the specification tables of all actual SmartMonitors, which one of them might have the so called “secondarySupportAvailability”
This M7 Hub is already on Firmware 053.00020.
Any more thoughts or news on this? I am feeling betrayed a bit, have to say…
As far as I can see you have a Smart Monitor which can act as a standalone SmartThings hub over the LAN and you have been able to use it as such. It should support Matter over Wi-Fi devices, Matter Bridges and presumably also Matter over Thread devices if you have an external thread border router.
In order to add Zigbee and Thread support to your Monitor it appears that you need to add an external Dongle and it doesn’t look like you have one.
Without Zigbee and Thread support a hub cannot participate in a Hub Group. A hub that depends on a Dongle for Zigbee and Thread can also not participate in a Hub Group. A hub that already has devices connected cannot be added as a secondary hub to a Hub Group without first removing them.
Thanks @orangebucket,
I get that and I also tried to add M7 to my V3 without any connected devices on the M7.
What I really wonder is why they promote SmartMonitors as a possible Group Hub without giving them the needed functionality?!
Thanks anyway!
They’ve certainly moved away from requiring the Dongle for some or all of their TVs, so I am wondering if that is also true of the Monitors.
This is really frustrating… I have two Samsung TVs from 2022 with each having a zigbee / thread dongle. However they cannot form a hub group for better ST network resilience…