Hey folks. I’ve got two of those IKEA Tradfri five button remotes that I’ve been using for ages. (Sporadically, apparently, because it’s just occurred to me that neither of them are working.)
Did a little digging here and discovered that there was a firmware fix that was incompatible with them being used in ST…? I’m honestly not sure what any of this means: Ikea Tradfri 5-button remote - #4 by Declankh
Can anyone tell me if these are now permanently dead?
Thank you –
Melissa
I have two and they are both still working. I’m using the ‘Zigbee Button Groups’ drivers as I’m using zigbee groups for mapping the button to the bulb/switch/dimmer I want to control.
OK, that’s great to know. Thank you. I might just be having trouble because of iffy batteries, even though they’re saying they’re fully charged.
I’ve had horrible luck with those buttons chewing through batteries.. it was rare I would get more than a week out of them so much so that I modified them to be hardwired to power.
Any 5v 200-900ma AC adapter can be used, just ensure you solder positive to positive and negative to negative.
In my case I took barrel connectors and solder those in to the buttons to make it a cleaner look.
I have one that I have been using for a few years. I use it to control the Sonos in my office.
I’ve been use the ZigBee Button Remote [YG] 1.3.8 driver with good luck.
SmartThings Channel and Drivers
I find the battery percentage is not very accurate.
A while back I was experiencing issues where it was dropping and found there was a firmware update. Unfortunately, you will need an IKEA hub to update the firmware.
I don’t recall what version of firmware I am on.
Ohhhh. So did you get an ikea hub just to update the remote?
Yes I did get a hub given that I also have some IKEA buttons that I use. I was able to update them, but it took a couple of days.
Wow, it took a couple of days to update? Oh… I think I get it…you kind of have to wait for it to do it on its own. It’s not something you can initiate, I’m guessing.
I don’t recall a way on how to force it to update. It did recognize that a newer firmware was available rather quickly.
At the moment there’s something broken in SmartThings that affects IKEA buttons, at least when pairing them, regardless of drivers or button firmware. If they were already paired and working they should keep working. If you pair the 5-button again, it breaks and buttons stop working.
Oh, now that’s interesting. I missed that post. OK, I’ll try changing the batteries and see if I can get them to work. But if they don’t, it sounds like you’re saying to just hold on and they’ll probably update them?
Yes, do not try to delete them and add them again, will make things worse.
However, you say you’ve been using them for ages, which means they were added a long time ago and the pairing should be correct because they worked before. The ongoing bug happens when adding the device, does not impact already added devices that were working.
I don’t think they’re going to update the button firmware (although they now update a specific IKEA smart plug so there’s some precedent already), but they’ll fix the group binding eventually and then, only then, pairing them again might fix it. But right now I’d wait for an official reply to the error.