Honestly I wouldn’t even know how to make a non-stock device type. I’ve removed and re added things so many times with the assistance of support and blown away routines and started from scratch, complete resets, etc. I don’t know why the device types aren’t showing local, support always gets back to me every once in a blue moon with current open or new tickets saying how busy they have been but I ho early haven’t gotten any attention on these issues in a long time.
All I have btw, 4-cree connected bulbs, 2 go control z-wave switches, and the aeon remote. That’s it. Other than that I have my nest stuff and harmony hub connected too but I don’t use ST to do a single thing with any of it (no programming or routines of any kind except on the switches and bulbs). I have simple timed events that are supposed to turn lights on and off at certain times to certain levels. That’s it. Very, very basic. I’m not even using the flexible sunrise and sundown. I have specific times programmed.
In one of your previous posts, you mention that if I am using stock device types and they are not local installed devices then something is wrong. Can you elaborate on this? I am looking into this again and only have 2 of my devices in local device types… only my 2 switches, not my Cree bulbs. How do I correct this? I don’t even know where to begin.
Is there a way to completely blow it all away and start over (like a hard reset)?
So not sure if anyone can help becuase ST seems to not be able to.
Lately Both of the smartphones(Galaxy S5’s) on the network leave and come back within a minute when we are just sitting at home. I have tried everything to fix it.
Also my front door will not autolock anymore. It just randomly stopped.
You might want to use Life 360. It’s a lot more reliable than phone presence.
Is your lock z-wave or zigbee? May have dropped out of network. Have you done anything to troubleshoot? There are several things you can try, starting with just taking the batteries out to factory reset. It depends greatly on your luck, which one would work for you…
The lock is working if I control it from my phone.
Interesting. What app do you use? Have you checked the logs for any errors? I took mine off SmartThings so I canot replicate to see if I get the same results…
Also how do you incorperate life 360 for smartthings to pick it up IFTTT?
I have had this problem since lunchtime, I have a z-wave lock and a wall plug which I can control within the app, but if I set a routine which would normally trigger one of these on or off, nothing happens. A message is written to the notifications tab, but the activity feed is not updated.
Also the Sharp Tools app or widgets no longer work with these devices.
Hello,
I never post anything online, I never rant online, but this is gone too far and I must vent. my stress levels are through the roof now.
I use a v2 hub, z-wave stuff (ge switches, aeon switches, motions, etc… All supported; I don’t want to use custom code, and an amazon echo. My internet connection is always great. But I have nothing but issues with this crap for the past 2 monthes since ive installed this. When it works it works ok, BUT it doesn’t work most of the time:
the app crashes all the time, red bar across the top, crash, sending notice to developer, etc.
Routines half work, they will set the mode, but not turn off the lights, sirens are hit or miss, mostly miss. Echo interface now doesn’t work either, echo says OK, but nothing happens. I’ve reset the hub (3 times today alone, doesn’t help), rebuilt z-wave on numerous occasions, reconnected echo, removed and reinstalled devices, wound up with 2 smart home monitors, got stuck in an armed state, had to get support to disarm me.
All my batteries in all my devices (except a smoke detector) always say 100% and that just is not true! No update on battery life since dec. 10th or so?? This is crazy!
Right now, after a reset, re-installation of the app, and echo. Lights can be controlled individually from the app, but routines are only changing the mode, echo is not working, although it looks ok. ST is just ignoring the echo commands? yes I know how to setup echo devices.
I need some form of reliable alternative to this daily non-functional house I live in now. I spend hours a day at least twice a week trying to get this crap just to function right. I will be looking at Wink I guess?
Sorry for ranting, but I feel others should know what is going on before spending $1000’s on switches and stuff and countless hours installing things that just don’t work reliably at all!
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I know exactly how you feel… and in regards to your first line… that is precisely what triggered this post from me to begin with… I never go off on a rant in a post… but I’ve been pushed too far. At least for now my system seems to be working a hair better than it has but I know that’s only temporary. I just hope they address these issues soon because there are too many issues (multiple issues) affecting just about everyone out there.
I’m going to use Rule Machine as suggested to try to get out of Smart Lighting and Routines since those built-in smart apps and features do not work. Hopefully I can make this work right by doing that.
WA2FAST,
So how would you feel so finally get you ST system and find out that the day you get it is the day everything breaks down. It seems that most of the features I bought the system for are not working for me at all. IFTTT functionality is not an option right now due to the Oauth issues. The routines I had planned on do not function. Integrating with my Harmony remote and authorizing works but going the other way does not. And my Nest thermostat is not compatible with it. At least my Dlink 5222L cam works with it but its going to be a pay feature come this February. I guess making sure the money train features work is more important than making the actual system work properly.
VERY frustrating device. Hope the issues get fixed soon.
I can tell you exactly how I feel… read the first post created by me, and my previous post. I’m right there with you. I migrated off of Wink (due to the insane lag in their system) to come to ST and have experienced nothing but issues since. In my latest research, I have found some things that I may personally be able to try with my setup to put a Band-Aid on it for now… won’t know until I have time to really dig my heels in.
Your setup seems very similar to mine. I have a Nest Thermostat, Nest Protect, Harmony Elite, and my ST setup with all of my Z-Wave switches and smart bulbs. My Harmony controls my ST just fine so I think I can take care of my timed routines through Harmony, then remove all of my Routines that have a timed event associated with them. The difference from your setup and mine from what it sounds like is I do not use Harmony to control my ST devices or my Nest devices although I can see all of them through Harmony. Likewise, I don’t have ST try to control anything except for the light switches and bulbs. I basically consider all three of my systems independent however they are actually “linked” together and can see eachother. I just don’t have ST trying to control the thermostat or TV activities just like I don’t have my Harmony trying to control the thermostat. I do occasionally use the buttons on the Harmony to control my lights which always seems to work however the routines should take care of 99% of my lighting needs. I only use the Harmony remote when I’m sitting in front of the TV and the routines didn’t do what they were supposed to or I want to manually turn them on or off quickly for some reason without opening the app or walking into the room to press the switch.
There is a device type out there that works fine with Nest. Although I don’t use it and quite honestly prefer the Nest app to ST and Harmony for the Nest, there is a device type that works and you can control your Nest from ST. Again, I don’t use ST in this way, it’s so unreliable that I try to keep this system as simple as possible for only dealing with light switches and light bulbs… at least until they get their act together. My Nest has it’s own program for my house temp and I only use my Harmony to control my home theater except again like noted above… I occasionally use the buttons for lights, but that is not frequent.
Actually our setup is the same.
Nest, Nest protect, Harmony elite and ST. I just got my ST last night so I am still playing around with it trying to get it set up, but you would think it would be a lot easier to setup then it actually is.
I am going to move its location to be on my first floor instead of in the basement where my router is located. It seems that with its current location I can not remotely log into my synology NAS. Which would be a strange problem if it was the ST causing that issue, but since I plugged my ST in last night and now today I can’t log in remotely to my NAS, that is the only thing that has changed so leads me to believe that is the issue.
I have my Harmony elite set up to control just my home theatre system, but I do want to access ST for control over my lights in that room so when I watch TV or a movie I can control which lights are active during that activity, but I can’t seem to get them to authorize each other right now.
The integration of IFTTT was a major buying feature for me as well. I like the idea of having my apps and devices being able to trigger actions on other devices. For example, I do get numerous calls but often do not hear the incoming call while my phone is charging in another room with the TV on, so I would like my harmony remote to mute all activities with an incoming call. That actually works. But with ST I would like to try other things like possibly turn on the lights in my dark room when I get that call. But I can’t get ST to connect to IFTTT because someone, some where decided to update something and broke it for everyone.
I do not understand why most of the functionality is on the Smartthings servers either. If a server goes down or the wrong code gets updated then BAM everyone suffers.
Reading through the forums is eye opening. We are all suffering a lot of failures and Samsung can’t or won’t commit to when they will fix them. I have three lamps and four Hues lights that are schedule to come on at sunset minus 10mins, and go off around 11pm.
I moved all of my “routines” to “smart lighting” to negate the fact that my routines fail often. That didn’t work! I was told to move from “routines” to “smart lighting” - that didn’t work. Then I was told to break out the “smart lighting” so that I had a couple of minutes delay between each one - that didn’t work either. Then I was told to create backup “smart lighting” just in case the original ones didn’t work - that didn’t work. So now I have triple the routines that work less than half the time, and the situation is getting worse by the day it would seem. I get “hang in there” back from support with no commitment to fix.
My echo works, so I could just use that to turn on and off the lights, but the point was I wanted automation (for a multitude of reasons.
Is there a better way to automatically control the lights locally, instead of relying on the cloud? I have “smart rules”, but haven’t looked into that yet.
I’ve told support that I’m at the end of my tether. They say they will “try” to process a refund if that is what I want, but I would hazard a guess they will say “oh, it’s more than 30 days since you purchase”. I hope it doesn’t come to that, but I really am done with a sub par product and false promises.
Oops - went into rant mode there - sorry about that. Any ideas of local automation gratefully received.
Steve
I think SmartThings has reached the tipping point. When you read the Amazon reviews and the posts here, you see the kind of reputation it is getting as a consumer product. Like most things in the consumer world, once the product reputation is damaged, no amount of fixes will change it.
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My hub was next to my main router (Airport Extreme 6), which also was next to a bunch of different bridges. I had a ton of problems controlling devices, but @JDRoberts suggested to move it. I moved it to my range extender (Airport Extreme 5) which had nothing plugged into it, and it works perfectly now! The range extender is also in the center of the second floor, so it has signal all around the house.
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The location is definitely important. So too at least for me was to add a secondary controller to gain visability into my ZWavw network. I found 9 orphaned devices with no corresponding ST device. This was causing havoc with my zwave reliability. I had to add ST devices back in with matching Network ID’s and then delete again, this time I could monitor the zwave device deletion through the secondary controller.
Thing is, some needed multiple attempts to delete. It seems that without these tools to monitor in st the zwave network health. And the fact I picked up 9 orphaned devices in 2 months of tinkering makes me wonder how others are faring?