My hub seems to have dropped off the firmware updates since version 21.00013. I have obviously failed to notice it hasnt been updating and it was only the big announcement to update to version 25 that prompted me to check. I contacted support for an answer and their advice was to reset the hub…
“I’m sorry to hear this. From the version showing in your screenshot, it looks like the last update your Hub had was in May last year. Did you stop using this for a while by any chance? Could you try seeing if we can get the firmware update pulled through? To do this, press and hold the red recessed button at the back of your Hub for about 15 seconds until the LED goes flashing yellow and let go. Once this is done, the Hub will restart and should attempt to update to the latest firmware. Do let me know how this goes for you!”
Unfortunately, carrying out the reset has bricked the hub. It only shows a solid red led and there has been no further activity from the device since. I removed the batteries and disconnected the psu. Upon reconnecting power, the led lights up red immediately. The reset button also has no affect now and the light remains red. Up until this point I had home automation, which has been in place since 2015. I have just killed it in 15 seconds. Where next? Is there any way the USB ports can be used to reactivate the hub via some software from ST? Do I abandon ST? Do I purchase a v3 hub? To say that I am disappointed is an understatement!
After v2 gate, my new v3 is almost up and running albeit a few casualties. The main disappointment is with the ST devices. Two motion sensors won’t reset, a multifunction sensor won’t reset and 3 smart outlets. I have other ST sensors which are ok but it seems to be the older ones that are now only fit for the bin.
The centralite circuit boards on the sensors have poorly attached battery terminals and the reset button contacts failed (s1).
For the life of me the smart outlets are a puzzle. I have tried the button hold down (+5s) to reset but it fails to respond??. On another point, there is a bit of a safety issue with the old style ST uk outlets (see image)
The Zwave devices were straight forward to setup. Pressing buttons on top of ladders and crawling around in the attic were not top of my list to reset the Aeon illuminate modules. The distance away from the hub didn’t seem to cause any re-pair issues either.
I’m sure that’s really annoying. I doubt if it will make you feel any better, but it might have been going bad before you tried to reset it. Which would explain why it hadn’t automatically updated.
Anyway, the USB ports are not activated on any of the hubs, so you can’t use those. I would continue to work with support and see what they say.
If your hub is toast you will need to buy a new one and repair all your devices. If you ever considered switching to an alternate now would be the time. The only feasible alternate with similar approach is Hubitat. Many folks who have left ST have gone to that hub solution. It is a young company but people seem to like it for the local control, speed, and robustness. I use both but ST remains my primary.
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tgauchat
(ActionTiles.com co-founder Terry @ActionTiles; GitHub: @cosmicpuppy)
4
Not meaning to challenge you here, Ken … but “many” is a very ambiguous term.
SmartThings has a “couple million” customers. I don’t think Hubitat is even up to 10,000 Customers yet (the exact number is surely confidential) and many of those did not come from SmartThings.
So I’d speculate far less than 0.5% of ST folks have jumped ship to Hubitat. Frankly - if it is as much as 1% then that, indeed would be “many”.
I doubt it is more than a couple thousand. A good start.
That’s fair Terry. I probably should have used more precise language. What I meant is that Hubitat is a popular option for those who leave ST. I personally think leaving ST is crazy given Samsung’s size and investment power, but then again I haven’t experienced a bricked ST hub either. Also, I think cloud fear is overstated since the whole world is moving to the cloud. I’m in China this week and they run the whole friggin country on the cloud.
I wonder if Samsung would be wise to just buy out HE and offer it as a local hobby oriented ST option. I suspect HE would entertain this as a startup exit strategy if the price were right.
I ask that because it’s not exactly an impulse purchase. You don’t walk through BestBuy and happen to spot this on a shelf and say “looks cool! I’ll take it”. At least I don’t think it goes like that.
I did lots of research before going with Smartthings. It was specifically the flexibility and compatibility in the price range that brought me to it - along with the fact that I’d already gotten the Schlage smart lock, and wanted to automate its unlocking.
Especially in the pre-Alexa world, I can’t imagine anyone getting into DIY smart home without doing lots of research… and without wishing for a significant level of customize-ability. So if a couple million purchases have been made, it baffles me somewhat to hear that Samsung’s research indicates most owners are using this for only a few ‘things’ and with very simple automations.
I think some hubs/starter kits are given as gifts… “for the person that has everything”… I know I bought my dad a ST Starter Kit years ago. It basically collects dust in his house now. He seems to like buying cheap WiFi outlets that work with Alexa instead.
My guess is the vast majority of home automation users fall into the category of “it’s something neat to try.” But, the majority of them lose interest the moment things don’t work as expected. This can be as simple as batteries dying in sensors, to things as serious as the numerous SmartThings Cloud Service outages through the years, to the frustration of the SmartThings to Samsung account migration issues, and finally to the utter confusion over which of two SmartThings Apps to use… And the fact that Samsung support is pretty useless, as the OP has found out, only helps to discourage the casual user.
So, while SmartThings may have sold a million hubs over the past 5+ years, I am guessing that many, many of these are powered off and collecting dust these days. I know of at least 4 of them within my family that are no longer used.
What I believe is happening, is that many of the serious DIY Home Automation enthusiasts are migrating away from SmartThings to Hubitat. These are the folks responsible for much of the community developed software that originally drew me to the ST platform. Broken promises and removal of ST features through the years has driven these “power users” to other platforms. They also do not want to see all of their work (classic groovy) to become useless. Features like Backup and Restore, and Local Processing are also very attractive to these power users. Thus, Hubitat is filling the gap for these users currently. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?
ogiewon said: “I know I bought my dad a ST Starter Kit years ago. It basically collects dust in his house now. He seems to like buying cheap WiFi outlets that work with Alexa instead.“
Even though they rely on many of the same technologies, home control and home automation are IMO somewhat different things. Yes, the border is blurry. But “Alexa, turn on the kitchen lights” just isn’t the same from a design perspective as
if it’s between 6pm and 8pm and the dining room motion sensor senses motion, turn the lights over the stove and countertops bright white, but
if it’s between 8pm and 11pm and the dining room sensor senses motion, turn the island counter light 50%, but
if it’s between 11pm and 4am and the dining room sensor senses motion, turn on “midnight snack” scene in Hue.
Yes, I completely agree. On ST, I could never trust the platform to be reliable and fast enough to truly automate my home. Attempts to do so were met with resistance from the family, especially when things just randomly occurred. Since migrating to Hubitat, we now experience reliable, quick home automation. My wife, for the first time ever, asks questions like “Can you please automate the laundry lights to come on when I walk in?” On ST, she tolerated my hobby. On Hubitat, she depends on these automations. Subtle, but a significant difference.
Agreed on the importance of market segmentation when trying to estimate these kinds of numbers.
I’m sure a significant percentage of those no longer using smartthings either went to home automation as a service (Xfinity home, Vivint, ADT Plus, etc), or went even simpler with an echo and a compatible lighting system. Or HomeKit if they had iOS phones.
As @ogiewon said, it’s the power users, who were already a very small percentage of SmartThings customers, who would have considered Hubitat as a candidate along with Homeseer and open platforms like home assistant.
It absolutely goes exactly like that. Especially at Best Buy. That’s why companies like smartthings spent so much money designing the box that the system comes in. And why they pay extra for prime location shelf space.
The amount of research that you do is typical of power users, but power users are not the majority of the Customerbase. The typical customer picks up the box, looks at the brand-name, reads the bullet points, and makes a buy or no buy decision. In under a minute. Tons of market research on this out there if you want to go read some.
Or just read the reviews of high-tech items at Amazon and see how many people buy something “because it says it did…“ And then give it a low rating because it was either incompatible with their other devices or they didn’t understand how to make it work.
For that matter, people can’t even be bothered to look for a simple logo with regards to compatibility, and then ding a device that they bought which didn’t have the logo. It makes engineers crazy, but it’s the reason marketing jobs exist.
I have resigned myself to the fact the unit will no longer function and I am faced with the enormous task of resetting all my devices to enable repairing with another hub. The worst of it is I have several Aeon dimmer units in the ceiling to operate lighting. To get at the pair button will mean using ladders and taking my lighting apart. Two of them are in the attic buried under fibreglass insulation and boxes etc. I have other units in the garage which are on the edge of the hub range so it is going to be quite difficult to bring them in close range to a new hub for pairing without taking the circuits apart. All in all a complete disaster. I also can’t unpair the devices from the original hub.
What I can’t work out is why the unit suddenly stopped updating its firmware.
Support aren’t too helpful as they have to go through the routine of eliminating all possibilities, psu, batteries etc, basic stuff.
I have been using the v2 hub for four years and have many devices. Most of the lighting is either scheduled or automatic setup using room IR sensors and some rules. I also had ST control my central heating until I changed boilers and decided to go with a system that operates independently of ST. Too many outages made remote control unreliable.
I should have provisioned for this scenario.
Are there any instructions for migrating to a v3 hub from a dead hub?
Basically, you’re going to have to start over from scratch. SmartThings does not offer a backup and restore feature, or any sort of hub migration tools.
Right, I wasn’t even considering ST community, they have more than 85k members, which I wouldn’t be surprised if they were from pre-Samsung acquisition. Lol
Well, at one time Wink was able to migrate their Wink V1 hub users to Wink V2 without any user interaction required whatsoever. This worked for Zigbee and Z-Wave devices. Lutron Clear Connect devices required a touch of every switch and dimmer.
Hubitat offers a database backup and restore feature. This at least keeps all of your automations intact if you move from hub to hub. It does require re-pairing of each Zigbee and Z-Wave device. Lutron devices would still just work, as that integration is via the Caseta SmartBridge via Telnet. If you’re moving from a Hubitat C-3 or C-4 hub, you can simply move your USB Radio stick to the new hub, and not have to re-pair any devices. The newer C-5 hub has internal radios, so not quite as simple to migrate from hub to hub.
I doubt if it will make you feel any better, but it might have been going bad before you tried to reset it. Which would explain why it hadn’t automatically updated.
And why they pay extra for prime location shelf space.
It makes engineers crazy, but it’s the reason marketing jobs exist.
