I have a box of x-10 stuff Id be willing to part with for $25.
Id recommend getting zwave plus for the important automations. Zigbee will save you a few bucks but not as reliable, forb zigbee I’d recommend iris sensors if your in the US. I think they are on sale right now for less than $20
Aside from the adjustable mounting stand, any difference to this one?
Yes, a bit. The Aqara version provides an illumination sensor output, but only when a motion event triggers sending motion data.
There is a good bit of discussion about the Xiaomi Original and Aqara sensors, buttons, etc. over here:
There are several other places with information and conversation concerning these devices. Just do a search for ‘Xiaomi’.
For those really considering using any of these devices you might want to read. you have a 50/50 shot with getting these to work and then continuing to work
I definitely have zero problem for more than 6 months with two Xiaomi door sensors/one Xiaomi button, from last 2-3 months I subsequently added 2 more Xiaomi motion sensors and so far so good, I have no experience on Aqara ones though, compared to the range for both ST motion or multisensor, Xiaomi’s one are just superior, I have a couple of visonic $10 each as well and they worked well enough if there is any concern on Xiaomi
SO how many hops is it to your hub for these? More than one? Are you repeating anything?
I only have one ST outlet that could act as repeater and it is in a room for repeating signal for ST multisensor, quite isolated from those Xiaomi devices
And that is why it works. If you put it in the room to repeat it will fall off and never come back
Selling the following items in Bulk: $45
PM Me to buy.
I haven’t experienced any dropout in any area in my house in multiple storey except one location from what I understand from community it must be paired without any repeater initially, whether it will drop after pairing to the hub in one hop and then switch to use a repeater later is best to be answered by others obviously there is a long thread with the group of people maintaing the DH
I have a 3000+sf home and I have had Xiaomi Motion and Contact sensors installed for approximately a year that I don’t even notice anymore because I have not had to replace batteries and they haven’t dropped. I do run repeater plugs throughout my home. I currently have 7.
Within the past 6-8 months, I’ve also upgraded to the Aqara Motion and Contact sensors. I have had problems with 2 of 6 Aqara motion sensors staying on network. All of my 10 or so original Human Body Sensors have been on network without issues past the initial pairing.
They were so cheap that I bought a bunch to use for trivial bs (like turning on the stove vent lights or kitchen counter lights) in addition to my Iris and Jasco motion sensors/switches that handle the more important motion tasks. I typically use the Xiaomi motion sensors to create redundant triggers or zones in rooms. Also, my guest bedrooms are exclusively Xiaomi at this point.
Honestly, I’ve had less issues with Xiaomi than I’ve had with ST outages, Iris products (horrible relative battery life, rainbow drain, and falling off network) and, of course GE bulbs. So, all-in-all, I guess I’ve been lucky.
I’ve got over 2 dozen motion and door/window sensors and have not had 1 drop in over 13 months of owning them. No Zigbee repeaters in my home. All sensors are still on the original batteries (although I have grown skeptical of the DTH battery reading, as they all still show 95-100% battery remaining after a year 
).
Your and my experience is not unique, but it does seem to be the outlier experience with these guys.
Same here, stable and low battery drain.
Out of curiosity, what ZigBee repeaters are you using?
Also, do you know for sure that some of your Xiaomi devices are connected to the repeaters rather than directly to your ST hub?
I ask because a number of people have reported a lack of success in keeping Xioami devices connected through a repeater.
If you are using the a4refillpad DTH, then the battery reporting will be incorrect. All ZigBee Xiaomi devices report battery voltage in two bytes, and the a4refillpad only reads one of the two bytes.
All of the DTHs in the bspranger/Xiaomi GitHub repository use the correct method to read battery voltage and calculate a percentage based on it. There are even user-accessible min/max voltage settings used in the calculation of the percentage which you can change if you prefer.
I highly recommend switching over to those DTHs. Directly copying over the old DTH code, saving, and then publishing works just fine.
I use a few of the Iris/Centralite wave Zwave, Zigbee smart plugs.
