Zooz vs. Inovelli Switch?

GE/Jasmine has them, but…

Looked at the Jasco, gets pricey when dealing with 3-way switches. Do like the zooz and inovelli for their 3-way switch technology.

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FWIW, the Leviton switches have replaceable shells. They come with white and almond. Black, and I think brown, are available for about $5

Well, since Inovelli switches are apparently out of stock, I purchased a Zooz Zen21 to control an outdoor light switch on the far side of my house (by the gate). I kept losing the connection, so I bought a second one and put it inside the garage, both to act as a repeater for the first, as well as a way to turn off the garage light when I forget to. The switch inside the garage is probably about 15 feet from my hub, although it’s on the other side of the thick door leading into the garage.

Sadly, even the closer switch doesn’t work all the time, and the outdoor one barely at all. I sure wish Inovelli would hurry and make some more switches. I haven’t had any issues with those (and while messing with the programming, I was convenientally reminded that the Inovellis have a timer setting…which is great for my hallway lights.)

I have the same issue. About 2 weeks ago I installed a Zen21 switch about 20 feet away from the hub and everyday I lose connection. I have to manually turn on and off for it to be available. It did work for the first week or so.

I am considering returning the rest of my unopened Zen21 switches.

Have you contacted Zooz support?
@TheSmartestHouse

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Honestly, I’d rather stick with Inovelli. I can still return the Zooz.

@Eric_Inovelli, you need to start ramping up your production line, dude!!!

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Lol, I’m giving it all she’s got Captain!

In all seriousness, we had to switch manufacturers and are starting from scratch, so it will take a few months. I’ll be living off of ramen and potatoes for the next few months :slight_smile:

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Damn, dude…that’s sooooooooooo not funny. I need more powe…er…switches. :frowning:

Sorry to hear about that guys (and about your ramen crisis too @Eric_Inovelli!). Garage is a tricky spot and it’s hard to say what can be causing interference. Have you tried placing one of your Inovelli switches in that same location to see if it works better? They’re manufactured at the same plant so hardware is pretty similar. We recommend getting in touch with Zooz support to troubleshoot this in detail, range is a tough one to figure out remotely, especially with SmartThings, but the support team will do the best they can to find a solution!

Well, I didn’t want to take out my existing ones just to check. I was hoping to get a new one to just swap and check.

And I even held the door open for the closest one. It worked well for awhile. Guess I’ll have to try it again. Is there an easy way to force a switch to remap itself through the mesh? Even when the new one worked well enough, the farther one still sucked. I seem to recall something about unplugging the ST Hub and pulling the batteries.

Hi Eric, you can try 2 things:

  1. Network repair: https://support.smartthings.com/hc/en-us/articles/200981864-How-do-I-make-sure-my-Z-Wave-devices-are-routing-optimally-in-the-SmartThings-Classic-app-

OR

  1. Excluding the switch from SmartThings and re-adding it.

Did you have them running locally or in the cloud?

Network repair was working for some other switches (turns out my front lock was disconnected), but nothing’s been coming up on it lately.

Last time I excluded it was before I added the second switch, so I’ll try that again.

That should help because it’s during inclusion when the hub asks the device about its neighbors. Let us know how it goes!

When I try to repair network I get “Network repair for … light switch [05] . Failed to update route”

That means it can’t communicate with the switch for some reason. Do you have any other non-battery powered Z-Wave devices between the switch and the SmartThings hub?

Ok…looks like it’s finally working. I’ve run the Z-wave Network Repair a few times today, and it’s finally working (5 time’s the charm?)

I was concerned about the Z-Wave Repair, because a couple of times, it wouldn’t let me watch the process, so I didn’t know if it wasn’t finding a problem, or just not showing me the problem. Several days ago, it was telling me about my front door switch and front door lock (couldn’t update mesh and couldn’t update route, or something to that effect.)

I’ll be keeping an eye on these switches…I got them so my son could take out the trash in the evening, and I bought a motion detector to turn on the outdoor light for him. He’ll be sure to let me know when it doesn’t work, lol

@rumrunner424, you might have to run the Repair Network several times. I was also having an “Update Route/Mesh” problem with one of my Inovellis (despite the fact that the switch worked exactly as it was supposed to - weird)

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I don’t.

This is my first Z-wave switch and almost everything I use is ZigBee.

If I stand right in front of the switch and manually turned on the light, repair works and I am able to turn on and off at that point. Starting around 5-6 feet away, the further I walk away from the switch, it seems there is a longer delay in turning on and off.

I will keep monitoring. I guess it’s OK as long as my automations work.

A single Z-Wave device in a mostly ZigBee network may have connectivity issues. Sometimes installing a handler helps, but sometimes you want to stick to local control to avoid cloud-related delay. The easiest way to deal with communication problems is adding a Z-Wave repeater between the switch and the hub, especially if you have a metal switch box.

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I realized I do have a Vision ZM1601US-5 z-wave plus siren which has been working fine for over a year now.

I do not have a metal switch box, this house is only 5 yrs old. I was not expecting the need to put a repeater in between considering there is only about 20 - 25 feet between the switch and hub and there are no walls in between. There is a clear line of sight, except the hub is inside my entertainment center.

The good news is I have not lost connection since repairing network. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

I need to figure how to run locally, shows running in cloud.