Looking for advice or ideas on this.
About my installation. The sense unit in is the main panel (outside) and the antenna is located outside the box via knockout and cable provided. The router is inside and about 30’ away. The home is stucco and concrete so that is a factor but it has been working fine since I installed the Sense 4 years ago. Typically I have a connection data rate 52 Mbps or better according to my router.
About 6 months ago my sense unit started dropping off the App (iPhone) and web quite often. Sometimes it will return on its own and other times I have to cycle the breaker and reset the Sense.
I finally contacted support and they did the usual CS things, do I have power, is the router working, reboot everything, etc., Then they asked for an upload report. So I got it reconnected and sent one. Then they said my upload speed was low 40.1 KB/s but the sense unit was fine.
They recommended I move them closer (10’) or extend the antenna. They said the antenna was good because if it wasn’t the unit would not connect. I disagreed and told them an antenna or coax could be damaged but still work but likely in a diminished state. I asked where on the site page could I order a new antenna and coax pigtail. They said both Sense units and antenna were no longer available. They recommended I just extend it with Rg-58 or RG-174 and SMA connectors.
Long story short is I don’t want to do that using those recommendations, the amount of work involved and with an unknown antenna. Actually I don’t trust that the Sense unit itself will work much longer.
IF….. I was to extend the coax I’d use LMR-200, a new antenna and proper connectors but skeptical that will fix it.
I know the original Sense is obsolete and a Smart meter is not available here yet.
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Your connection looks acceptable to me. Your signal strength typically sits around -55 to -60 dBm, which is not perfect, but that should be good enough to maintain a stable connection. That said, I see that in the last 24 hours or so, the signal strength has dropped to about -65 dBm; did anything change in your configuration?
Setting aside signal strength, connection issues could be caused by interference other devices; a lot of things use the 2.4 GHz band used by WiFi, such as other WiFi devices, Bluetooth devices, and microwave ovens. You could run an experiment where you switch your router from channel 1 to channel 6 or 11, and see if the connection issues go away (or get worse).
On that subject, I see a few WiFi SSIDs broadcasting (weakly) in your area on channels 4, 8 and 10; if you have control over those devices, I recommend migrating them to either channel 1, 6, or 11. As you may be aware, devices that operate outside of channels 1, 6, and 11 will take up spectrum on both of the adjacent, non-overlapping channels, which may degrade the WiFi experience for everyone nearby.
WiFi issues are tricky to figure out. Best of luck solving the issue, and let me know if there’s anything else I can do to help.
@BrandonAtSense Thanks for the response.
That is a lot of new info to consider. You took a whole new vector on the problem. The reason I don’t believe it is a WiFi issue is of all the devices this is the one that most often fails and requires a reboot of the Sense to reconnect. I have 50+ devices and they are rock steady for the most part or return on their own. Let me add some additional info.
In the last 24h what happened is the unit failed again and I had to reboot it before it would connect. No config changes just recycled the Sense breaker. I was within 10’ & right in front of it and it would not connect until i reset the Sense.
Interference is a concern however the “system” has coexisted for years and worked well. Could it still be a problem? Maybe. The only unit that gives me frequent connection problems is the Sense.
On router channels mine is set to Auto. I have tried different channels in the past and It works best in auto Mode. My home system is a mesh system and handles 50+ devices well.
About the SSIDs. All of my items are on the same SSID. There are many in the area and I have no control over them. My two closest neighbors (strongest signals) haven’t added anything new in a long time.
Don’t get me wrong you may be right but to put 50 working devices at possible risk to solve 1s issues could send me down the rabbit hole.
Thanks again!
I understand: if the Sense monitor is the only device having trouble, it may not make sense to go down the path of general WiFi troubleshooting, especially if you’ve done so in the past and already have the setup optimized. That said, it’s worth considering that your Sense is (probably; I’m making some assumptions about your setup here) operating in a different environment than your other WiFi connected devices, maybe being positioned in a basement or a garage, so it has to contend with interference from different sources. It also doesn’t have the benefit of being as close to other devices to sense when they are transmitting data over WiFi, so it may be harder to avoid packet collisions. Factors like these could negatively impact the WiFi performance for just your Sense monitor, without necessarily being a “Sense issue”.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a hard and fast answer as to what the issue is. Nothing stands out as a smoking gun. Your monitor’s WiFi and other metrics look healthy, and I don’t see any errors flagged by your system on our side.
Something I noticed when I looked into your issue is that our WiFi driver is about a year out of date. It’s possible that you’re seeing a bug in the WiFi driver, and the latest driver has a fix for that bug - though I can’t promise that. It will take us some time to integrate the updated driver into a release, so we can’t test this theory any time soon, but it’s at least something to look forward to.
If you’re interested, I can add you to our beta fleet, where you will receive updates (such as an updated WiFi driver) earlier than the rest of the fleet. Note that being part of the beta fleet means that sometimes our software will have some bugs and rough edges - the beta fleet is where we test our releases before they get pushed to the general population. If that still sounds appealing to you, let me know, and I can add you.
@BrandonAtSense I agree. Although my Sense unit isn’t actually that isolated (panel is located outside) it has other Wifi devices close by. A couple cameras, smart bulbs and switches but being outside they have to contend with stucco and concrete walls.
My router may be on the somewhat older side but it’s steady and reliable. It doesn’t always pay off to jump out to the bleeding edge with the newest gadget with blazing speeds and newer Wifi when most of the existing devices don’t support them yet. 2.4 and 5G still seem to be the standard for home products.
I normally wouldn’t opt for beta products but don’t see a big downside being it is only for Sense. You can add me.
I am a little surprised that updates are still coming out for it being that it is no longer available. I really liked the Web app and wished you still supported it too.
Thanks!
Yeah, I definitely would not recommend upgrading your router - maybe just the firmware, but that is more of a general IT hygiene exercise rather than something I’d expect to improve your Sense monitor’s WiFi. Most devices (especially an older one like a Sense) do not support any of the new bells and whistles anyhow, like you said.
I’ve added you to the beta fleet, and am going to make a note to check in here after we’ve updated the WiFi firmware to see if you’re having any better luck.
We definitely still make our best effort to support the existing Sense units, and we’re working on new features all the time, such as improvements in device detection. We also make an effort to provide security updates where applicable. All our users are important to us, and we appreciate your feedback!
P.S. - I wish we still supported the web app too.
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Just adding my 2¢ here. Not sure if my issues are related to the OP, but the title of this thread certainly is relevant.
A few weeks ago, my Sense was dropping a few times a week. After years of stability.
That said, things seem to have corrected itself. My sense has been online pretty consistently the last 2 weeks+.
