Z-Wave 800 Series 2-1 Switch (On/Off & Dimmer) | Project Phoenix

Ah yeah, whooops, let me put them up right now. They will arrive at the same time the switches arrive, which is looking like either at the end of the month or early next.

3 Likes

Cool - thanks!

Red 2-1shipping is end of April or beginning of May?
aggrrr…another month delay in my project (replacement on Insteon switches with transition to Home assistant from Homeseer).

Just got an update from the manufacturer – the switches are in production right now, which means they’ll probably finish next week and then it’s a few weeks before they would arrive in the US and get customs clearance, so I would say my best guess right now is beginning of May.

2 Likes

Thanks for update.
Any limitation on quantity in May?

Let me double check with @Courtney_Inovelli – but I’m pretty sure we are good on inventory w/Z-Wave.

1 Like

@stu1811 Don’t forget that Inovelli May begins at the end of June . . .

1 Like

@Bry Fools day (1st of April) was a week ago :slight_smile: I hope you are still @April 1st mood

The black paddle for the 2 in 1 is not and option. Is there a timeframe to offer them? I would like to add it to my current 2 in 1 Zwave order.

Side question, will the 2 in 1 paddle work for the up and coming ZigBee fan switch?

@Eric_Inovelli Probably really only you know anyway. But with the long range aspect of the 800 series products, what type of actual/practical distance are these 800 Reds going to attain? I know it depends on what’s physically in between the components, so say for example I’m trying to figure out how to get a Z-wave signal from within my condo to the inside of my detached garage. I could realistically put in a repeater (for the time being I suppose the only option for that is the 2-1 Red if only talking 800) at a point in my condo physically nearest the garage, which would then have to go through an external wall, through one garage building and out the other side, and then through my garage door. I could probably get a neighbor to allow me to install a switch inside their garage to bridge the gap further, which would make it Hubitat C8–(through 1100sq ft condo)–>Red 2-1 switch–(Jump #1 through 2 exterior walls and covering approx. 100 linear feet)–>Red 2-1 switch in neighbors garage–(Jump #2 through through 2 aluminum garage doors covering approx. 60 linear ft)–>either a Red 2-1 switch or something less robust if it doesn’t need to be 800 series to receive the signal–(Jump #3 open air 15 linear feet)–>z-wave relay to control garage door. I know that’s a lot. Lol. I’m just trying to get an actual sense of what the performance difference really will be between 700 and 800 series devices. I’ve put in some 700 series Zooz switches and plugs in my condo and have found that everything is able to connect directly to the hub, so it’s a healthy mesh within, but I don’t think there’s anyway that I can get anything connected in the garage without 800, and that’s if it actually can. Have you been able to do any of that sort of real life testing apart from whatever “standard” testing goes into the development? I imagine you have some installed in your house and whatnot?

I think the 800 series long range mode only works from the controller or base station to each unit directly. No mesh networking on a long range device.

1 Like

Interesting. Well I wonder just how deeply the one connection alone can penetrate then.

With enough power sky is the limit

1 Like

Works wonders in a vacuum.

4 Likes

Only on April Fools Day…

2 Likes

As @DataMeister mentioned above, “Long Range” is a specific feature that the Z-Wave controller would need to support and that the device would need to be included as. This is distinct from the traditional Z-Wave mesh; it is a star topology, where everything connects directly to the controller. Hubs should be able to both, but a device can participate in only one or the other (so repeaters are not relevant for devices used with LR).

In their testing, SiLabs got 1 mile line-of-sight with 700 series, 1.5 miles with 800 series, and expects longer range in the future. You will probably get quite a bit less in regular environments and normal devices. But to know for sure, there would need to be actual Long Range controllers out there and Long Range devices to use them with. :smiley: I’m not aware of any hubs/controllers that actually support it yet, just ones that would be “capable” with an update; and very few LR devices, an Ecolink garage door opener being one (I saw 2200 ft in marketing material; not sure if it ever actually became available to use…) and Inovelli’s hopefully being another soon. But I’m not sure there are any real-world experiences to look at yet for LR.

What I’m having trouble finding at the moment is if 800 increased the theoretical range of a “hop” even in traditional mesh topology. I think I read somewhere that it is theoretically longer, but that would only do the most good with all 800-series devices in the path … and I’m unable to verify since all I can find is SiLabs claiming the technically accurate but misleading 1.5 mile range for 800-series devices. But both 700 and 800 are for sure theoretically longer than 500 (and older generations), so with a classic mesh topology — likely the only realistic option for most users in the short term — a strong mesh of these newer devices will give you your best chance at “longer range,” even if not literal Long Range. :slight_smile:

1 Like

@BertABCD1234 Yeah that’s a bummer about star topology, at least for me I’m a bit less excited for 800 then seeing that every device I have connects directly to the hub and I haven’t even needed to rely on any hops yet, except for this one garage setup. Which, even if I put a Red 2-1 in the garage, which I have no need for out there to then throw the signal up to the garage relay thing, I’m hardly any more likely to be successful with 800 vs 700 if it can’t work in “800 mesh.” I don’t know, maybe before I pop in my last two 700 switches in the condo maybe I’ll just try to see if I can mesh my way through my neighbors garage over to mine, but that’s a lot of work for a long shot. May just have to give up that hope. But that’s why I wondered what someone’s experience with the switch has actually been. I’ve definitely read the SiLabs stuff and I really just do not care about marketing materials at all, they mean nothing to me, I only care about actual use.

The new Hubitat C-8 does.

@BertABCD1234 can correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think the Hubitat C8 supports it right now… Its chip is capable of LR, but I dont think the Hubitat team has enabled that specific functionality yet.

1 Like