Rachio 3 Not Responding in Homekit (Again)

I’d be willing to try. New user.

What is required to test this should be easily obtained by Rachio. Once Rachio is confident they have things sorted out a “official beta test” should be released to a subset of customers with non-mesh and mesh networks. Please take your time and get it right first to the best of your ability Rachio. It’s been a year but better late than never… Sign me up

The WiFi Issue may run deeper than just those with Mesh Networks. My neighbor (a software engineer for a Govt. Contractor) just purchased a Rachio and could not get it to connect to his Asus Router, so he returned it and bought the Orbit.

I have had to use various iOS devices to get the Rachio to connect to my network after multiple failures using my phone. Eventually I had to use my daughter’s old iPhone SE to get it to connect.

Yes, that’s why I said non-mesh and mesh networks… It does run deeper. I think it has a lot to do with 2.4 and 5 GHz handoffs too. You got something, anything, to successfully connect on firmware 631?

I am brand new user.

I had a couple of install issues but it seems to be up and running.

Although I’ve not done anything other than take pictures, map zones, put in sprinkler heads in zone maps and then install wiring, it was non-trival effort and I’d rather not have to do the first four again. I was able to turn on one zone as extent of my usage testing.

So pressing my luck, I decided to try HomeKit.

I followed instructions and HomeKit immediately recognized the Rachio as a Rachio after manually entering address. Overcome with overconfidence, I said add.

Everything seemed to go well except… Rachio does not show up as a HomeKit accessory or anyplace in HomeKit I can find. Not no response, not powered off, not burning to the ground, Nada.

I’m not a HomeKit expert by a long shoot so I may not be looking in the correct place but I can’t find a trace.

I can’t add rachio again because it does not show up on add accessory using HK accessory add.

I’d like not to do a hard reset as I understand that will blow away all the configuration data.

I saw some discussion that “implied” “Update Wi-Fi Network” might reset the HomeKit connection without erasing configuration data but allow attempting to relink Rachio into HomeKit.

Can anyone confirm this or some other path to accomplish what I’d like?

Or do I just need to suck it up?

BTW - a “save configuration” would be a wonderful function. So obvious, maybe it exists and I’ve not found it? I hope.

Thanks in advance.

Rachio firmware iro3-firmware-hk-5-632, rachio app 4.1.4
iOS 13.4.1 iPhone SE (2020), iOS Home 4.2.0 macOS Home 3.0

That sounds like a different issue. I’ve got an Asus Router as well (RT-AC68U, just the single unit, no mesh or anything) and I haven’t had any issues getting it to connect to my WiFi. The issues we’re discussing in this thread is pretty specific about the Rachio 3 not connecting to Apple HomeKit

I’d be curious to hear what Wifi Chipset Vendor you are using.

I had similar no response issues with another HomeKit device (switches/dimmers) and they worked closely with the WiFi Chipset vendor and have made successive updates to it. Problems are few and far between now.

My environment is mesh.

Debugging this for me required a site visit for the HomeKit Device Team, mesh network developers and the Wifi Chip set team. All working together to get things figured out.

I believe they mentioned a few posts up that they were using Cypress chips.

Edit: Yep, it’s Cypress:

Good afternoon everyone, as promised, here is our weekly Friday update on the HomeKit connectivity issue for May 1st, 2020.

Our Engineer working on this issue discovered how to reproduce the “No Response” HomeKit bug as well as the non-discoverability bug after an R3 is removed from the Home app in this state.

We have received a new WiFi chip SDK that includes updates to the HomeKit functionality. We want to test if this resolves those issues. It does require programming updates on our end and we are starting to implement those changes.

Next week, our Engineer will working to integrate the new SDK. If that is done next week, we will start our testing effort, then move to beta testing in which many of you have so helpfully offered.

Thanks everyone, have a great weekend and thank you for being Rachio customers.

Michael

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Thank you for your transparency and keeping us updated.

I’d like to put my name in as well for helping beta test. I have experience QA/beta testing hardware and software.

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Laura - I don’t think you SOLVED anything. In fact, I believe this is more Rachio engineers not understanding the problem. Laura, I simply don’t believe Mesh Networks to be an issue with Homekit. I have had this happening for more than a year and hoenstly, Rachio needs to solve this problem. I have a multitude of Homekit enabled devices and the only device that disconnects or simply cannot be discovered is my Rachio 3. Rachio needs to stop making excuses and fix their Homekit integration.

I have a Mesh Network and every device I am using with Homekit is FINE - except RACHIO…I just want that to sink in here. I have contacted your support team ~5 times since last year and it’s unacceptable that this is not working.

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I’ve had the issue where it stopped responding and after deleting it and trying to readd it it is never found

I’ve been following these threads and knew it wasn’t just me…

I to would be happy to give a beta a try and see how it goes. :slight_smile:

I’m not sure anyone is currently claiming it’s solved nor that it’s only because of mesh networks (though that was a theory at one point) so I’m not sure what you’re referring to. I’d recommend reading from this post to the present to get the current status:

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@burt2858, apologies that I wasn’t clear. We know we have not solved the HomeKit issue. We are know this is an issue, we are replicating the issue on our end, and we are on a path we believe could solve the issue.

We are working to implement a potential fix and will be leveraging users who have volunteered as beta testers. If our current attempt does resolve the issue and passes beta testing, then we will be rolling it out to everyone. If it does not resolve it, we will use the data gathered to keep moving forward on a solution.

I understand this is a frustrating experience for many of you. We are working to resolve it as fast as we can. Please also understand that we don’t want to make things worse by rushing something that makes the situation worse.

Thank you for your engagement and we are working to resolve this as quickly and correctly as we can.

Stayed tuned for our status update this Friday.

Thanks @burt2858 and everyone else,

Michael

Michael, I too would be happy to beta test. :slight_smile:

I’m having the same issue. I have a Rachio 3 that had worked great for many months until very recently (presumably since the 632 firmware was released) and now shows “Not Responding”.
BTW, I have a Verizon fios router (2.4GHz and 5GHz bands) with a network extender (don’t know if that officially counts as a mesh or not).

When I look at the Rachio firmware version in the Rachio app it shows as the 632 version, but if I look at the Rachio firmware version in the Apple Home app it shows as 615. Is that what everyone else is seeing?

There is one odd thing I noticed that may not be relevant, but I’ll mention it anyway…
I have an iOS app called Network Analyzer that (among other things) can give information about every device connected to your WiFi network. So, I ran Network Analyzer for my WiFi network and I noticed that every HomeKit device I have (smart switches, Homepods, Apple TV’s, garage door openers, iPads, etc) shows as “there are known IPv6 addresses for the device“, EXCEPT my Rachio.
Could it be that the Rachio 3 is not currently IPv6 compatible and that is causing the HomeKit issue?
Maybe IPv6 is a (new?) requirement for HomeKit?
Or, possibly the 632 firmware accidentally removed IPv6 compatibility?
Again, I’m not sure that’s the issue, but it’s something I noticed and wanted to pass It along.

BTW, you can sign me up as a beta tester also.

Thanks!
Jay

Firmware 632 is most recent and is broke. Rachio is working on the issue and looking for a beta testers when they are ready with an update

I’d say the home app is showing the older firmware because it’s never been in contact with it once it had the newer firmware so it doesn’t know it exists on the rachio yet.

Not to correct you, but just so the dev team can try and pinpoint when the issues started, I think it actually started a bit before that. Mine didn’t upgrade to 632 until very recently (I had to manually tell it to update in the app and then wait for it to finish updating). I think mine was on 631 before and was having these same issues. It did all work at some point last year, probably when it was on 615 (I wasn’t paying attention to firmware version back then)

I would also be happy to beta test.

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