Rachio 3 Not Responding in Homekit (Again)

Don’t ask me why it works. It just does…

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Mine with beta 3 is mostly online. Occasionally it will go offline and I need to unplug it from the power for a min or two and it will get back online. Only annoying thing is that the Home app thinks a software update is available so it shows I have 17 firmware updates that need to be installed - no idea why it thinks 17.

Clearly if Apple hasn’t figured it out by now it cannot be fixed or they aren’t trying to fix it. Time to change tactics. Who wants to join a startup :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

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When you realize you do not even look anymore to see if they fixed it…
and realize, this is not going to be fixed.

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I still check.

I’ve come to a similar conclusion. Rachio’s been quite the disappointment with this and with their wireless flow meter (dropped out every few days this season).

We’ve decided to build a new house so I’ll happily leave the Rachio when we move. I’ll probably get a Rain Machine when I do the sprinklers at our new place.

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I suspect they are equally as frustrated. Not that it solves the problem, but I do fell they have been trying.

What are we checking?

I agree with the first part still but I think stopped “trying” about 8 months ago. Before that, the CTO was directly commenting here (franz) and we at least saw more of the wheels turning. A month or so after they started The Official HomeKit Updates Thread progress pretty much ended. Since the beta they released in April, all they’ve done is add additional logging and move to the Apple SDK in a beta firmware (which I’m not convinced anyone actually got). The updates have largely been “waiting on _______”. Either waiting for people to get back into it or for a holiday to be over or waiting a on company (Cypress and then Apple). I suspect they reached the end of their technical ability, which is really unfortunate. Unless Apple really puts some hard effort on it and make a breakthrough, I don’t think this will ever be solved.

I assume they’re referring to this: The Official HomeKit Updates Thread

I check

I am on it. I do agree the poor/lack of communication is not helping.

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The Rain Machine is fantastic (as is their support)

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Yeah I doubt they have much of a homekit debug team and they are probably focusing more on new products than debugging existing products that are now several years old. What incentive is there for Apple to fix this for Rachio?

Honestly they just need to release a new device with a known WiFi/homekit controller that other manufacturers use that is reliable and give everyone here the new one.

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:rofl:

I doubt it is a priority for Apple. They have been “testing” since at least the last week in September. The HomeKit team is likely not large and focused on new device certifications. My guess is Rachio just hopes we forget about this because, for me at least, we will be entering the 3rd watering season where this has been broken. The latest update is still no update and “Apple and Rachio are both closed for the holidays. This thread will not be updated until Friday, Jan. 7th.”

The Homebridge plugin is solid though.

For reasons I do not understand turning off IP6 in my gateway has gotten it to behave and I’ve only had to put it back online once in many months.

But it is still flaky. If I turn the sprinklers on off to two quickly a few times it stops responding for up to five minutes which is pretty annoying if I’m getting soaked by s sprinkler.

I kind of went through this with the Logitech video doorbell. Kept going off-line requiring me to cycle its power to get it back online. They pushed out a firmware update. But the doorbell still would go offline but at least now it would put itself back online after about two minutes. They had me take pictures of the wiring. Voltage readings. Plus all kinds of other stuff. Finally, after much bitchin they sent me a replacement unit that did the exact same thing. At this time they offered me a refund. But I insisted on them sending me a replacement unit as not everyone was seeing this issue making me think some units had hardware issues. Even told them if they gave me a refund I was just going to go to the Apple store and buy the exact same item and we could go through this whole process again. They finally sent me a third replacement that has worked perfectly with no issues whatsoever. It’s actually a really great video doorbell… Once you get a unit with no hardware issues.

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Apple is closed for the holiday? Cmon Rachio, enough of the BS excuses already!
" [Just a few days after the release of iOS 15.2 to the public, Apple is once again restarting the beta testing process. The company is now rolling out the first betas of iOS 15.3 and iPadOS 15.3 to developers and public beta testers, but we don’t expect any major changes with iOS 15.3."](iOS 15.3 beta 1 now rolling out to developers [Update: Public beta] - 9to5Mac)

Closed My A$$…

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iOS, macOS gets all the resources and has plenty of staff. Apple’s HomeKit team must be like half an employee the way HomeKit has barely developed over the years :-p One person probably went on PTO and shutdown the entire department :rofl:

For real. There are hundreds of departments within Apple and I’m sure they don’t all carry the same schedule…

@kubisuro, I’m with you…I’m not an Apple guy, but from the outside looking in, I thought Apple might take over the world of home automation. But they released Homekit, and nothing has really changed. Of course, other products are jumping into the Homekit ecosystem, but that isn’t Apple themselves progressing the system, IMHO.

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It’s NOT Apple’s job to debug Rachio’s software. Many other companies have working HK solutions, Rachio just seem to be scoring an F- in RTFM class.

My Rachio 3 got stuck the other day. For some reason it had tried to reboot and spent three days with three white bars and a pulsing white bar. After I’d given it plenty of time I put it out of its misery and power cycled it. We’re back to off again, on again being reachable in the Home app.

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