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Enough already


topolino

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Dear Fibaro,

I have spent more than € 2000 on your products, and I am greatly disappointed to find that very few of the functions you boast about in your glossy marketing are actually available. You don't even bother to tell new customers about this fact, so we all have very frustrating hours and days trying to figure out where all the functionality we have paid for is - only to end up here to get the truth about your misleading advertising and obscure release plans. I think new customers deserve to know what they're getting into when they are buying your products, and I think I can do something about that.

I am very tired of hearing you pretend to be Apple and that you don't disclose your release plans. There is a huge difference between what you are doing and what Apple is doing. Apple always releases the functionality that they advertise. You basically release foilware and vague dreams.

I also don't feel confident about the safety of your products. There are just too many stories about melting and malfunctioning dimmers and smoke sensors that don't work. I have returned three smoke sensors myself after testing them in heavy smoke with negative results.

So, I'm now working on putting consumer power into practice. My HC2 will soon start running a script that will check if version 4.0 is installed. If it isn't, it will post daily global tweets on Twitter with unpleasant truths about your products that I will collect from various forums and queue up in a database, and I'm sure many of the unhappy first movers here will gladly contribute. One such truth is that your products are not allowed to be sold in Sweden for security issues.

After working many years in marketing, I can tell you that powerful detractors like me are the last thing you want for your brand.

The only way you can stop this is to deliver on your promises, or at least tell us when the functionality you have promised will be available.

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Dear Fibaro,

I have spent more than € 2000 on your products, and I am greatly disappointed to find that very few of the functions you boast about in your glossy marketing are actually available. You don't even bother to tell new customers about this fact, so we all have very frustrating hours and days trying to figure out where all the functionality we have paid for is - only to end up here to get the truth about your misleading advertising and obscure release plans. I think new customers deserve to know what they're getting into when they are buying your products, and I think I can do something about that.

I am very tired of hearing you pretend to be Apple and that you don't disclose your release plans. There is a huge difference between what you are doing and what Apple is doing. Apple always releases the functionality that they advertise. You basically release foilware and vague dreams.

I also don't feel confident about the safety of your products. There are just too many stories about melting and malfunctioning dimmers and smoke sensors that don't work. I have returned three smoke sensors myself after testing them in heavy smoke with negative results.

So, I'm now working on putting consumer power into practice. My HC2 will soon start running a script that will check if version 4.0 is installed. If it isn't, it will post daily global tweets on Twitter with unpleasant truths about your products that I will collect from various forums and queue up in a database, and I'm sure many of the unhappy first movers here will gladly contribute. One such truth is that your products are not allowed to be sold in Sweden for security issues.

After working many years in marketing, I can tell you that powerful detractors like me are the last thing you want for your brand.

The only way you can stop this is to deliver on your promises, or at least tell us when the functionality you have promised will be available.

I'm happy to assist as I feel hard done here as well constantly being told to send devices to them at my expense for testing.

Smoke sensors that false alarm on mains power... Relays that stick due to the loads placed on them... Where's my multimedia functionality shopping local services... Showing videos of the motion sensor on a porch outdoors then stating after they are internal use only!

Lots of gripes and I think you are perfectly within your rights to get answers!

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I feel the same..... every time version 4.x is the answer to my problems..but where is 4.x???? Will it ever come...

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  • Thanks,

    Other things include missing or incomplete graphs (semi-available on iPad only), bad stability, dead nodes, no distinction between tamper alarm and actual alarm, bad integration of cameras, few alarm systems supported, useless apps with room-oriented control panels where it's impossible to see the status of switches, unclear if smoke detector works if the system is down, unstable remote access, missing documentation, temporary api (?), door sensor as window graphics bug on ipad, non-working locationing, proprietary mail server, CO-sensing from smoke sensor not available, missing historical data, no logs, no debugging facilities, smoke sensor and flood sensor not available in alarm panel, no heat alarm for smoke sensor, strange insensitive/blind periods in motion sensors, only battery for motion sensors, bad compatability with other systems (like vera), heating panel need a themostat instead of just a termometer, logic and switches, melting dimmers, dimmers sending current also when off, dimmers generating noise in the power grid, strange "spioing"-sounds from wall plugs, wall plugs getting warm (when led is on?), ios apps slow to connect & often not able to connect, and much more...

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    I don't have time for answer every problem but:

    1. incomplete graphs - In 4.x you will have graph.

    2. bad stability what do you mean? My HC2 works perfect.

    3. bad integration of cameras what do you mean? Before you buy HC2 you should know what camers works with it. mjpeg

    4. unclear if smoke detector works if the system is down smoke detector can work without HC2

    5. unstable remote access Ok i have one problem for about year

    6. non-working locationing My is working, so maybe you don't know how to configure that.

    7. no logs what do you mean? I have logs.

    8. only battery for motion sensors you know this before you buy it... In the other hand you can buy others sensors (not Fibaro).

    9. dimmers sending current also when off you have problem with led lamps?

    Did you install the system yourself?

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    To add something to this. My motion sensors false trigger and stay breached until next movement. This is a known issue an will be fixed in 4.x. Just wait a few months...

    The latest Alpha would probably fix this but now I cant set global variables in LUA... WTF??

    I expect a statement from Fibaro!

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    I say now the guys will see this and hopefully come back with something positive for us!

    Let us not rock the boat to much as a smaller user base = less users and more bugs!

    Please login or register to see this image.

    /emoticons/default_smile.png" alt=":)" srcset="https://forum.fibaro.com/uploads/emoticons/[email protected] 2x" width="20" height="20" />

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    To add something to this. My motion sensors false trigger and stay breached until next movement. This is a known issue an will be fixed in 4.x. Just wait a few months...

    The latest Alpha would probably fix this but now I cant set global variables in LUA... WTF??

    I expect a statement from Fibaro!

    Same here and no sir it isnt fixed in Alpha,too.

    The most important documentations are missing and unavailable. This causes half the troubles.

    Does anyone know how to get this notification? I have seen this kind of notification from videos from wall plug which seems like a long time!

    Also does anyone know how can we integrate IP enabled DVR?

    Please login or register to see this attachment.

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    So does that mean currently we have an automation system that has no user input?

    Not everyday is same. We should be able to customize it according to a lot of IFs where user have his input. This picture is perfect example of it. I think fibaro marketing team understands customer needs more than the technical team.

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    Guest bozman

    Please rock the boat, we arn't getting answers at all!

    Dont show us new features that are couple of years in the future!

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    Guest merylion

    Hi,

    From one hand Fibaro system proposes a lot of positive functions and is very good system but also I can agree that many promised functions are not appearing for long time.

    To be honest I could live with options I have if whole system will propose reliability and stability in working.

    For me completely not acceptable is that dead nodes are apperaing. Detectors are non reliable - mentioned smoke and movement detectors. I am fed up of coming to HC2 few times a day to reset some scenes which are working wrongly due to unreliability of sensors. Also I am really scared of the day when my HC2 will crash in which case I will have a dark home for 3 weeks needed to get HC2 being sent back from repair!!! So far there is no any option to restore backup on other HC2 in case of system crush. This is unbelievable!!! I am professionall Automation Engineer and no possibility to fix system by yourself is disqualifying any automation system. Normally such system would not survive on market even one year.

    Summarizing. Whatever we have now for me is satisfactory if it would be reliable at all

    Regards

    Marcin

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    Totally agree with the sentiment in this thread..

    We have people who have invested a large amount of money for a product that seems to claim to be able to do a lot of things but the lack of documentation or information on how to set things up.

    We also have the issue of instability sometimes which does affect the confidence of the owners in reliance on Fibaro products. I do find that sometimes a relay will not switch the light on but other lights will switch on... then there is delay in switching on a light based on a scene... all this adds to loss of confidence...

    Perhaps, Fibaro need to start providing a lot more guidance on how things need to be setup and they may need to be more proactive in responding to just this type of query...

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    I had many problems with the system(including the delay in switching relays/dimmers)..When manually switching ON/off dimmers or switches the HC2 interface is not updating imediatelly, but after 1/2 hour or so..

    I have emailed tens of emails to Fibaro support and still they were not able to help.

    I'm very upset mainly because they are not responding to my emails requesting help(more than 1 month I had been writing to them)

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    My HC2 sits in a cupboard powered on but not doing anything these days. Waiting for 4.x to change my world (maybe...)

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    I can understand the sentiment, I also have the same issues. But I tried several other systems before and I can tell you that Fibaro (for me) is still the best system out there. It's not always stable, but it's more stable than Vera, and a lot more stable than Zipato.

    @Topolino: I really don't understand what you're trying to achieve with the actions in the opening post. It's bad for the Fibaro community that we're all part off. Next to that in the unlikely case that they release the software sooner you just have more chance on bugs.

    I am also looking forward to the next version, but all we can do is just wait for it. Or switch to another system, but I'm afraid you'll find other problems there...

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  • I don't want to harm Fibaro or the community, but I feel tricked into participating in a very expensive beta program. I want Fibaro to give us a heads up about when we can expect to have all the known problems solved (i.e. version 4), and when we can have the functionality that has so far been falsly advertised.

    I also want anyone considering to buy these products to have the benefit of knowing know up front that it's not what it pretends to be in the glossy advertising. I really wish I'd known how immature this was before spending a small fortune.

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    I can totally understand what topolino is trying here and feel the same.. The marketing brochures are very sleek and the products are excellent in how they look.. we as Fibaro customers just want the creases ironed out and be able to rely on the premium products that we have purchased.. there is nothing wrong in raising this as a concern and I would hope that Fibaro themselves should have someone who can respond to these queries rather then us be left in the dark. Not really asking a lot..

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