Doorbell install info for users

May or may not help and may be vague.

This isn't the fix all end all. Mesh and wifi differs, especially signal strength, walls etc.

First, my call is supposed to occur today with the inside tech, he was busy up on another call yesterday, but emailed me.

I've supposedly received two doorbells with improved WiFi antennas. I can't confirm that, so I do have to assume its fact.

Operationally it is not fact or any different that I can find than the old doorbells.

Install is persnickety.

Basically how I did it with an Orbi Mesh RBK53 Wifi which has two access points.Single SSID broadcast both 2.4ghz and 5ghz at once and can't be split.

Did not reset doorbells prior to install.

Did not turn off transformer power, I'm an electrician or was at one time, and know how to handle low voltage, for your own safety turn it off.

1. Removed retainer screw in old doorbells.

2. Slid old doorbell up and off original mounting plate. Reused those plates.

3. Hooked my phone to the same wifi connection as I have all Simplisafe hardware connected to.

4. Doorbells are a little slow responding so be patient.

5. Opened app, chose install doorbell pro.

6. Patience again, until it say doorbell is ready to connect etc.

7. As read previously, if doorbell appears DOA, with power on wait a while until it's internal brain battery charges a little.

8. So, in app, when barcode pops up to scan, so does another popup with instructions, I didn't read it, just tap above it to get it to disappear.

9. When holding phone with bar code in front of doorbell camera, about 8 inches so it can scan bar code. Might help, if problems scanning, move the phone in and out and do the twist, and shake it all about, a little. 😂 

10. It'll say, connecting to wifi or something. Wait. Be patient.

11. Blinking Lights I haven't mentioned there a direction sheet somewhere here on their function.

12. Both doorbells turned Red, blinking or not I don't recall. Means it can't connect to wifi I think.

13. Patience again. As I was about to just give up, reset and try again, I did something that may not matter at all while it was Red, I opened my quick tools on my Samsung and turned off wifi on my phone. Matter or not, unknown. I'm fairly certain my phone was connected to 5Ghz band, why wouldn't it be.

14. I did reset each doorbell once or twice while fiddling with the install.

15. First doorbell got happy and connected to my mesh. Eventually. Patience. 😔 

16. 2nd doorbell same procedures, even the unknown effect one.🤷 Really shouldn't be necessary but who knows.

17. Both doorbells connected to mesh.

Also for giggle's, I had an extender, my brand, and connected one doorbell to that for testing. No difference whatsoever that I could see. Put extender back in storage. Lol

Now testing and operation.

Opening SS app running connection checker. Both reported well within specifications. All blue bars, Dbm -38.

Actually the connection checker varies on upload speed, I assume it's what the doorbell reports, as I have 24Mbs upload available. Reports varie from 2 or 3 and always below 10. Usually 9.something.

Ok, about the same as old doorbells.

Oh, forgot, both new doorbells had a firmware version ending in 

.176. Old ones were .171.

Both new doorbells eventually showed updating in app. (Actually downdated)

It was actually a downgrade as both new doorbells fell back to .171 firmware version from .176.

One doorbell, the side doorbell, took at least a half hour with update spinning in app, hiccuped during update and said disconnected, then resumed.🤷. finally finished.

Continued testing when they were finally happy. Live views are almost exactly like old doorbells.

Occasionally, very occasional though it is, if a doorbell that hasn't been used for a while might open in 2 to 4 seconds once in a while.

However, what is typical if not live viewed for 10-15 minutes or hours; 30 seconds, patience ran out, multiple tries, 3 probably sounds right, and then they finally opened live view.

They're powered devices. Another however is this, once live view opens, much like outdoor battery cameras, I can click back and forth between live views and consistently open live view on both doorbells, multiple times in 3 or 4 seconds. Back and forth. Almost like they sleep like battery cams.

I'm leaning firmware bugs and/or hardware.

Until I let them rest a while then they may open live view, may not, but is more likely to be back to 30 seconds and 3 attempts, disconnects and reconnects.😵‍💫🙄

Both fired at 5AM this morning when base disarmed. One good video, one black video. Which is also typical here at least.

Thats pretty much what I did, I skipped some irrelevant stuff.

I spent 2 or 3 hours fiddling and testing both new (refurbished) doorbells.

A QC Simplisafe tip, both retainer screw threads in the plastic part of the doorbells, need a thread tap run through the threads. More than likely stripped or cross threaded by previous users. Maybe you do, maybe you don't prior ro shipping to customers.

I'll be buying a tap at the hardware store, the retainer screws which I reused were good, but only start in threaded plastic hole about 1.5 turns and then stops or will cross thread.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.😉