IQ Remote stability

Support
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1

I have 3 IQ Remote secondary panels paired with the main IQ Panel 2. Lately I’ve experienced a fair amount of freezing and lost connectivity.

We Arm Away at night so that the motion sensors are on, and change to Arm Stay before existing the bedroom. Just this morning, the IQ Remote in the bedroom was showing Arm Stay, so my wife went downstairs thinking the motions were off. But the alarm was triggered because the IQ Remote was frozen on a previous status; the main panel had been on Arm Away.

I know these connect via wi-fi and all of my panels (including main IQ2) show 4-5 bars of signal strength. With the periodic lost connectivity, sometimes the IQ Remote won’t re-connect with the main panel even though it’s successfully connected to wi-fi. One time I rebooted the IQ Remote several times to no avail. I gave up, left it alone for a few hours, and then came back later and it was able to pair.

I have assigned all 3 IQ Remotes and the IQ2 static IPs through my router’s DNS settings. Haven’t noticed similar issues with any other wi-fi devices on my network.

Since this is occurring with all 3 IQ Remotes, I’m wondering if there is an issue at the main IQ2 that I should be investigating.

Anyone have an idea of what could be going on here?

2

hmm, well we are certainly happy to help try and get this figured out for you! Based on your description I would have a few more questions to confirm:

  1. What model router do you use?
  2. Do you have multiple access points in the home or just the main router?
  3. If you have more access points, what model are they?
  4. Are the IQ Remotes affixed to the wall? Or are they on night stands/desks, etc.?
  5. If wall mounted, are there any high voltage lines directly behind the remotes or the IQ Panel 2?
  6. You say this is happening lately. Did you not experience these issues originally? How long did the system function without issue?
3

I may have found the culprit: a metal shelf near the router. It was moved there around the time this started happening.

It seems obvious, I know. I was fully aware that metal can interfere with wi-fi but thought I was in the clear when there was no apparent degradation in signal strength. Didn’t think to monitor intermittency and throughput more closely, especially since other devices (including more than 10 ADC cameras) don’t seem to be having problems.

Still don’t know why that would cause the IQ Remotes to freeze, but let me relocate that shelf and evaluate the difference. Trying to isolate one thing at a time. Will report back either way. Thanks!

4

Metal will typically cause the most signal attenuation. If the devices functioned properly up until when the shelf was moved it is certainly a good thing to test.

Other devices may also experience issues here and there, but they may recover more swiftly/gracefully from interruption.

5

Things are much improved, so the metal shelf was the primary culprit. I moved the shelf to another part of the house, and a sensor nearby has started losing supervision, so there’s my additional proof. Very surprising because it’s an open air shelf, but lesson learned.

I’ve had a couple of disconnects since then but the IQ Remotes have had absolutely no issue reconnecting. There may be another factor with the network configuration I need to explore, but reliability is back to an acceptable level. Will report back if I can’t get it worked out.

Thanks again!

6
Very surprising because it’s an open air shelf, but lesson learned.

Metal tends to just eat up RF signals. One of the biggest problems I’ve encountered when installing wireless door contacts for example is a thick metal frame. Often the sensor will function normally even just held a few inches away from the corner of the door, but when mounted the signal is lost.