Problem with Conbee II and RPI 4 / Domoticz

deCONZ Setup Support
1

Hi, all,
I am new to this forum. I usually try to figure out myself what is going wrong, but afte four days of doing so, it is time to ask for help.
Situation is as follows.
I had a RPI with SSD and Domoticz and ConBee II and that worked fine with a number of devices from IKEA and LIDL (Silvercrest?).
Then I moved to another country and Zigbee does not work anymore.
I see the PHOSCON app and i can use it, but my devices do not want to pair with the ConBee II anymore.
So, I stripped the RPI to a bare computerboard and it still does not work.

When I put the Conbee II in my windows PC all devices work fine.
When I pair the devices to the LIDL hub, all devices work fine.

Only not in the RPI4 / Conbee comby.
I tried several USB cables and power supplies.

Please help.

2

Hello. May not an issue but did you chnage the timezone in Phoscon, according to the timezone On your RPI ?

3

Hello, when you use phoscon, have you a firmware number displayed on the “gateway” page ?

You have just changed country ? same raspberry (same local ip) ?

Do you make a zigbee network restauration, or just make test on an empty network ?

It’s a raspberry 4, from my memory you have usb 2 and usb 3 on it ? Have you tried only with usb 2 ?

Have you a desktop or headless OS ? (to know if we have access to the complete application for log)

4

Hi,

Firmware is 26780700
Both are on Europe/Amsterdam timezone.
I tried it all. I also started a new RPI4 from scratch with only Domoticz and deCONZ and Conbee II.
I tried it on USB2 and 3.
I have headless, but desktop via VNC on my PC.

5

Ok so no more idea, if you have started from scratch it will be ok, but just to try can you use thoses request.

sudo systemctl status deconz
sudo systemctl status deconz-gui

You need to have one enabled and one disabled.

I have headless, but desktop via VNC on my PC.
Are you sure of you ? have you enabled or not the VNC in raspiconfig ? Your debian is the headless version ?
Because on some setting launching the VNC mean start a new session.

Can you try to run deconz with command line and debug enabled ? (nothing will be stored, just look at the line for something “strange”)

/usr/bin/deCONZ -platform minimal --dbg-info=2 --dbg-error=2

But you need to close your deconz service first

sudo systemctl stop deconz-gui
sudo systemctl stop deconz
6

Funny,
When I use your command, I can pair devices. If I only state ‘sudo systemctl stop deconz’ I cannot.
device with your command are found and with sudo systemctl stop deconz they are not.

7

The command is using the headless mode.
IDK if your OS is headless or desktop natively, I know you can use VNC, but I had so much problem with that, you can have a desktop OS without keyboard and without display.

sudo systemctl stop deconz Is to stop the headless mode.

Because you can have 2 deconz instances, it’s for that I m asking to close the 2 services before using the command line.

If you want to use the headless mode can try

sudo systemctl disable deconz-gui
sudo systemctl stop deconz-gui
sudo systemctl enable deconz

Then restart the machine.

8

Hi Smanar,
Just to prevent for misunderstandings, allow me to explain my steps:
First I took a brand new SD card and put Raspberry Pi OS on it, with VNC on.
Then, I changes timezone to Europe/Amsterdam, gave it a fixed IP address.
Then I followed the https://phoscon.de/en/conbee/install#raspbian. At that moment only deCONZ was active.
Using the webinterface, on https:///pwa I could not pair any device at all.

Then you gave me the alternative and that worked, but I cannot keep that screen open, so I closed it.
I did the sudo systemctl enable deconz again, but no pairing was possible.

Then I put Domoticz on the SD, via the easy was.
After that I added the plugin, following https://github.com/Smanar/Domoticz-deCONZ.

The device I previously paired, appeard in Domoticz, but the can not be handled.
It is also nog possible anymore to pair new devices.

9

Just for information you have SD card image here ConBee SD-card images with raspbian+deconz

First I took a brand new SD card and put Raspberry Pi OS on it, with VNC on.

This is important, wich one image have you used, the desktop or the headless one ? Raspberry 3 / 4 haven’t problem with desktop.
You have enabled the VNC using raspi-config ?

The procedure you have on the phoscon website is for the Desktop version ONLY.

For me your issue is a deconz instance conflict.

If you have used an headless version of Buster, forget the VNC, the headless version is a light incomplete version.

Just type

sudo systemctl disable deconz-gui
sudo systemctl stop deconz-gui
sudo systemctl enable deconz

Restart the pi and never use VNC.

10

Ok, I think something goes wrong here.
Lately, I use the Raspberry Pi imager and choose the Debian Bullseye with desktop as the basis for Domoticz. This gives me the opportunity to remote access the computer.
I enabled VNC in the settings of the imager.

Well, I got it working with your explanation. Many thanks.

11

Yes, it’s for me the better option, raspberry 3 / 4 haven’t performance issue with desktop OS.
With this OS, when using VNC you will use exactly the same session, it s like connecting a display to the raspberry, less problem.