Repeated dropouts and missing data.

We have no data from midnight to around 9:30am and then it's stopped reporting from 2:30pm again.

The app reports we've used a total of 4.5kwh with 2.1kwh generated from the panels... but the web dashboard is stating double that.

We've had so many dropouts for data in the last couple of weeks. Yesterday it went offline for an hour at 7pm and again for an hour at about 10:30pm.

The day before that, we lost another 2hrs of data from 00:00-01:00 and 1600-1700. The day before that, we have drop outs 00:00-00:30, 02:00-02:30, 03:30-05:00 and 20:00-21:00... before that, it went offline for 2hrs at lunchtime.

Last week we lost 3hrs early afternoon on Tuesday.

I keep looking to see if any of these coincide with the outage announcements that you report... and they don't.

Any idea why?

It could be your internet dropping out, but you would probably notice that.

So it is more likely that your dongle is losing connection with your house WiFi. The easiest way to check is to see if it is flashing blue (solid blue means it has WiFi contact). Our dongle sometimes loses contact, and can take up to an hour to reconnect.

If it is the WiFi connection, you may need to get a better WiFi signal at your inverter/dongle.

GE server outages are much more rare - but they do happen. You can usually see people reporting these on the GE Facebook user pages.

Anomnomnomaly I had a similar thing when I connected my new smart TV by WiFi. I think it was just a bit too much for my system. When I connected it by an ethernet cable the problem went away, Someone suggested that the issue could be linked to WIFI channels - too many people in the neighbourhood using the same one. Why don't you have a look at what they suggested - it may work for you - put "why does my inverter keep going off line into the search box and you'll see the previous message string.

To answer a few suggestions made (thanks)

1: Internet hasn't dropped out all day. I work from home and am connected constantly... I'd certainly have noticed any dropouts. My router logs show no disconnections.
2: Wifi signal strength is good, I've tested the signal to the garage where the inverter and battery are located. Router again shows the HF-A21 connected
3: Wifi channels are again as clear as they can be... I changed them all to avoid interference. The only other wireless devices in use such as TV's are located on the opposite side of the house away from the inverter. Other TV's and tv boxes are all ethernet connected.

I have a wireless router at the phone socket on one side of the house, and a mesh router upstairs that's only about 4 meters away from the inverter itself.

I get solid 2.4ghz and 5ghz signals through the whole house, with little to no interference from neighbours according to the app I use to monitor signal strength. Most devices in the house (phones/tablets (3 phones, 2 tablets) are using 5ghz usually and only 2 TV's and the inverter are using 2.4ghz wifi band.
5:

Some people have reported difficulties with mesh networks ( what ever they are!) and older dongles that get confused by 5ghz signals. Someone suggested turning off the 5ghz signal until the dongle reconnects and then switching it back on - other people say they run 2.4 and 5 GHZ signals simultaneously with no issues. I'm afraid I've reached the limit of my "borrowed" knowledge, but perhaps someone else will have some new ideas

I can try turning of the wifi side of the mesh router. It's connected to the master via ethernet and is to to help with 5ghz signal strength upstairs in my office... But I've also wired up almost everything else via ethernet to that router now too... So both PC's, and the nVidia Shield TV box.

It came back online about 4:30pm... But I've only got data for 6hrs out of 18 today.

The time it went offline... exactly midnight... was also at a time when everyone was in bed... and TV's have been on and in use over wi-fi at many times when it's remained connected. So I'm kinda ruling that one out too.

The only thing left to try is turning of the mesh wifi side and leave all wifi to the master.

Anomnomnomaly I know this shouldn’t have any effect but are you using the mobile app?.. by that I mean
do you have the mobile app installed on a phone which is in the same WiFi?

Karen Wifi may have 99 problems, but this ain't one of them 😀

A 2.4GHz-only device has no way to know about a 5GHz network. If you think about it, it literally can't see those other radio signals at all. So being the same name definitely won't be a problem. I've occasionally heard of the opposite, i.e. dual-frequency devices having a problem if both networks were given the same name and got confused because they could see both. But that was a long time ago, and anecdotal.

Also on mesh networks: these are pretty bulletproof, I doubt that's an issue. Extenders are problematic, but this shouldn't be confused with Mesh which achieves the same effect but much more robustly.

People also get a bit obsessed about the GE Inverter not having 5GHz. To be honest though, if you've only got a single access point (router) and don't want the cost of Mesh, then 2.4GHz has much, much further range so is an easier bet to get right for the average domestic user. 5GHz is much more likely to need multiple access points (e.g. Mesh) to cover the same area. And it's not like you need the high data-rate of 5GHz for just pulling a few datapoints from an Inverter 😀

None of this helps OP admittedly. But thought I'd settle a few myths 😆

I defer to those with more knowledge Riscy - I was just summarizing some of the feedback I have seen given by others to those who have had this issue - don't really understand the tech stuff, but this does seem to be quite a common problem. The general approach seems to be quite relaxed - just wait it will come back on it's own - but it sounds as though gavin has something that is occurring much more frequently than most of us have seen.

naltsta

Yes, using the givenergy app, this install was only set up on the 6th Jan and commissioned by the 10th.

So far I've been quite happy... with a near perfect South facing roof we're maximising generation for what is a low part of the year.

I'm still working with settings to figure out the best ones... currently on a fixed rate tariff until Sept this year, so protected from the price rises, but also can't take advantage of any lower night rates.

So for now, the battery is charging from solar only... so doesn't get more than a few % most days, and that's used up when you boil a kettle most days.

But several times we've had that up to 50% charge already, max generation was 6kwh about 12 days ago... and last week when we were away for a few days... the battery got a full charge on Tuesday that ran the house on idle along with solar for just over 2 days.

We're currently averaging about 20-25% of power covered in 3 weeks of Jan.

Our last place had a 4kw system too, but it was installed before you had apps to monitor, and no battery system... but we were on the FiT and earning between £600-700 a year from the panels, and saving about £30-40 a month of the bills.

This year, I get to really dig into the figures and see how much we can generate and use... and I've not even let my provider know they're installed yet.

Anomnomnomaly

I think the phone app does something weird when trying to force a local connection.

I think I fixed all my WiFi dropouts by allowing the app “always on” access to my location data.

I know that sounds mental but I haven’t had a single dropout since and I was getting them all the time too.

Karen Yeah I felt bad that my reply wasn't that useful in answering the question... Hopefully it ruled-out a few things though. The more you rule-out, the more likely to stumble across the right answer 😀

Any suggestion could be helpful... when you've got an odd intermittent issue that you can't replicate... it's often just a case of eliminating as many options as possible.

For example, this was a screenshot of yesterday

https://www.dropbox.com/s/f4vitwg94d2n041/Screenshot_20230203-102808.png?dl=0

and one of this morning

https://www.dropbox.com/s/su4nrfl460x9ejn/Screenshot_20230203-102823.png?dl=0

If the problem isn't consistent... hard to know what's causing it

I've lost count of the number of times I have to stop the app and restart it again just to get it to show fresh data.

Anomnomnomaly This isn't the answer to your question but I was talking to the oil boiler service engineer looking at why my Mum's boiler kept failing on flame failure. He found that problem was caused by a poor connection on the photocell circuit. But he told me he had been called to one lady six times when her boiler kept intermittently switching off. On his final call, he happened to be standing by the boiler when it switched off. He asked her what she had been doing and she said she had just been switching channels on the TV. Turns out the RF boiler thermostat in the living room was affected by the remote control! A call to tech support to change the channel the RF was working on sorted that problem out. But if she hadn't been changing channels while he was stood by the boiler, it could have rolled on for weeks. It might also explain why my Mum's garage door opener also randomly operates (or used to, the power supply is switched off now)!

Do you use the app for all your monitoring, or have you tried using the portal? If so, do you see the same dropouts on the portal graphs? The app is known to be a bit flaky at times, but generally the portal is more reliable. At least you would be able to eliminate if it is the app causing your issues or if it is something effecting the dongle connection?

Tim

Strange you mention that... recently I had an issue where my nVidia shield TV box in my bedroom would turn on randomly within no one in the room or even upstairs.

We tried all of the remotes in the house as all the TV's are Samsungs... and whilst you could trigger the TV with another remote... it needed to be a near direct line of sight. So some needed to be changing the channel or turning it on in one bedroom with both bedroom doors open... which just doesn't happen as those TV's are only used as people go to bed.

I wondered it it was being triggered by something external... like a neighbour... But detached house and as far as I can tell, no one watching a TV middle of the day that would have line of sight for 30-40 meters or even a reflected signal due to distances between houses/gardens and so forth.

In the end I adjusted a setting on either the box or the tv and it stopped... The box may occasionally turn on still but without a signal detected it sleeps again... you can only trigger the tv to turn on with the remote, it's not triggered by the box waking up like before.

So for a remote to trigger it... I would assume it to be consistent. There are 3 brick/block walls between the downstairs lounge and the garage. 2 internal single skin walls and an external double skin with filled cavity.

The remote can't trigger the TV in the bedroom above the lounge which is just, plasterboard, wooden joists, floorboards and carpet. So I wouldn't think an infra red remote signal could cause the drop outs... and it appears that the data is still being recorded and sent to givenergy as the web ui data differs from what I was seeing in the app.

Yesterday the app showed no data from midnight to 9am, and then no data from 2-4pm and again 9-11pm... so 13hrs missing. It reports we imported 6.11kwh from the grid and today the web ui says the same, but yesterday the live data was saying we'd imported about 10.5kwh... 12-9am the house is pretty much idling with standby stuff on... maybe a tv to 1-2am, or from 7am. so 100-200w on average... would certainly add an extra few kwh and the drop in the afternoon was when the dishwasher was on (not an IoT one)... the late evening one I'd actually already gone to bed and was watching a movie

The only signals I can think of that are wifi or blutooth are my soundbar and wireless sub/rears hooked up to my PC, and when I next notice a drop out, I'll shut those off... and as I now have access to the web/ui dashboard. I can always restart the inverter remotely and see if that resolves it.

Typically... it's not dropped out at all today, and we've not changed routines at all... in fact we've used the washing machine and tumble dryer today as we had a little boost of sunshine between 12-2 that was generating 1.5-2.2kw. Not enough to charge the battery up, but enough to partly cover the extra being used.

Anomnomnomaly Points to clarify: is the "midnight drop out" that the data connection between the inverter and Givenergy cloud is lost but the inverter continues to operate as scheduled (supplying house load/timed charge etc)? So is the issue a loss of data connection but the inverter continues to operate normally?

Is there any indication of any other devices disconnecting during the same periods (TVs)? Does your router have a reboot at midnight schedule set (even if you haven't set it)? It seems to me that it would be helpful to identify whether the issue is solely with a regular disconnection of the dongle and your router and whether the source of the disconnection is the dongle or router.

Thinking back to @hoggy's post, I recall that there used to be a routine inverter reboot scheduled every night but I'm sure Givenergy stopped that. Whether the reboot was initiated from the cloud or coded in firmware, I can't say.

If you initiate a Restart Inverter, how long does your dongle take to connect? What about DHCP lease period? What's your set at? Maybe try extending it or reducing it? Maybe the dongle isn't playing nicely with DHCP address refresh?

Tim It was a firmware thing so i guess if your on FW below D450 - A450 it's still a thing.

11/10/2021

Hybrid(D450-A450)

1.Removal of the 2 am automatic restart function
2.Fixed the problem that the hardware could not be charged after triggering low voltage during SOC correction
3.In the process of SOC correction, if there is PV, the discharge PV does not work, but the charging PV does
4.Changed the battery high voltage protection from 59.5V to 58.5V.

hoggy

Currently on software version D0.450-A0.451 if that helps

Tim

When I was watching the portal yesterday I was seeing different readings to what the app was showing... So I think there was a (delayed) live feed to there but it wasn't being recorded/shown in the app.

I've just checked the graphs in the portal for yesterday, and that data now matches what I'm seeing in the app.

So I'm unsure what was going on... as far as I could tell... I'm getting a connection with live data during the day as it was telling me how long since the app last updated and it was 'saying' it was updating... but I can't be 100% I was checking it at a time it dropped out... It updates in 30 min intervals as far as I can tell. So if I noticed no data around 10am... it was already back online for me... and it stayed like that until 2... came back at 4... so unless I actually check whilst it's dropped out... I have no idea. It's not like I can sit there glued to the screen 'waiting' for a dropout that might never happen.

Data seems to be delayed by around 30-60 mins from what I can tell... the graphs are a bit vague looking at them on the phone... the bars are kinda thin and trying to single one out to see exactly what time it's recorded isn't always easy as you progress through the day and the bars getting thinner and thinner 🙂

Right now, in the app, the last bar recorded is 15:30-16:00... it's currently 16:55 here... it says data is live and updated 20s ago... so either it hasn't updated for nearly an hour... or dropped out from 1600-1630.. The graph on the portal only seems to show up 15:00-15:30... so that delay is longer... I've refreshed both portal and app to make sure data is the latest.

Until the phone app or portal refreshes to show current data... I won;t know if it dropped out or not in the last 60-90 mins.

Anomnomnomaly the portal (normally) updates every 10 minutes. The inverter doesn’t store data; if there’s no connection, it’s lost. If you’re looking back and seeing updates every 10 mins then the connection between the inverter and GivCloud is fine. If you are not seeing updated data “in the moment” but it’s there next day, I’d question your local wifi.

Anomnomnomaly
Experienced a similar situation.
After a few months of flawless working inverter started saying "Offline" and had data a gaps.
Spoke to GE and was told it was my WiFi coverage,
I was sceptical as there had been no changes to my Router/WiFi setup but since I had a spare additional router ended up installing that as an AP/Bridge as close are possible to the Inverter.
Since then no more "offline" reports.
So I would recommend adding another Access Point/Bridge to your WiFi setup.

Just a note on Mesh Routers they are mostly problematical for all Inverter Dongles and the GE WiFi dongle is no exception. Mesh routers are generally configured with the SSID's for 2.4ghz and 5ghz set the same, i.e. Mesh 1 or whatever. This allows most devices to reconnect simply when they move from one connection in the mesh to another.

Installers typically use their phones to set up the WiFi for the dongle. Where it gets messed up is that their phones can see both the 2,4ghz and 5ghz signal as working fine. During the connection process they connect directly to the dongle which then scans for a signal and that's where the issues start.

The GE WiFi dongle is 2.4ghz and WPA/WPA2 Security Mode, AES encryption enabled.

If you have a WPA3 encrypted router then you would need to change the Security Mode to WPA2 and AES encryption on your Router to even have a chance to resolve this,

You can either split the SSID's into two separate channels so 2.4ghz would be called maybe Mesh 2.4ghz and 5ghz would be called Mesh 5ghz (literally anything you choose so that you know which is which).

Here's the link to the Dongle Connection Guide
https://kb.givenergy.cloud/article.php?id=1

Typically... since I made this post a couple of days ago... I've not had a single drop out.

The router is using the same SSID for both 2.4Ghz & 5ghz, I used to split it at the old house because I wanted my phone and tablet to specifically only connect to 5Ghz for the bandwidth advantage as every other device in the house was using 2.4Ghz.

But now that I have a mesh setup, there's no difference in bandwidth.

The mesh router is the one closest to the dongle... it's in my office upstairs which is next to the outside wall and garage. About 4 meters away from the inverter in a straight line, and only a cavity wall in the way.

I've measured the signal using a wifi analyser app in the garage and getting about 70-80% signal strength on 2.4Ghz.... So I don't think that was ever the problem... and I was getting live signals in the app... But as I didn't notice the drop outs as they were happening... I can't be sure if I saw live data at times the app/portal reports them missing.

So I've been checking the app/portal every couple of hrs during the day... in the hope of spotting when it happens.... and typically... it hasn't dropped out at all since the 2nd Feb

I appear to be having a drop out right now. Portal is reporting two different readings for my system.

Image one shows that the graph hasn't updated in 90 mins and showing 0.71kwh of generation., but in the same image right below it, it's saying that I've generated 1.4kwh. and in screenshot 2 taken about 1 min later, the live data is saying 1.5kwh

This is exactly what I was talking about before... I'm getting live data, the app is getting live data... but it's not being recorded. The inverter shows as online right now and is recording the data as you can see in image 3

Is there any way to tag in an actual member of staff from GE to explain what's going on... the data is there... it's being sent out... because I can see it through the web portal... So why is it not being recorded?

As a rule always update the panel you are interested in by refreshing it. Refreshing the graphs panel, for exmaple, doesn't refresh everything.

I have found also the graphs panel is regularly lagging behind the latest data even when forcing a refresh. I suspect is uses some consolidated data which is updated periodically. For me it always shows the data an hour or two later - uless there has been a general outage on the GE servers.

cluelesscris Yeah, I'm refreshing each panel several times along with a ctrl F5 of the entire webpage, to ensure I'm getting the absolute latest data from the web portal and not anything cached locally.

The fastest way to get in touch with the folks at GE is to use the live chat service online.

If you call you will be on hold for a LONG time.

My dongle doesn't even see the WiFi if I have both 2.4ghz and 5ghz enabled.

If you can split the bands, leave the current SSID as 2.4ghz only, and make a new one for the 5Ghz.

Problems mostly gone away since then for me. Still the odd drop out since 2.4ghz is a bit ropey but it does work most of the time.

LordHippos Honestly there's no way for the dongle to even see the 5GHz network. So having both networks with the same name will not be a problem. If you think about it, it doesn't have a radio than can tune 5GHz, so how would it know about it.

(and fwiw lots of people on here are running identical 2.4 and 5 network names and the dongle has no issue.)

Riscy

I don't entirely disagree but it's not perfect, if I logon to the dongle via the IP address, it doesn't see my 5Ghz SSID at all, and if I have both bands on the same one, it also won't see it or connect (even if I manually add the details).

It would be a way of ruling out some kind of band switching causing the issue.

LordHippos There is a thing called "band steering" which some wifi APs/routers implement. What this does is for a new device on the network, it forcibly ignores the initial 2.4GHz packets from that device, in an attempt to cause it to seek a 5GHz one instead. (because devices with dual-radios will try connecting on both)

If it's a purely 2.4GHz-only device then obviously it never tries a 5GHz association. So then it keeps retrying on 2.4 (think of it like if your mobile phone has been out of signal and comes back again). The router's band-steering then gives up waiting for a 5GHz and allows the 2.4 to connect.

TL;DR you might see a delay the first time you add a 2.4GHz-only device onto a dual-band network, while the router does the band-steering and waits for a timeout on the 5GHz. But, it will connect on 2.4GHz after a period, and will (ok, should) then remember for that device not to try band-steering again.

Lost a further 3hrs of data this morning, missed 30 mins, came back, missed 30 mins, came back, missed 2hrs, came back.

Ironically it's reporting the data back to the portal... just not recording it. So the app reports I generated 2.44kwh today, whilst the portal tells me it's 4.9kwh.

Likewise, the app reports just 4.3kwh imported from the grid today, whilst the portal tells me 5.4kwh

The dongle has it's own inbuilt SSID scanning tool on the config page in sta interface settings > search and will show an rssi % value. I'd check this when you do and don't have the issue, it definitely sounds interference related. The dongle can be flakey with anything under 65%.

When people reference mesh as an issue, it's because the dongle ties to SSID and not Mac address and doesn't hunt for better, it can just tie to the first name it sees (which could be a 10% AP on the other side of the property).

Adam-Reynolds Good info!

Is it not the other way around, though? Binding to an SSID would be fine, because if a stronger AP with the same SSID comes in range then it'll roam seamlessly. However, if it binds to a specific AP MAC, then yes that would be an issue if you bind to the wrong one.

Adam-Reynolds How can I check the dongle?

I can't see anything in the app except setting up a new dongle

Anomnomnomaly Log into your home router and find the IP address of the dongle. It will have a hostname with either HA.... or in our case WFxxxxGxxx. Use either the ip address (192.168.1.xxx or whatever your home router says the IP address is) or the hostname (WFxxxxGxxx etc) in a browser (ie http://hostname or http://192.168.1.xxx). Try admin and admin for userid and password. If this doesn't work, try admin with a password of the serial number of the inverter or dongle. One of these is likely to work. Then you can change default settings if you want. When you make changes, remember to apply them when you move onto the next section. I suggest you leave:

Mode Selection

• as STA Mode Transparent Mode

AP interface Settings (Note this is redundant until the day you need to get into the dongle by the back door)

• 11/b/g/n
  leave other settings except Security Mode

• WPA2/PSK

• make a new TKIP passphrase and make a note for future reference

• Leave LAN setup as IP address 10.10.100.254; subnet mask 255.255.255.0 and DHCP Type server (you will need to use this route if you ever need to get back into the dongle in AP mode)

STA Interface Setting

• AP's SSID - your home wifi SSID

• MAC Address doesn't matter unless you want to be able to recognise this in your routers "connected devices" table

• Security Mode WPA2PSK

• Encryption Type AES

• Pass Phrase (Enter your home wifi password here

• WAN connection Type this can be fixed IP or DHCP but if you do set it to fixed, do that in your home router first in attached devices.

• Static Mode - IP Address you set in your router for the inverter dongle

• Subnet Mask is almost always 255.255.255.0

• Default Gateway is the IP address of your router (often 192.168.1.254 or 192.168.1.0) which will route traffic from the dongle to the internet to go to Givenergy cloud

• DNS leave blank as your router will provide this service

Application Setting
Isn't applicable

Device Management
Change the account name if you wish, but change the Password to one which you make a note of so you can log in to change these settings in future if needed.

Don't forget that you need to apply each change needs for it to be written to the dongle.

Tim

The dongle went offline earlier today and refuses to come back... it's on, there's a blue light flashing... cannot connect via the router IP or the LAN setup IP

I tried to connect to the dongle via my phone as the instructions suggest... that implies there is no security for initial connection... but it's asking for a password that I don;t know. It's not the SSID, it's not the serial number and it's the wifi password either.

Anomnomnomaly try resetting it as per this guide (or try the suggestions for passwords)

https://kb.givenergy.cloud/article.php?id=1

Anomnomnomaly The dongle has it's own wifi you connect to to initially to set it up, it's broadcasting it's own connection essentially.

I think default password is just admin as per comment above, but the recommendation was to set it to the inverter S/N which some of the installers may do.

Otherwise I think 12345678 or 123456789 may also be what mine came with.

I've reset the dongle, and it still won't let me connect

The guide shows that you can connect to the dongle initially without a password, and then you need the admin/admin password to connect via a browser.

I can't even get past that first step. I've tried the dongle code as the pass, admin is too short as it's requiring at least 8 characters. 12345678 & 123456789 don't work

If I can't even connect to the dongle, I can't do anything else.

I've even removed the dongle and plugged it into my PC to see if I can access any settings that way.... the drive appears but there's nothing on it except a text file with the serial written to it

Anomnomnomaly
you need to ask the installer what password they set surely?

positor1 If I've reset the dongle, surely it should be back to default https://kb.givenergy.cloud/article.php?id=1 shows it connecting directly without any password... but it's asking for one... and even if it was password free, you can't connect with a blank password box.

I've actually tried connecting with 2 different phones now and a wifi dongle connected to my PC

Anomnomnomaly Give Givenergy a call, or better a web chat during office hours. If the chat function is manned, it'll pop up from the contact-us page, otherwise it's a phone call. You seem to have tried everything that we have suggested.

had the installers out today, we have 2 problems that were causing issues and conflicting with each other.

1: The dongle seems to have failed... probably getting worse over time
2: WiFi signal to the garage keeps dropping to about 26%

So they've replaced the dongle and that needs configuring again... But to do that properly we need to see about installing a booster.

We'll try a wireless booster tomorrow, he's going to bring one round. If that doesn't work well enough, then I can try a powerline adapter with ethernet (need to order that), and failing that run an ethernet cable from the router in my office, through the wall into the garage roof and into a booster in the garage.

That last one... is the worst case option... wifi booster or powerline adapter with wifi booster plugged into it will be easier and cheaper.

Anomnomnomaly I've been using a TP-link AV600 Powerline successfully in the garage for nearly two years. It does need rebooting occasionally, but better than drilling holes through the house...

Anomnomnomaly If you ever intend to have an EV charger in/by your garage, you'll probably want to install ethernet to get a CT connection to it. Maybe running ethernet (or two) now might not be a bad option?

Going for the easier option to begin with.

I already have a netgear powerline adapter in the lounge next to the router and upstairs in my office... Simply because running ethernet across the lounge, out the side of the house then up and around over the top of the conservatory to the far back corner of the property... was an issue... Unsightly cables tacked to skirting, drilling holes in walls and running cables up and around for 20 meters... was something... the other person in the house didn't want.

To be fair, they work quite well... it's only a gigabit lan in the house and I'm getting around 570Mbps over the powerline... and we're only getting a 60Mbps connection at the moment because we won't be getting fibre to the home for at least another 2-3yrs.

Adding another one to the system will be fine, combining that with a netgear wifi booster plugged in at the back of the garage.

Should be here by tomorrow... cost is £75 and that should resolve the weak wifi signal and boost it so that the dongle is getting well over 50%.

Then it's just a case of setting the new dongle up for the system and get that sweet, sweet data flowing properly again. 😃

Well, after installing and configuring the new wifi booster... actually configured with a powerline adapter and setting the wifi booster as an access point rather than extender... I now have a wifi signal to the garage of 83% on the 2.4ghz band... I'm not using it at all for 5ghz as my mesh router upstairs covers that and I don't need 5ghz to the garage at all.

The access point is about 3ft from the dongle on the other side of the wall.

I connect to the replacement dongle, log in... follow the instructions.. as soon as I select the wifi network, enter the passkey and hit apply.

Then entire dongle seems to crash... by the time I can get back into it... no settings have been saved at all.

Cue this repeating every single time... the dongle appears to lose power... the light goes out and comes back on after a little while.

So I've cured the wifi issue, the dongle has been replaced... and we still can't configure the dongle.

I'm starting to think that the problem actually lies with the inverter itself... that it's not able to supply the right amount of power to the USB device, or that we've been unlucky and had 2 consecutive dongles that are faulty.

As far as a process of elimination goes... those are the two remaining options... if a 3rd dongle is tried and cannot be configured... it HAS to be the inverter... or at least the part of the inverter that works with the dongle.

Anomnomnomaly Have you tried taking the dongle out of the inverter and plugging it into a USB power supply, then logging on to it and carrying out the reconfiguration? If it is the inverter failing to provide sufficient power while the dongle writes updates to its config file, this would show where the problem lies.

Tim Didn't know you could do that... will a simple phone charger suffice?

Anomnomnomaly Should do. I've heard of people plugging them into their computer to power the device and also to log onto it at the same time.

Tim

We are back online again... system has been re-commissioned with the new dongle... as of about 4pm today.