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Forum Discussion
I need to disable 5g to hook up my smart plugs that use 2.4
My smart plugs - WEMO and Meross - have great trouble connecting to the Orbi RBR750. They need to use 2.4g. Their support says to turn off or turn down the power of the 5g on the orbi to do it. I ...
Amazon delivered the Meross MSS110 today. Installed Meross app, followed directions, plug is working on Orbi WiFi.
Repeat: Android phone remains connected to Orbi 5G WiFi channel. Did nothing to the Orbi system.
Now have 13 brands of smart plug that connect to Orbi WiFi "no problem."
Sorry for my delayed response. I finally figured out how to turn down the radio signal for the 5g, which involved Advanced-->Advanced-->Wireless settings. (I was just doing Advanced-->Wireless before, which was incorrect).
When I turned 5g down to 25% temporarily, I was able to link the Meross. When I turned it back to 100% and tried to link a second Meross it did not work. Not sure why my system functions differently than yours. I see from the discussion boards than a number of people seem to have the same problem as I in their setup functionality. Note that I have had the same issue with WEMO.
In any case, it was beyond the call of duty for you to purchase a Meross just to test it out, and I really appreciate it!
Smart Plugs are my new hobby (since Covid has restricted almost everything else. And, it turns out to be less costly than my previous hobbies!)
Smart Plugs require a bit of patience, and sometimes more than one attempt. Plus, when I said "nothing", that it literally true. Did not chance the Transmit power, stop broadcasting SSID... nothing. I did notice the Meross plug seemed to 'hickup' at one point (maybe looking for WiFi systems?)
Some Internet of Things (IoT) devices definitely pose problems. Specifically..
- Some attempt to pass the MAC address of the WiFi access from the smartphone app to the device. If the phone is connected to a 5G WiFi access point, this will fail because the device will never 'see' that access point (MAC address). Those are the devices which require all sorts of bother (stopping SSID broadcast, getting the phone far enough away from the access point that it selects the 2.4G signal, installing another access point that is 2.4G only, etc.)
- Just recently, someone posted about an old thermostat that displayed the SSID of every individual access point (but not the MAC address of each one), which made picking the right access point a crap-shoot.
- There was a WiFi controller made to place inside automatic blinds that was the very devil because the setup process was simply unreliable. Took me 5-6 identical tries to get it to work. fail, fail, fail, fail... worked! (sexactly same input every time)
Wemo (Belkin) and Meross were pretty normal for me.
What software does your smart phone run? My Sony Android phone is on Android 10 (not the newest). I have a tablet running Android 11 that I can try if it will help.
I have an iPhone running 15.4.1, but this problem has been longstanding including previous versions.
I asked the War Department if I could borrow her phone for a bit:
- iPhone 12
- 15.3.1 (I see there is software update scheduled for tonight)
Installed Meross app. Added Meross MSS110 plug. Working. No problem.
Installed Wemo app. Added Wemo plug (the wide one). Noticed that the iPhone version of Wemo app brought up a whole list of my WiFi SSIDs. They all showed 4 bars, so I just picked one. I did notice that Wemo seemed to have problems finding the plug after it was added. Had to press the 'refresh' circle once or twice. Plug added. Working.
Going through the messages, it was not clear to me which WiFi band you are using. My ancient Orbi has only primary and guest, so I always put Internet of Things on the primary SSID. Many of these IoT gizmos attempt to connect through the WiFi network directly to the smartphone at the conclusion of setup. When the smartphone is on the guest WiFi network, that often doesn't work.
I understand the "5G issue" has been around since the Orbi was first introduced, and there definitely are devices which will not connect (mostly because of poorly written software). But my impression is that Meross and Wemo will connect with both Android and Apple smartphone apps.
Oh, the 750 supports 802.11ax on both 5G and 2.4G bands. I seem to recall posts mentioning that some devices are incompatible with ax and recommending unchecking the box on Advanced Wireless Setup for the 2.4 band.
Now...... how the heck do I get these apps off her iPhone?????? Ah. Loooooong press on the icon.