Techno Trials

We got our first internet connection years and years ago and for the most part, it worked well in those earlier days. Even in more recent days, it hasn’t been the worst it could be. Problems began when we added in wi-fi to our connection as we have some signal issues from the office (at the back of the house) to the living room (front of the house). There have always been some iffy spots in the living room where connections were tricky. Earlier in the year, we finally broke down and got a mesh system to extend our wif-fi. That was a pretty expensive set-up with the improvement being fairly minimal. But we stuck with it until an update to the hardware changed something so that we could no longer connect. The mesh system was taken back to the store and it was sent off for repair. Weeks later, we hadn’t heard anything so the Scientist checked up on it and it seems the manufacturer wasn’t interested in repair. We got our money back.

We opted not to go back to the mesh system and to investigate getting a couple of extra access points. The Scientist got some quotes and we had someone out this week to do the installation. I am happy to report we have some massive improvements at the front of the house and it’s now possible to sit anywhere with our devices and access the internet.

Meanwhile, we have an ongoing problem with our smart lighting. We got some smart light bulbs a few years ago for most of the rooms in our house. They fall on two systems but mostly worked okay for us. Some of the systems have been enhanced by using automation apps and those have had various rates of success. But mostly we just used voice commands to turn lights on and off. In recent months, we’ve turned off the living room light by voice or through the app for the lights and the light will come back on within seconds or minutes…with no obvious reasons. I got an email from one of the automation apps I once used so thought perhaps I had some routine on there. But there were two things listed, totally unrelated. I deleted those and the app and thought the living room light issue had been solved. Alas, it continues to cause problems. We can turn it off through the app ten times and it will pop back on shortly afterwards. Or just after you feel it’s safe to do so. We assume there must be some other automation that is conflicting but can’t figure it out. So the quest to fix this issue continues…