submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 11 months ago) by corroded@lemmy.world to c/homeassistant@lemmy.world

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I recently found a box in storage that contains about 10 Philips Hue bulbs; I had completely forgotten that I used them in the past. At the time, I had them paired to a Hue bridge. The newest is probably at least 6 years old, maybe a bit more.

I now have a Zigbee network with HA, and so I figure I might as well use the bulbs; they all still work. I can't figure out how to reset them so I can pair them to my Zigbee controller, though. Every article I read assumes that they're already connected to a bridge, to Amazon Alexa, I have a Hue dimmer controller, or something of the sort.

Is my only option to sign up for a Hue account, set up my old bridge, and reset them through the Hue app? Surely there must be some other way. I found a thread on [that other site that isn't Lemmy] that gives a routine of switching power on/off to cause a factory reset, but it doesn't work after several tries.

UPDATE: I was never able to find a method that worked without using my old Hue bridge. I ended up connecting the bridge and manually deleting each bulb. I few I had to add and delete again, but after about an hour of work, I was able to pair them all with HA.

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[-] ryan@the.coolest.zone 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Cobbling together data from a couple sources...

Install each bulb, and toggle it on/off five times with the wall switch. Make sure to wait 10 seconds between each toggle. (Edit: like on for ten, then off for a couple seconds, repeat)

Unsure whether there's any visual feedback once this process is complete - I would assume it may go into some pairing indication mode like a dim/brighten cycle to indicate it's ready to pair.

[-] corroded@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

That's a bit different than what I read. I read something like 8 seconds on, 2 seconds off, repeat, repeat. I'll give your method a try.

[-] Astarii_Tyler@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

My bulbs would reset after 5 quick on/off cycles

[-] SmashingSquid@notyour.rodeo 3 points 1 year ago

If you use zigbe2mqtt and your zigbee adapter supports touchlink you can reset them using that.

https://www.zigbee2mqtt.io/guide/usage/touchlink.html#scan

[-] prim3r@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 year ago

I had to get a hue remote to properly reset my bulbs.

[-] adam@doomscroll.n8e.dev 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah, a standard hue remote lets you do it. I can't remember the exact thing but it's something as simple as holding the remote next to the bulb with a button pressed when you turn the light on.

[-] radon12445@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I had to deal with this two days ago. Using one of the new remotes, you have to get very close to the lamp and hold down the power and the scene button for ten seconds. My color lamp started flashing cold white and once it was fully reset it glowed in warm white. After that it was ready to pair again. The remote doesn't need to be paired to the lamp.

[-] DecentM@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

I'm not buying Hue anymore, but the few ones I have reset and are ready for pairing after like four or five power cycles. Last I had to do it I remember reading about a time window that those cycles need to be in but I'm not sure how fast it needs to be.

[-] corroded@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I don't really want to buy Hue any more either, but I might. I started switching over to Zigbee devices several weeks ago, and I've had a hell of a time getting motion sensors that would work. I've used a few PIR sensors and mmWave sensors. By far, the best performing out of all of them are the Hue motion sensors. I'm not a big fan of their decision to force Hue Bridge users onto a "it's all in the cloud, let us collect your personal information" plan, but as far as a hardware goes, they're orders of magnitude ahead of the other white-label stuff I've tried.

[-] modesto_hagney@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

I’ve used Hue Thief in the past. Usually works pretty well.

[-] Undearius@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

I just used Hue Thief a month ago to reset my Hue bulbs that I bought about 7 years ago with the gen. 1 bridge.

I did run into a few errors but eventually got it to run. I was finally able to reset the bulbs and get them paired with my be Zigbee adapter.

[-] d_ohlin@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

My Hue bulbs are the "original" (3rd gen I think) before Bluetooth was a thing...but I just walked through this whole exact same thing and I could not get them to reset with any number of power cycle routines.

The only way I could get them to actually pair with my HA/Z2M was to manually add them to my old hub (long story why they weren't already in there), and then delete them.

Yes, it was a pain. But it worked well and once I got the process down I just did 3-5 at a time and worked through them all. YMMV.

[-] corroded@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

This what I ended up doing. Did you have any issues adding them to HA? HA is able to detect them now, but it stops at Interviewing when I try to pair them. I tried 3 different types of Hue bulbs (color, white, a different color model), and they all have the same issue.

this post was submitted on 08 Nov 2023

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