Strange UI behavior

Community Playground General Discussions
1

Hi all,

I posted a while back on some issues I was having with my VeraLite: http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,30410.0.html

Long story short, after hours on the phone and via remote access with support, it was deemed my unit needs to be replaced. I’ve been a bit hesitant to replace it since it’s no longer under warranty and the z-wave side is working, so all of my scenes are running as scheduled. It is very hit or miss as to whether or not I can log in to manually control my devices, though. When I am able to log in, the UI is very sluggish (on UI7 at the moment, but had the same experience when going back to UI5) and sometimes will also kick me back to the log in screen. I currently only have 4 devices installed - 2 appliance modules, 1 receptacle and 1 dimmer. There are no plug ins currently installed. Everything was removed/uninstalled and the unit was factory reset multiple times when troubleshooting the issue.

I decided to look at things again today as it is getting pretty annoying not being able to log in when I want to control something. After doing some research, I ended up logging in via SSH (which took a few tries, connection kept timing out) and running the “top” command, expecting to see my CPU at or near 100% and the memory all used up as well. Well, that wasn’t the case (see screen shot). This is where things get interesting…

While I am logged in as root through SSH with the top command running, I am able to log in to my Vera without issue and run scenes with little to no lag. I am able to log out of the UI and back into it multiple times without issues, whereas before I would often get the error that my unit could not be found. I can access it via the Android app on my phone without issue. It works great!

After I close the SSH connection, I go back to not being able to log in again, and on the off chance I can log in, it is seriously slow.

So, what gives? Why does it work great with an open SSH connection? Any ideas on what is causing this?

Thanks!

2

Can’t really explain why, or even think what the specific issue might be. But, this sounds like a network issue. Things to check;

Duplicate IP address.
Firewalls.
Bad cable or switch.

3

Thanks. Those things have already been checked. I even went as far as resetting the router and connecting just the vera (directly in to the router) and my laptop (wifi) and still had the same issue. I tried other cables, removed the switch by plugging directly in to the router, and verified there were no IP conflicts. Everything was running fine and nothing had changed setup wise in well over a year prior to this issue starting so I don’t believe there are any firewalls interfering either.

If it were a network issue, don’t you think it would exhibit the same behavior regardless of the SSH connection?

4

It is the fact that an SSH connection(a TCP connection) seems to resolve the connectivity and performance issue, that causes me to suspect it is network related.

5

Well, it must have been a fluke because now I’m back to not being able to get in to my Vera. It takes many attempts to even ssh into it (timeout errors), and on the off chance I do get in after a few minutes it will disconnect saying the software aborted the connection. Then I will be stuck not able to access it again. At the same time that connection is aborted I will get page cannot be displayed errors in the UI. I guess it’s time I just cut my losses and buy a new one with hopes that one lasts a bit longer.