HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup

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HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup

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HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup
HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup
2018-06-01 21:07:35
Model :

Hardware Version :

Firmware Version : 1.5.2

ISP : AT&T

I recently bought a HS210 KIT 3-way smart switch. I got all the wires hooked up and confirmed that the manual operation of the light switches work. Both switches turn on and off the light and both switches still have power when the light is off, regardless of which switch I use to turn on/off the light.

My problem comes when I am setting up the switch in the Kasa app. I go through all of the steps and enter my WiFi password. It then sits at a "Connecting to Home Network - We are finishing your Smart Switch configuration and adding it to your home network" screen for several minutes. It eventually fails and gives a screen that says "Installation Failed - Double check your WiFi password and let's follow the Install Guide again - Don't worry, we've saved your Smart Switch details - Start Over". If I hit start over I go through the whole process again and it eventually fails with the same error. The funny part is if I then cancel the setup instead of starting over, the first switch does show up in the app and I can control it through the app. Additionally the lights on the switch itself show that is in normal operation mode (on the switch I get a solid green "signal" light and not the flashing green/amber light). Obviously this means the switch was able to connect to the WiFi network despite what the app said. The problem is that it never "pairs" with the second switch. The second switch remains with the flashing amber/green light. If I reset everything and try configuring from the other switch instead, I still get the same problem, but in reverse. I have gone ahead and just tried configuring the second switch after successfully configuring the first switch, but the end result is that I still get the error message and I end up with two devices in the Kasa app. The two switches should be pairing with each other and should only be seen as one switch.

Because I was able to successfully connect both switches to my WiFi, I was able to update the Firmware on them (1.5.2), but the updated firmware did not seem to make a difference. Does anyone what is going on? Any way to pull logs to see why it is failing? I tried on both an Android Phone and on an Apple iPad, but got the same failure (although with the Apple iPad the switches never got added to the app).
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#1
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4 Reply
Re:HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup
2018-06-03 20:51:40
I was able to figure this out. I have two wireless access points in addition to my main router/wireless access point, all connected via wired Ethernet. The switch was connecting to one of the stand-alone wireless access points because it was closer. Apparently it did not like this configuration. Once I shut off my stand-alone wireless access points and forced it to connect to my main router/wireless access point, it finally worked. Strange as I have never had issues with this configuration with other devices, including Wemo smart switches.
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#2
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Re:HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup
2018-06-05 01:55:02
This ^^^^

I was banging my head on the desk for an hour. Thanks Rojma!

This should be written somewhere on their business card sized install sheet. A friend returned the product when he couldn't connect using his Goggle Wifi, probably the same problem. I guess its just better to frustrate people and get negative feedback saying it doesn't work.
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#3
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Re:HS210 KIT 3-Way Smart Switch Does Not Complete Setup
2018-06-06 00:07:09
The funny part is that after I did successfully get the first switch to complete setup, l learned that all you have to do on the second switch to "pair" it to the first is hold it down for 5 seconds. This will cause the light on it to get red for a second. After that the flashing amber/green light goes away. However I don't think it is really pairing to the first switch. I just think it is telling the second switch to exit setup mode. Only the first switch is the one that connects to the WiFi. The second switch really doesn't need to connect WiFi since everything can be controlled via the first switch.

This got me curious so I went to see if I could get the second switch back into setup mode. On the second switch I rebooted it and then reset it by hitting the appropriate buttons on the switch. However all that happened when it came back on was the red light briefly came on. I then tried to hold the main switch down for 5+ seconds but this also seemed to do nothing. This begs the question of how do I get the second switch to go back into setup mode if I ever did need to truly reset it? Does it actually pair to the first switch and I have to reset both switches?

I am also curious about the firmware upgrades. When the firmware update occurs, it seems like it only happens on the first switch. How do I upgrade the firmware on the second switch? I realize it probably doesn't matter to upgrade the second switch's firmware since its not really connecting to the WiFi, but I like to be thorough and make sure all of my devices have the latest firmware.
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#4
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Seeing the same with hidden networks at points
2018-08-12 02:15:28
I'm using the 3 way switches individually, as I don't necessarily need 2 wifi switches controlling the same light. One of the Amazon reviews mentioned that you can install a pair of switches to 2 separate 3 way lights. The trick is to ignore the second part which asks you to hold the 2nd switch and blow through it.

I have a hidden network and have had very mixed results and it has taken me a lot of painful retries to get it right. The first switch I install goes fine when I blow through the 2nd switch configuration. i then start to add and configure another switch and that's when things become flaky. When it asks me to select a wifi network, it remembers the hidden network from my first configuration and _sometimes_ presents it in the list of visible networks. When that happens and I connect to it through the list, it seems to work. Configuring the second switch to manually connect to my network hangs it in the last step.

Recently for some reason one of my switches reset itself after days of working fine, and I had to struggle with the app trying to add it. It took me multiple tries for over an hour before it worked.

It's pretty clear that the wifi connections setup is not robust and relies on very touchy nuances. Would really help if TPLink addressed these and released an update.

One of the nice things about this switch is that you can use the pair of switches on 2 separate circuits effectively doubling your automation. It would also be really nice if TPLink can give the option in the app to not have to configure the 2nd switch.

I really do like the look of the Kasa switch as it blends easier with the rest of the switches. However, the app and configuration issues are painful enough to make me not use them as my first choice for single pole switches. The WEMO switches (configuration and app) seem far more robust, but do not have a 3 way switch. If Kasa can fix the wifi configuration issues and the app, I would gladly move to using Kasa switches for all future wifi switches.
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#5
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