Smart Hub 2 backup not working

[obsidian76]

Hi,

I have just been sent a replacement Smart Hub 2 as BT suggested my current smart hub 2 might be behind recent line drops.

So I backup the settings using the router interface thinking that I can restore them to the replacement router.

Silly me new router won't accept the backup file.

So now I have hours of fun and games reconfiguring the new router to match my network settings.

But why oh why can simple tasks such as transferring settings between identical routers be seamless, what's the point of having a backup function if it doesn't work

[Keith_Beddoe]

The backup would be specific to the hub serial number, as its only intended to backup the settings of that hub, just in case you have to factory reset it. You can use that backup to recover the user specific settings.

[obsidian76]

Well that is incredibly irritating and restrictive, that will be an additional 20+ devices that need reconfiguration, oh joy.

Now where is my nearest brick wall /s

[Keith_Beddoe]

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@obsidian76 wrote:

Well that is incredibly irritating and restrictive, that will be an additional 20+ devices that need reconfiguration, oh joy.

Now where is my nearest brick wall /s

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Its always been the same for all the home hubs, even the original home hub 1. The user config file holds some settings which are specific to the hardware/firmware build, as well as the settings you have created, and these may make a different hub unusable. I have not used a BT home hub since the home hub 1, as they have too many limitations.

[licquorice]

Why have you got to reconfigure multiple devices? If it is to change WiFi  SSID, simply change the new hub SSID to that of the old.

[obsidian76]

If it was just changing the WIFI SSID it wouldn't be an issue, it's changing mac address entries on some devices, reconfiguring DNS and DHCP and then going around and checking that each device has actually reconnected then the WiFi discs, it's just time consuming, thankfully almost all the light bulbs are on zigbee coz there is almost 20 of them.

Oh and my 'New' router does not have either a new line cable or network cable so I can't follow the openreach engineers suggestion to swap those out along with the 'new' router.

But it least it's not as bad as when I had (for a brief time) the hybrid connect. 

Well it will be something to do this weekend lol

[licquorice]

I'm obviously missing something here, I can't see how any of that information is held on the hub config file.

[obsidian76]

It's not but many of the devices connecting to the hub via wireless expect the hub to have the current configuration that I was trying to transfer to the new hub.

The smart hub is acting as a gateway and WiFi access point, DNS and DHCP (ipv4 and v6) are provided by 2012r2 Domain controllers, sure many devices will probably be fine, but they will still need checking

I thought I could save some time by effectively cloning the hub, I'll just have to screen grab each settings page on the old hub for reference.

[licquorice]

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@obsidian76 wrote:

It's not but many of the devices connecting to the hub via wireless expect the hub to have the current configuration that I was trying to transfer to the new hub.

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There are extremely few configuration changes you can make to the hub from factory defaults so I still don't understand  what you were expecting to clone and what configuration your devices were expecting the hub to have.

The only configuration changes you can make are basic firewall rules, port forwarding rules, SSID, and IP addressing range.