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Gen 2 Protect - Heads Up feature doesn't work (as designed)

Apollo606
Community Member

Thinking about buying a Gen 2 Protect because you like the Heads Up feature? Pause that, read this first. 

 

I bought a gen 2 protect in Feb 2023. I have a droid, my wife has an iPhone. I have 2 Protects, set up with the help of Nest Support. I get the smoke alarms on our phones, the heads up feature is active, I can see the Protects on our apps. 

I've come to learn that the Gen 2 Protect has it, as designed, to not have the Heads Up feature work. If you read the manual, it states that if the level of smoke is quickly rising, it'll skip the Heads Up.  However, even when you have small amounts of smoke, it skips that step. 

I've had it twice now where out of the blue the alarm goes off (we were cooking). I see the device history and see that the Heads Up was sent.. but at the same time the alarm went off. Which makes it useless. 

I have seen others post about this, and I have friends that have a Nest state the same.. the Heads Up doesn't work. I really wish I had known this prior to buying them. I feel like I just bought 2 expensive relatively dumb alarms that I could've gotten for half the price. 

My ask is to have the developers/engineers make it so that Heads Up actually works and goes out 20-30 seconds prior to the alarm sounding. Sounds like the Gen 1 Protect does this, but for some reason was changed in the Gen 2. 

Please please please have it updated so that this functionality can be utilized. Google Nest is wasting our time, our efforts and money by not updating the Gen 2. 

If you're reading this and thinking about getting a Gen 2 Protect.. please consider the fact that as of March 2023, it DOES NOT WORK as advertised. And no, there's no setting that's wrong, a set up that's incorrect, no connectivity issue, I've been through all of that, it's simply a design flaw that needs to be addressed ASAP.   Thank you.

2 Recommended AnswerS

Ozi
Community Member

Did you actually understand what @Apollo606 was saying? He was giving ideas on how Nest could fix the nest protect, not what other users should try. 

Is this information even getting to any actual support of Nest protect or is it just for customers to complain about it in an echo chamber? 

View Recommended Answer in original post

Dyifsssh
Community Member

Jokers. 

The issue is NOT solved. Every post on here makes clear that this is an ongoing issue and that Google have broken Nest. 

Please report an internal bug for each of us. Upvote it as many times as possible and while you’re looking into your product management teams see which ones did the QA on the new generation smoke alarm software because they’ve introduced a breaking change to prod that’s clearly just going ignored… 

View Recommended Answer in original post

24 REPLIES 24

Ozi
Community Member

Same issue,

The heads up doesn't work. The alarm fires right away, also waiving in front of it didn't silence it. The only way to silence it is to press the button with a stick.

You can also open the app and silence from there but for some reason that takes longer then usual. 

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi everyone, 

 

I know it's been a while, and I’m sorry to hear that you’re having trouble with your Nest Protects.
 

Have you tried to sort things out on your end? If not, please try to remove the smoke alarms from the app and then add them back again.
 

Keep us posted. We're happy to help.

 

Best, 

Zoe

Hi Zoe, appreciate the outreach. I've done that. Twice. I've worked with your support teams, twice. What we found is that the "heads up" does go on.. but literally the same time as the regular alarm. Making it useless. It's not just me, it's others. It's a system change that's needed. Please put in an update that gives the heads up say 10 seconds before the main alarm goes off.

 

While the manual says the heads up will go off the same time as the alarm only when there's a rapid increase in smoke detection.. that's not the case. It's gone off when we are cooking, repeatedly. There's no large amount of smoke. It's not even hazy. 

 

What's needed is that system change. Allow the heads up to work as advertised. As you have it now, it doesn't. Which is a shame because it makes it just a really pricey mostly dumb alarm. 

 

Dyifsssh
Community Member

Heads up also not working here. Interestingly since I added two Gen 2 to my Gen one I already had… then Gen one heads up has aldo stopped working. This is definitely a software issue. 

Thank you for the back up! It's not a reset issue, that doesn't fix it. It's software. 

For example, say the alarm triggers at smoke levels of 1 part per 100,000. And you have the heads up set to trigger at 1 part per 50,000. Well, that's too close to what triggers the alarm. Turn down the sensitivity, or make it that when the heads up triggers, the earliest the alarm goes off is 5 seconds. Etc. 

Customers of this product need a heads up that actually works. Figure out the settings, see what needs a change, put through the update, notify us and we can test it. Until you do something like this, you'll get more unhappy users of this product. Please do the work in updating. 

 

Thank you. 

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey folks,

 

@Apollo606, I'm glad to hear that everything has been sorted out. 

 

@Dyifsssh and @Ozi, have you tried following the steps that Apollo606 did? 

 

I'll look forward to your response.

 

Thanks,
Zoe

Ozi
Community Member

Did you actually understand what @Apollo606 was saying? He was giving ideas on how Nest could fix the nest protect, not what other users should try. 

Is this information even getting to any actual support of Nest protect or is it just for customers to complain about it in an echo chamber? 

No. Can you please read the actual posting? I have zero clue how you'd think this was solved. 

Dyifsssh
Community Member

Jokers. 

The issue is NOT solved. Every post on here makes clear that this is an ongoing issue and that Google have broken Nest. 

Please report an internal bug for each of us. Upvote it as many times as possible and while you’re looking into your product management teams see which ones did the QA on the new generation smoke alarm software because they’ve introduced a breaking change to prod that’s clearly just going ignored… 

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi everyone, 

 

I appreciate all of your insights and I'm sorry for the misunderstanding. Aside from removing and adding the Nest Protect back on the app, can you try to do a quick safety check up with your Nest Protect? Let me know how that works. 

 

Regards, 

Zoe 

In other news… release 3.5rc3 seems to have fixed this issue for me.

 

I just experienced a heads up on my burnt onions and couldn’t be happier about the outcome for my ears.

 

My taste buds however… they are sad.

 

anyone experiencing the issue outlined above check which software your alarm is on as it seems 3.5rc3 has the fix 

Dyifsssh
Community Member

Heads up @Ozi @Apollo606 and @zoeuvre  software version 3.5rc3 seems to have fixed it. I just had a heads up! (See what I did there… thanks) 

Apollo606
Community Member

Great new! I see that I have that as well, updated 3 minutes ago. I'll give it a try when I cook and report back on this thread. Thank you for your info!

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi folks, 

 

I wanted to check if you are still in need of any help. Please let me know, as I would be happy to assist, and answer any questions you may have.

 

On the other hand, we appreciate your suggestions, and please be assured that our product team is working non-stop with different partners to bring the best features to the Google Nest devices.  So, please let our product team know about it by sending feedback.

 

Best regards,

Zoe

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi there, 

 

We haven’t heard from you so, I'll go ahead and lock this thread within 24 hours. If you run into any more issues in the future, please feel free to create a new thread.

 

Thank you, 

Zoe 

Hi Zoe, 

I've filled out a form online with my issues, maybe see that and if it may help to get someone at level 2 to look this over? I ran 2 tests yesterday, this time no heads up was recorded in the history, went straight to smoke alarm and I was cooking with very little smoke.  Can we escalate this as it appears to be a software issue as the resets and checks haven't solved this. 

Ozi
Community Member

Still no heads up for me. So the problem is not working

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey everyone,

 

@Apollo606, I have checked a similar thread about this matter where you actually answered the form and we have received it. Soon, a member of our upper team will contact you via email. Also, this thread will be locked within 24 hours.

 

@Ozi, thanks for the follow-up. We’d like to take a look at this for you. Could you please fill out this form with the needed information?

 

 @Dyifsssh, I'm glad that things has been working for you already? Please let me know if you are still in need of any help as I would be happy to assist, and answer any questions you may have.

 

I'll be looking forward to hearing from all of you. 

 

Best,

Zoe 

Thank you Zoe. 

As per the other thread,  I ran 2 tests yesterday, no heads up this time. Before it would show in history as going off just before, these times there wasn't a heads up. Not sure why the heads up was skipped entirely when the smoke level was relatively low. 

Ozi
Community Member

Where is the form?

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi Ozi, 

 

Thanks for also completing the form; we have received it. Soon, a member of our upper team will contact you via email. Also, this thread will be locked within 24 hours.

 

@Dyifsssh, Before I mark things as resolved, I wanted to check and see if there might be anything else you needed on this or to see if you had any other questions. If there's more you need, just let us know.

 

Best,

Zoe

EmersonB
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi everyone,

Just one quick final check in here since activity has slowed down. We'll be locking the thread in the next 24 hours, but if you still need help, we would be happy to keep it open. If there's more we can do, just let us know.
 
Regards,
Emerson

zoeuvre
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi everyone, 

 

We haven't heard from you in a while so we'll be locking this thread if there is no update within 24 hours. If you run into any more issues in the future, please feel free to create a new thread.

 

Cheers, 

Zoe 

Apollo606
Community Member

I'm doing some testing of my Protect this evening, please keep this thread active.