Thursday 20 August 2015

Mi Air Purifier - Maintenance the Sensor

BY Cavarii IN , , , , 2 comments



The Black Sponge
Some batch of air purifier comes with a black sponge inside the sensor cover, some asked whether the sponge needs to be removed.

Xiaomi had explained that the black sponge is to protect the purifier sensors, in order to block the dust from sticking to the sensor, you do not need to remove it.

Of course, do not panic if you do not have sponge inside your sensor cover, as Xiaomi's support team had explained, different batches are using different 
protection method, if no sponges found with your sensor, do not worry.

Thursday 13 August 2015

Mi Air Purifier English Manual Translated by Cavarii Online Store

BY Cavarii IN , , 2 comments



We had translated the original Chinese Manual into English, for the benefits of Cavarii Online Store buyers.

 
                                                   Air Purifier Gen 1                                      Air Purifier Gen 2



If you had bought an unit of the Xiaomi Generation 1 or 2 Air purifier from us, please email to online@cavarii.com with your order number, for a copy of the translated English manual.






Sunday 2 August 2015

Mi Air Purifier - Unboxing

BY Cavarii IN , , 5 comments



This is the packaging of the Mi Air Purifier, in the standard Mi brown paper box, the packaging measured 31 x 31 x 80cm, weight around 10kg.

After breaking the seal, you can see the packing information.

The brochures, user guides and warranty card are all packed in an envelope

Purifier is enclosed in foam block. Take away the foam block, there is another layer bag wrapping the purifier.


The purifier comes in a rounded rectangular body, the front with only the Mi logo, on the top side there are two bars acting as both handle and air outlet. The top is the outlet grille, on the grille lower right side is a control switch and wifi running status indicator. The far right side is the LED lamp light sensor.



The top is the outlet grille, on the grille lower right side is a control switch and wifi running status indicator. The far right side is the LED lamp light sensor.

At the side of the handle is the chamfered edge, the inside are the air through-duct.

On the bottom half of the air purifier are neat mesh of air inlets, the official nominal count is 5732.




The bottom cover can be opened, the power cord is inside the triangular paper box nicely tugged in the gap between the cartridge and the housing.


A quick installation guide for the filter.

Tear off the plastic wrapping the filter, this is the label for the standard filter with model M1-FL.

The lever at the bottom can be swing to lock and unlock the filter cartridge.

This is the power cord, coming in a 3-pin plug, you may need a converter to fit into your local socket.

The outer layer of the filter cartridge is PET (unsaturated polyester) mesh-net, it is used to isolate the hair, fabrics, fines and other large suspended solids.

Filter mesh-net come in 161 folded 
layers, forming a blocking hollow drum. Filter is HEPA (high efficiency particulate air filter fine particles), which can be expanded to the length of 7m. For the adsorption of PM2.5, PM0.3, pollen and other particulate matter, officially declared effective filtration rate of 99.3% for PM0.3. The official specs for the coconut shell activated carbon is in the innermost layer, invisible to us...... purifier activated carbon is mainly used for adsorption of formaldehyde, benzene, ammonia and other inorganic toxic gases.



For ease of cleaning, the outlet of the fan can be opened. Turn the grill to open the top-level grille, unscrew the fan cover to remove the fan and fixed rotary vane.

Surrounding rotary vane grille are protection / isolation, at the bottom you can see the officially mentioned four air ducts.

The air purifier can controlled by the app, the app's main function is the remote control switch, and understand and getting info on the surrounding air quality. Applications will be combined with the local weather forecast (although only China cities' forecast is available) and even air quality, providing recommendations to open the windows or switch on the air purifiers. 

It can also be operated without the App and can be used normally, the operation buttons on the air purifier can be toggled between "Auto, Sleep, High speed decontamination" modes, with the led light to be lit at the side to indicate the current mode.


The air purifier is in the same category of appliance / devices using the Mi Home App to manage and control, they includes the Mi Smart Socket, Yi Ants Web Cam, water purifiers etc.


Other intelligent features of the app includes filter replacement reminder, timer switch, remote switch, run-time exception alerts (blockage), automatic start (automatically turn on 
when detected the air quality is poor) and the like.

Although the main function is only purifying the air, but the additional app functions make it standout among other air purifiers in its price range.




The air purifier's area of 26 x 26 cm is slightly shorter than an A4 Paper (29.7cm), and 73.5cm in height, a little shorter than a normal desk (76cm). For good purification of air, you will need to keep a distance of 10cm between the back of the purifier and the wall and leaving a distance of 20cm from the side of the purifier and the wall.

Purification design is by a double fan that create internal negative pressure, suction from the bottom of the mesh, and forcing air through the filter from the upper part of the fan.

Official recommended usage area is 28 - 48 square meters, which will meet the needs of ordinary living room to purify the room, but for office space approaching 150 square meters, it will only filter air surround the purifier. Similar to other purifiers using activated carbon, you can smell the unique slight acidity 
charcoal at the outlet.


The noise produced from the lowest "Sleep" mode, with human ear listen closely nearby, is the "whirring" sound of the wind, a bit like a refrigerator, with a sound value of about 50 dB when measured by meter.

When set to the "Auto" mode, the wind volume and noise level have increased a little, maintained at between 50 - 55 dB respectively.

When set at "High-speed" mode, the volume level will go directly close to 80 dB, and indeed vibrate a bit.

May be taken into account the noise level, the high-speed mode will automatically switched to "Auto" mode after 15 minutes. When keeping at this level, it can easily reach the official target of 406 m³
 / h purification efficiency (with official spec of purification 48 m² space required 12 minutes), but having to endure this high speed fan volume. 


Six Differentiating factors for Mi Air Purifier

1) Smart phones to remote control the air purifier

Traditional air purifiers have to control its operations using the buttons located on the device. When we are away from the device, we are completely unable to control the device. After returning home after a hard days' work, we need to switch on the air purifier and wait for a while before we can get rid of the bad air. Or, after leaving the house, we suddenly remember the air purifier is not switch off, apart from the costs of electricity and affecting the mood of the day, there is no way we need to make a special trip home to switch off the air purifier!

Mi air purifier's remote control through the mobile app, complete liberated you from the device, where you can now control and access at any time. Before returning home, you can now switch on and select the rapid purification mode, and arrive home with the air fresh and natural. When away from home, you can switch on or off the device at anytime. Before sleeping at night, you can click the sleep mode through the phone, no longer need to get out of bed to switch modes. Mi air purifier is so simple to remote control.

2) Visual view of indoor air quality visualization

When you feel the air quality in the room is not good, do you know how bad it is? And whether you know whether the air quality outside the window is better than the indoor air quality? Mi air purifier has a built-in high-sensitivity detection module that not only accurately display the total amount of suspended particles in the air, but can present also the value on the mobile phone. Whether you are at home or away, you can now view the air quality anytime and anywhere.


3) Filter replacement reminder

Most people do not know when to replace a new filter. Either replace early, spending unnecessary, or replace it too late, where the filter is no longer effective in purifying the air. Mi air purifier filter replacement reminder is specially designed to automatically send a reminder message through the mobile app, when the filter needs to be replaced.


4) Purifying at fixed time

If you feel a click operation is not smart enough, then you can use the more intelligent feature by using the timing function of the mobile app, where you can schedule the purifying time.
You do not need any special attention, just need to follow your habits set the timer in advance, when to switch on and when to switch  off.

5)  Automatic alert on abnormal behaviors and exceptions
If the air purifier encountered 
anomalies during operation, such as fans jammed with foreign matter, sudden increase of smoke, mi air purifiers report these abnormal situations by sending alert messages through the mobile app. To avoid deterioration of unforeseen circumstances.

6) Reminder to open the windows for ventilation for outside air
While the clean indoor purified air can always be better, but unpolluted outdoor air is closer to nature. The Mi Home app provides air quality data for major Chinese cities from China Meteorological Center. When the outdoor is a blue sky, with better quality than the indoor air, the app will send a reminder asking you to open the windows, walk into into the nature. Of course, do not worry even if the haze come back, the good quality indoor air purification is always waiting for you.

Note : This feature will only work in China, as the Mi Home App only provide air quality data for cities in China.

Saturday 1 August 2015

Mi Air Purifier - Troubleshoot

BY Cavarii IN , 9 comments

Cannot Connect the Phone to Air Purifier - Troubleshoot

A number of users' feedback had reported that they cannot connect the Mi air purifier to the network, making them unable to control the Air Purifier using the smartphone or could not bind the mobile APP Mijia with the Air purifier, and other issues.We will troubleshoot such problems from 3 major sources, the phone, the network (router end) and the air purifier.

Note - Please choose "China" as connection region in the App settings.


a) The Phone

i) Check to see if the phone is connected to your Home / Office network

ii) Check to see if certain privileges may be disable for the "Mi Home" or Mijia APP on your phone settings;

b) The Network (Router End)

i) While Mi air purifier supports most routers, but it only supports 2.4GHz WiFi, not 5GHz;

ii) The WiFi encryption must be WPA or WPA2 (without encryption can also be connected, but not recommended for security reasons), it does not support WEP and EAP 802.1x authentication;

iii) Failure to support the needs of the page authenticated network, for example: CMCC, ChinaUnicom other public networks;

iv) Some routers may not be able to connected, so far identified router models are : TP-LINK WDR6300 (unless set up to use only 802.11b), TP-LINK WR880N (shutting down WMM may resolves);

v) Routers with advanced features set-up. like hidden SSID, disabled QOS, non DHCP settings where you need to set a static IP manually, or the router settings that requires MAC address binding may all result in not able to connect the Air Purifier to the network;

vi) Close all router wireless control for blacklists;

vii) The company intranet which had disabled port 80 or UDP may lead to not work properly with the air purifier;


viii) Does not work if you are connecting to portable USB routers;

c) The Air Purifier

Air Purifier may had been configured previously to connect to another network, or is currently connected to other network, please reset the Air Purifier WiFi settings by pressing the "Operating Mode Choice" and "Switching of Indicator" button simultaneously and hold them for 5 seconds. After you hear the beeps sound, WiFi settings is reset.




Other Commonly encountered problems

Problem 1
Mijia App displayed error message when trying to connect to the Air purifier
"No available WiFi, please check if appropriate permissions had been restricted


Resolution 1
Under phone's settings, enter the "Security Center" >> "Authorization Management" >> "Application Rights Management", open the "smart home" network-related rights, and locate permission. (Note: settings may be slightly different with different OS and model of phones)


Problem 2
Mijia APP showing "Network connection is unavailable" message, as shown in picture


Resolution 2
Open the phone's WiFi or data network and then try and make sure the network, or other similar software does not disable the "Mijia" APP network connection.

Problem 3
When Mijia app trying to connect to air purifier, APP showing  "Connection Failed" and the purifier cannot be bind, WiFi status indicator is flashing slowly.



Resolution 3
a) when connecting to WiFi, make sure password entered is correct;

b) Whether router is connected to Internet;

c) Whether routers is using a WEP or EAP 802.1x encryption, as they are not supported, please replace with WPA / WPA2 authentication and try again;


d) Currently does not support the EAP 802.1x authentication network or public WiFi network that requires web authentication on landing page;

e) Whether router is configured with hidden SSID, disabled DHCP and requires a manually assigned static IP, MAC address binding and other advanced features, making it impossible to connect, try to turn on / off the relevant function and try again;

f) whether the router is connected to a device that may had slowed down the network or router, try to restart the router and try again;g) Some of the routers may not be supported, such as: TP-LINK WDR6300 (try setting up using only 802.11b), TP-LINK WR880N (disable WMM may resolve problem), wait for a new version of the Mi Home APP and try again after the app update, you  may need to try other routers temporarily in order to use the air purifier;

g) If all of the above still cannot solve the problem, try doing a factory reset of the Air Purifer by pressing the "Operating Mode Choice" and "Switching of Indicator" button simultaneously and hold them for 5 seconds. After you hear the beeps sound, WiFi settings is reset.



Problem 4
Under the Mi Home APP, the purifier is show "offline", but the WiFi indicator on air purifier is flashing quickly


Resolution 4
a) Whether the router that the purifier is connected is working properly, OR whether the SSID connection password had been modified; 

b) Try to reset the purifier WiFi module (see step 3h above), and try to re-connect the App to the air purifier again, 


Problem 5
Under the Mi Home APP, the purifier is show "offline", but the WiFi indicator on air purifier is always on

Resolution 5
a) Check the phone network is normal, whether you can connect to the network;

b) The network where the air purifier and hand phone connected is working properly;


c) Whether the router had blocked port 80 or disabled UDP;


d) Try to reset the purifier WiFi module (see step 3h above), and try to re-connect the App to the air purifier again, 



3. The different WiFi indicator for air purifier
a) Slow flashing (approximately flashing once every 0.8 seconds): Purifier had never been connected to the router,

b) Flashing quickly (approximately flashing every 0.2 seconds): The air purifier is binded to the Mi Home app, the air purifier is in the process of connecting to a corresponding network, if the network has a fault, the quick flashing will remain; 


c) Steady : purifier is connected to a network.


Xiaomi Air Purifier demo and setting up