Blinking a sensor differs between sensors running firmware version 3 (V3) and firmware version 4 (V4).

A V3 sensor will always stay Bluetooth connected to the Boveda app when in range and the app is running. Because of this, blinking V3 sensors is quick and easy. When the user taps the “Blink Sensor” button, the app tells the sensor to blink immediately.

Our V4 sensors are slightly more complex. A V4 sensor does not always stay connected to the Boveda app. One of the reasons for this is to help conserve battery life. The sensor is smart enough to reconnect every 30 minutes on its own to send data. A V4 sensor will connect to the Boveda app any time it has new data to give to the App (Temperature/Humidity, Accelerometer, Battery, Error, etc). Typically, as mentioned before, this happens every 30 minutes, since the Butler will take a new ambient temperature/humidity reading every 30 minutes, but can happen any time the Butler has new data. For example, you drop the Butler and it detects an impact, it will try and connect right away to the Boveda app. Because the sensor does not always stay connected to the Boveda app, when you go to blink the sensor, we either need to wait until the sensor connects again, or we can tap or shake the sensor to give it new data and make it connect right away and then blink.

*The current message that pops up in the app is confusing and will be changed in a future app update. For now, the word update in the message is describing the app “updating” the sensor with the blink command, not an actual software update, so this may cause confusion for customers.