Hometroller SE Pro running incredibly slowly

[FlyBoyBob]

In a previous post I wrote that I thought the box was running slowly due to being hacked within days of first turning it on - so I bought the Restore Stick and started from scratch.

It made no difference - since day 1 this box has been unusably slow. It goes from fairly slow response to a mode where any mouse click can take a minute or more to do anything and programs take many minutes to start. Even moving a window can take 10-15 seconds, and I have disabled all special video effects.

Even from the first boot-up when I bought it, and after the Restore, and with HomeSeer HS2 (29) not running.

The Task Manager window does not show any cpu hogs at the time, and can be showing around 5% cpu usage and 250 mbytes while the machine is virtually frozen. Sometimes Task Manager stops and even the mouse gets jerky.

I am out of ideas - please help,
bob

[Rupp]

Did you load any other software on the HT other than HomeSeer? Does task manager show any programs running?

[tbever]

I have a similar situation. I recently migrated over from Micasverde and have a similar setup: I have the Hometroller SE, with HS Pro which I updated to 2.5.0.29. I have a monitor and PS2-USB keyboard connected. I have also noticed this is an incredibly slow machine. I just assumed it was very low power hardware, but I could be wrong. I have not opened it up for remote access so it has not been hacked. Everything works OK, but it does take about 10 minutes to boot to Homeseer. To do a "save files" while the HSPROTECT is running takes about 30 minutes. Is this normal or not?

I installed Z-Seer and if I try to run with HSPROTECT enabled, it crashes because it is trying to save to the protected area. I ran it today with HSPROTECT off and it ran much better and did not crash. The first time I ran the optimize all it ran slowly but began to speed up. The second time it ran pretty well. I only just got the unit yesterday so I am not at all familiar with it, but it does seem very slow.

[rjh]

This does not make sense, it should boot in less than 2 minutes. When HSProtect is enabled, all writes go to RAM so the system is essentially running on a RAM disk. This makes it run very fast. When HSProtect is disabled, it writes to flash, and the flash on the SE unit is very slow.

So make sure that HSProtect is truly enabled. As a double check, open a command prompt and enter:

fbwfmgr

and hit enter. It should say:

filter state: enabled

It will also show you the write through volumes and directories. (these are the only directories that always write to flash). Only one entry should be there:

\Program Files\HomeSeer HS2

Also, make sure the event log in HS is set to NOT write to the disk. By default we ship units with this disabled, but maybe you turned it on. You don't want HS writing to the flash.

If you want to use faster flash, the flash we use is inexpensive. We have tested the Kingston PRO 133X flash and it works fine in the SE unit (about $13 at newegg). You can simply copy the current flash to a new flash using a PC.

I am not sure the flash is the issue in your case though.

I have a similar situation. I recently migrated over from Micasverde and have a similar setup: I have the Hometroller SE, with HS Pro which I updated to 2.5.0.29. I have a monitor and PS2-USB keyboard connected. I have also noticed this is an incredibly slow machine. I just assumed it was very low power hardware, but I could be wrong. I have not opened it up for remote access so it has not been hacked. Everything works OK, but it does take about 10 minutes to boot to Homeseer. To do a "save files" while the HSPROTECT is running takes about 30 minutes. Is this normal or not?

I installed Z-Seer and if I try to run with HSPROTECT enabled, it crashes because it is trying to save to the protected area. I ran it today with HSPROTECT off and it ran much better and did not crash. The first time I ran the optimize all it ran slowly but began to speed up. The second time it ran pretty well. I only just got the unit yesterday so I am not at all familiar with it, but it does seem very slow.

[tbever]

The settings seem to be OK just like you described.

In the Event Logs Settings: enable event logging to file is set to "No", enable logging to event view is "yes", store logs in LOGS directory is "No", max size for event log (memory only) is "100000".

"\Program Files\HomeSeer HS2" is the only write through directory on the list when I enter fbwfmgr.

Now that it is up and running for over 48 hrs, it seems normal. The boot time before was really slow and overall operation around that time was slow, so I wonder if it was related to updates or initializing the z wave devices or something? At any rate it seems fine now.

This does not make sense, it should boot in less than 2 minutes. When HSProtect is enabled, all writes go to RAM so the system is essentially running on a RAM disk. This makes it run very fast. When HSProtect is disabled, it writes to flash, and the flash on the SE unit is very slow.

So make sure that HSProtect is truly enabled. As a double check, open a command prompt and enter:

fbwfmgr

and hit enter. It should say:

filter state: enabled

It will also show you the write through volumes and directories. (these are the only directories that always write to flash). Only one entry should be there:

\Program Files\HomeSeer HS2

Also, make sure the event log in HS is set to NOT write to the disk. By default we ship units with this disabled, but maybe you turned it on. You don't want HS writing to the flash.

If you want to use faster flash, the flash we use is inexpensive. We have tested the Kingston PRO 133X flash and it works fine in the SE unit (about $13 at newegg). You can simply copy the current flash to a new flash using a PC.

I am not sure the flash is the issue in your case though.

[Bill Brower]

I have a Shuttle that boots really slowly when I have a USB KVM.

Try booting without a mouse and keyboard and then hook them up after it is running.

[tbever]

Installed the TRANSCEND 4 Gb Industrial CF

I was nervous about failure of the Kingston CF cards that come standard in the SE, so I bought a 4 GB Transcend industrial grade CF card from Homeseer.

The difference in Boot and disc write times IS HUGE!!!! Before my SE was taking sometimes 10 minutes to boot. To write the files to the card ie right clicking on HSProtect and "Save Changes to files" would take 20 - 30 minutes!

After upgrading the CF card, the system finishes booting in 1 MINUTE 20 SECS! Writing the changes in the files to the CF card takes about two minutes at most.

Other operations also seem much snappier: I have not experienced the slow downs I was getting with the prior CF card.

I would highly recommend this card for the speed boost as well as the potential increase in reliability. It should have been either standard or available as an option at the time the hometroller SE is ordered.

In terms of upgrading the CF card, it was fairly easy. I used the USB system backup image I bought and reinstalled the OS. I then copied over a backup copy of the homeseer directory under program files. I had to stop HS2 first and then kill some other processes using task manager to copy over the entire directory. For whatever reason the serial cable to USB adapter cable driver was not seen by the OS, so I had to install that via an included CD Rom. The file that homeseer could not initially find was ser2pl.sys. After that I had to go back and change the time zone, reset the time itself, and reset the IP configuration to the static IP address.

[rjh]

We added as an option in the store.

I was nervous about failure of the Kingston CF cards that come standard in the SE, so I bought a 4 GB Transcend industrial grade CF card from Homeseer.

The difference in Boot and disc write times IS HUGE!!!! Before my SE was taking sometimes 10 minutes to boot. To write the files to the card ie right clicking on HSProtect and "Save Changes to files" would take 20 - 30 minutes!

After upgrading the CF card, the system finishes booting in 1 MINUTE 20 SECS! Writing the changes in the files to the CF card takes about two minutes at most.

Other operations also seem much snappier: I have not experienced the slow downs I was getting with the prior CF card.

I would highly recommend this card for the speed boost as well as the potential increase in reliability. It should have been either standard or available as an option at the time the hometroller SE is ordered.

In terms of upgrading the CF card, it was fairly easy. I used the USB system backup image I bought and reinstalled the OS. I then copied over a backup copy of the homeseer directory under program files. I had to stop HS2 first and then kill some other processes using task manager to copy over the entire directory. For whatever reason the serial cable to USB adapter cable driver was not seen by the OS, so I had to install that via an included CD Rom. The file that homeseer could not initially find was ser2pl.sys. After that I had to go back and change the time zone, reset the time itself, and reset the IP configuration to the static IP address.

[sputnik]

I was nervous about failure of the Kingston CF cards that come standard in the SE, so I bought a 4 GB Transcend industrial grade CF card from Homeseer.

The difference in Boot and disc write times IS HUGE!!!! Before my SE was taking sometimes 10 minutes to boot. To write the files to the card ie right clicking on HSProtect and "Save Changes to files" would take 20 - 30 minutes!

After upgrading the CF card, the system finishes booting in 1 MINUTE 20 SECS! Writing the changes in the files to the CF card takes about two minutes at most.

Other operations also seem much snappier: I have not experienced the slow downs I was getting with the prior CF card.

I would highly recommend this card for the speed boost as well as the potential increase in reliability. It should have been either standard or available as an option at the time the hometroller SE is ordered.

In terms of upgrading the CF card, it was fairly easy. I used the USB system backup image I bought and reinstalled the OS. I then copied over a backup copy of the homeseer directory under program files. I had to stop HS2 first and then kill some other processes using task manager to copy over the entire directory. For whatever reason the serial cable to USB adapter cable driver was not seen by the OS, so I had to install that via an included CD Rom. The file that homeseer could not initially find was ser2pl.sys. After that I had to go back and change the time zone, reset the time itself, and reset the IP configuration to the static IP address.

I was one of those who experienced that cf failure. I also bought the industrial cf card as soon as I heard about it in that other thread. It's been running for a week now, and I haven't experienced any issues with the drivers (I did the same thing...pasted a backup version of the homeseer directory on top of the existing one). Weirdly, when I installed the industrial card and turned on the system with the restore usb flash, it just seemed like the system booted straight into windows xpe (almost as if there was already a copy on the industrial card). All I saw was the hometroller blue screen for a few seconds before windowx xpe loaded. Seemed a little too fast for the files to copy from the usb to the cf card. I was also expecting some kind of a restore 'please wait' screen or something, but didn't see it. I tried the restore flash (it had boot priority) several times, with the same results. In any case, it's working ok so far.

As far as speed, I actually didn't have speed issues with original cf card. It was fairly responsive before, and now it's slightly faster with the industrial card.