Newbie Z-wave questions.

[Rupp]

A few questions:
I understand how to program the first 6 devices by using the speed buttons. How does one go about programming 7 and up? I read the book 2 times and I'm a bit confused.

Can only 64 devices be learned by a remote?

If I learn say 5 devices and copy the contents to HS. Then later on learn 4 more devices do I copy the entire contents to the USB device again? Will this not add the ones that already exist again?

-Rupp

What hair color do they put on the driver's licenses of bald men?

[sonypoolplr]

Rupp,
I was looking over the manual that Rich posted and on page 5 under the "Tips for adding devices" it says that; Re-learning devices will not modify any devices you have already configured. This also says you can learn one at a time so I am assuming you don't have to do the whole list again but I could be wrong.

I didn't see anything in the instructions about the number of devices that can be learned by the remote.

[davidw4806]

I did not load each device into a group key but loaded by room or area of the home. So I may have 5 devices in the living room and they all come on at the same time or off at the same time.

I have not figured out how to choose a single device using the handheld but I only use HS so it does not matter. Since I already had X10 and that gives me discrete choices using my WGL800 and a palm pad, keypadlinc or Maxi controller those are my entry devices.

That is also the only way to trigger events, I do not think you can trigger events using zwave at this time.

I have 40 devices so far and no problems. Not sure if it will stop at 64 but I think the handheld can hold 256 devices but I may be wrong. It does slow down during adds as you get more devices but I assume it is the processor looking for the next free location.

Thanks

Dave

HS 1.6.177 HSP 2.0.151
2.4 ghz Windows XP Pro
Way2Call Serial, Motion occupancy sensors ,Door sensors
Zwave and X-10 galore
viewsonic 1000 touchpad
Use Homeseer, RCS 15B, Keypadlinc, with many doomotion, network monitor, weatherplug, aha reporter. touchpad, daily comics and DVD collection

[davek102]

The Manual for the controller says that the controller can configure 64 groups with up to 64 modules in each. The controller can cotrol them in groups only, it appears, but Homeseer sees can control them as individual devices.

I think that different controllers, however, can define different groups for the same devices. This is the major difference between an identical copy to a secondary controller vs. a copy of system information only.

[davek102]

A little more folow on. A device may actually be included on 0 or more groups, and 0 or more scenes. Groups and scenes beyond the 6th can be selected using the left and right arrow keys on the controller. It's a little clumsy but it works. Because Homeseer only uses the device information, it uses its own abstraction for groups and scenes (events), with which we are all familiar. Since (at present) the USB contoller/Homeseer cannot simulate a virtual device as is the cas with X10, ant the Zwave controllers can only take actions on groups or scenes, you cannot at this time use a Z wave controler to trib\gger events in Homeseer, unless you do it by polling the status of a real Zwave device.

[rjh]

The controller can control up to 64 devices, but it can learn up to the maximum of 232 devices. Remember, the controller is used for 2 purposes, one is for manual control of devices, and the other is to configure your system. When you add a device, you need to add it to a group. You can then delete that group. However, the device information is still saved in the remote even though the group has been deleted. This device information is what is transfered to HomeSeer. If you had other zwave hardware, such as a thermostat, you would be required to add this to the system using the remote. However, the remote has no clue how to control a thermostat, but it must be used to assign an ID to the device. Ideally, the remote should have an include button, maybe recessed, that simply adds a device. They you could assign it to keys later. The Intermatic controllers actually work this way. It would also be ideal to have a "transfer" button to allow easy transfer of device information.

As for more than 64 groups, press the MENU, then GROUPS, then use the right arrow to select groups over 6.

Note that when you copy a remote to another one, you can copy just the system information. If you do this, only the device ID's get copied over, not the groups. This allows each remote to control a totally different set of devices. If the copy does not have all the device information, it will not be able to control devices that were not copied over.

Hope this clears it up a bit.

-Rich

HomeSeer Technologies LLC

[Rupp]

Scenario 1: I punch and hold 1 on the remote and learn device 1 in the living room. Then transfer device 1 into HomeSeer. I go back to another room, say the kitchen. I punch and hold 1 again to learn the new device then go transfer this to HomeSeer. Is this scenario possible? Can you learn devices 1 at a time and continue to load them into HS?

Scenario 2: I store device 1 in quick pick 1 in the living room, device 2 in quick pick2, in the kitchen, device 3 in quick pick 3, in the bedroom. Load to HomeSeer. Then 2 weeks later I want to add a new device. Can I learn the new device back into 1 or do I have to add it to quick pick 4.


I guess what I'm asking is can the quick picks be reused over and over after the data is loaded into HomeSeer?


Sorry to be so dense but I think the groups and scenes of the remote and the way HomeSeer is handling the data is confusing me.

-Rupp

What hair color do they put on the driver's licenses of bald men?

[davek102]

The answer is yes to both questions.
New divices can be added into any group.

[rjh]

There is absolutely no relationship between groups on the remote and HomeSeer. When you press any button on the remote, and hold it down (even if its dimming), you can press a button on a unit and add it.

When you transfer data to HS, all you are doing is transfering information about the device. This information is:

The device ID number (just like housecode/unitcode in X10, but its a single number)

The device type (lamp module, appliance module, thermostat etc.) This allows HS to control the device properly. The user doesn't get involved in this process.

-Rich

HomeSeer Technologies LLC

[Rupp]

I see one advantage to learning all the devices sequentially and not reusing codes would be if you needed to totally reload from the remote it certainly would make it an easy task.

-Rupp

What hair color do they put on the driver's licenses of bald men?

[Georgev]

One of the Sylvania plug-in modules have failed (it does not respond to on/off/dimm using the local control button and it does not also respond to the delete unit from group/scene or reset unit in the setup menu on the controller. Now I am getting a Failed message when sending the ALL ON or ALL OFF command. I am assuming that this happens because the controller is not getting a confirmation back from the unit. What is to be done in this scenario.

I purchased the starter kit from Homeseer and it is within the last 30 days. If I need to return the failed product, should I return the whole kit or just the failed component? The remote in the kit is the master controller and I hate to return the whole kit to avoid having to learn everything new into a new controller. I purhcased the starter kit and 10 switches. So my installed base of devices is rapidly expanding.


George V
NJ

[davek102]

I suggest you that you reset and retry before returning the unit. On the setup menu, go to Reset and push the button on the unit. Then try to add the unit to a group and see if it works.

In case this unit had previously been added to another controller, this will solve the problem.

[rjh]

If the button on the module is not working, the module sounds bad. Try unplugging it, then plug it back it.

Unfortunately, there is no way to remove the device from the remote if the module is not working. You will have to reset the remote control and re-add your modules.

-Rich

HomeSeer Technologies LLC

[rocco]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Rich Helmke:
Unfortunately, there is no way to remove the device from the remote if the module is not working. You will have to reset the remote control and re-add your modules.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>Does this apply to HomeSeer as well? or just the remote?

It sounds to me like you have to start all over learning your modules anytime one of them dies, and the whole system may be down in the meantime because of the 'Failed' message.

[rjh]

Well this is a tough one. Even if there was a way to remove the device from the remote, how would you know which one to remove? They could list the device ID's , but you don't know which ID goes with which module.

Its not a hard failure. The remote (and HS) will still control all the modules, it just returns an error because of the bad one. So things still operate ok. In HS, you know which module is failing since its status will be "Unknown". You can then remove it, and HS will never try to control it again.

So its just the remote that has the issue. To get rid of the error message, you will have re-add all your modules. Note that this is only for the ALL-ON and ALL-OFF buttons. For the groups, you can delete a group, then just re-add the modules to that group, then the message will be gone.

When you install the modules, you could remove all of them from the ALL-ON/ALL-OFF buttons then create a special group that has all the modules. If one goes down, you can then delete the group and re-add them.

-Rich

HomeSeer Technologies LLC