We have rolled a bunch of old X-10 6380's and the like to fairly new Insteon hardware. A couple KeypadLinc's, a total of 4 Dual-band devices, several Lamplinc's, the Rain8 appears to be an (unsupported) Insteon device. We're not sure how many of the older devices that were being controlled by X-10 do in fact have Insteon capability. We have installed a 2413U as our Insteon interface. We have 2 ControLinc devices.
Prior to the 2413U being installed, we'd been getting some periods of garbage/lockups first with the T103(is that right?) and after that completely failed, the CM11a. The garbage periods could be observed with the old (non-Insteon) ControLinc status LED, and the new Insteon Controlinc, and later with a (Monterrey Pools?) X-10 analyzer. It would show continuous BSC's and BBK's. I think we blamed Homeseer for it, but I don't think I can substantiate that. We have now learned that Insteon signals seem to be detected by the X-10 analyzer as BSC's and BBK's.
In our efforts to obtain a reliable, quick and robust system, we decided to roll over to Insteon. So far, we've been unable to attain our goal. We're using the 30 day trail of the latest PLM plugin. 153?
We found that we repeatedly would have to remove/reconnect the USB connection to the 2413U in order to manually add a device. Tap-Add nearly every time would require that the interface be physically disconnected from the PC (and power) in order to function properly again. Tap-Add was successful a few times before it was abandoned as unusable.
At this point, we've SHUT HOMESEER OFF, and are operating everything as local scenes because Homeseer couldn't keep up. There was "retry's" nearly every time HomeSeer would try to control something.
The "Phase Detection" with the 2413U returns conflicting results. RF linking does appear to be working.
We've found plenty of web pages that somebody has something bad to say about Insteon in general, including things like this from Amazon:
"Great features, very high failure rate, October 25, 2010
By
Eric Varsanyi - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This review is from: Smarthome 2476D SwitchLinc INSTEON Remote Control Dimmer, White (Tools & Hardware)
I originally bought about 70 of these when Insteon first came out (around 2003). Over the years I've bought another 20 or so. Of the original batch almost every single one has failed, either with a paddle problem (the paddle stops working) or by just failing completely (no power, no sign of activity -- just as if the power were not connected). I have two stages of whole house power filtering (bought from Smarthome of course) and many other technology devices without similar failure rates.
There were a lot of firmware problems in the early units and they designed them so they could not be field upgraded. Mixing early with newer units in the same installation causes instability (it seems as if the signal isn't 'getting through' but use of noise blocks and detailed analysis with an oscilliscope and insteon protocol analysis software indicates the units are transmitting over each other in violation of their own protocol spec). They appear to have fixed all these problems in newer units but if there are older units in the installation they intermittently 'jam' the signal and the subsequent automatic retransmissions causing user visible instability. I haven't seen such failures in isolated tests of groups of newer units (the ones they started sending out in 2008 or so), the old units worked acceptably together as well, the big problems only occur when you mix old with new. These problems are well documented and discussed in the community, SmartHome claims they've "never heard of that sort of issue" right before the offer to sell you additional noise blocks. Noise is definitely a common issue even with Insteon, putting in noise blocks to solve specific problems is not a snake oil solution by any means, its just not a cure for buggy firmware.
The Insteon technology is much better than the ancient X10 technology. It is more reliable, responds faster, and has good scene control. Other vendors (such as Leviton) have much better made implementations of X10 units (build quality, reliability) than SmartHome, but they implement the X10 technology and suffer its defects.
Up until this year SmartHome was very generous and replaced the early units that failed even out of warranty. They changed this policy recently (per their new 'Insteon Gold' program) and no longer cover the original almost-out-of-beta quality units they shipped up through 2006-2007 except for failing paddles.
Despite the continuous drumbeat of replacing failed units over the years (under warranty or not) this is a good product and unless I was building a new home (where I could use a proper hard wired system made to more professional rather than consumer grade specs) I would install them again. I have recommended them to colleagues and friends for many smaller installations (<20 units) and they excel at that application. I learned to always keep one or two of each unit type in stock to have an immediate replacement for frequent failures. In a larger installation you will go insane reprogramming failed units w/o something like an ISY99 to manage the configuration (they are exponentially tedious and error prone to program manually as the installation size grows, especially if you are using KeypadLincs in the configuration).
I'm disappointed that SmartHome abandoned their original developers and customers as they tested their technology at our expense. I would not recommend buying any newly developed products from SmartHome/SmartLabs until they've been out a couple of years and they have had a chance to make them work.
There is currently nothing this cheap (to buy or install) with similar functionality on the market."
What can we do to get where we need to be? Is there Insteon analysis software we can use to monitor all this? We have an oscilloscope, if that can be used.
After adding things multiple times, we've about decided that Insteon is NOT ready for prime-time.
We have a Theater Room that is the most complicated scene. Maybe 10-12 modules. Most everything else is just night lighting and such. A couple of motion detector lighting scenes.
Sorry for the crazy long post...I was hoping to cover most basic questions. I should be able to get a log file later.
Thanks,
-KP
Prior to the 2413U being installed, we'd been getting some periods of garbage/lockups first with the T103(is that right?) and after that completely failed, the CM11a. The garbage periods could be observed with the old (non-Insteon) ControLinc status LED, and the new Insteon Controlinc, and later with a (Monterrey Pools?) X-10 analyzer. It would show continuous BSC's and BBK's. I think we blamed Homeseer for it, but I don't think I can substantiate that. We have now learned that Insteon signals seem to be detected by the X-10 analyzer as BSC's and BBK's.
In our efforts to obtain a reliable, quick and robust system, we decided to roll over to Insteon. So far, we've been unable to attain our goal. We're using the 30 day trail of the latest PLM plugin. 153?
We found that we repeatedly would have to remove/reconnect the USB connection to the 2413U in order to manually add a device. Tap-Add nearly every time would require that the interface be physically disconnected from the PC (and power) in order to function properly again. Tap-Add was successful a few times before it was abandoned as unusable.
At this point, we've SHUT HOMESEER OFF, and are operating everything as local scenes because Homeseer couldn't keep up. There was "retry's" nearly every time HomeSeer would try to control something.
The "Phase Detection" with the 2413U returns conflicting results. RF linking does appear to be working.
We've found plenty of web pages that somebody has something bad to say about Insteon in general, including things like this from Amazon:
"Great features, very high failure rate, October 25, 2010
By
Eric Varsanyi - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This review is from: Smarthome 2476D SwitchLinc INSTEON Remote Control Dimmer, White (Tools & Hardware)
I originally bought about 70 of these when Insteon first came out (around 2003). Over the years I've bought another 20 or so. Of the original batch almost every single one has failed, either with a paddle problem (the paddle stops working) or by just failing completely (no power, no sign of activity -- just as if the power were not connected). I have two stages of whole house power filtering (bought from Smarthome of course) and many other technology devices without similar failure rates.
There were a lot of firmware problems in the early units and they designed them so they could not be field upgraded. Mixing early with newer units in the same installation causes instability (it seems as if the signal isn't 'getting through' but use of noise blocks and detailed analysis with an oscilliscope and insteon protocol analysis software indicates the units are transmitting over each other in violation of their own protocol spec). They appear to have fixed all these problems in newer units but if there are older units in the installation they intermittently 'jam' the signal and the subsequent automatic retransmissions causing user visible instability. I haven't seen such failures in isolated tests of groups of newer units (the ones they started sending out in 2008 or so), the old units worked acceptably together as well, the big problems only occur when you mix old with new. These problems are well documented and discussed in the community, SmartHome claims they've "never heard of that sort of issue" right before the offer to sell you additional noise blocks. Noise is definitely a common issue even with Insteon, putting in noise blocks to solve specific problems is not a snake oil solution by any means, its just not a cure for buggy firmware.
The Insteon technology is much better than the ancient X10 technology. It is more reliable, responds faster, and has good scene control. Other vendors (such as Leviton) have much better made implementations of X10 units (build quality, reliability) than SmartHome, but they implement the X10 technology and suffer its defects.
Up until this year SmartHome was very generous and replaced the early units that failed even out of warranty. They changed this policy recently (per their new 'Insteon Gold' program) and no longer cover the original almost-out-of-beta quality units they shipped up through 2006-2007 except for failing paddles.
Despite the continuous drumbeat of replacing failed units over the years (under warranty or not) this is a good product and unless I was building a new home (where I could use a proper hard wired system made to more professional rather than consumer grade specs) I would install them again. I have recommended them to colleagues and friends for many smaller installations (<20 units) and they excel at that application. I learned to always keep one or two of each unit type in stock to have an immediate replacement for frequent failures. In a larger installation you will go insane reprogramming failed units w/o something like an ISY99 to manage the configuration (they are exponentially tedious and error prone to program manually as the installation size grows, especially if you are using KeypadLincs in the configuration).
I'm disappointed that SmartHome abandoned their original developers and customers as they tested their technology at our expense. I would not recommend buying any newly developed products from SmartHome/SmartLabs until they've been out a couple of years and they have had a chance to make them work.
There is currently nothing this cheap (to buy or install) with similar functionality on the market."
What can we do to get where we need to be? Is there Insteon analysis software we can use to monitor all this? We have an oscilloscope, if that can be used.
After adding things multiple times, we've about decided that Insteon is NOT ready for prime-time.
We have a Theater Room that is the most complicated scene. Maybe 10-12 modules. Most everything else is just night lighting and such. A couple of motion detector lighting scenes.
Sorry for the crazy long post...I was hoping to cover most basic questions. I should be able to get a log file later.
Thanks,
-KP
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