Philips Hue: first hand reliability?

[IVB]

Ha, you will be wise to abandon the zwave ship, but not for an even flakier system. You'll get what you pay for. Switching to UPB or proprietary RF may be a better way to reliability (but of course, more expensive).

 
Well, I don't know if it was a full kill of power or replacing the Intermatic zWave dimmer with a $2 rocker, but its working now.  I now have 9 lights, my 3rd & 4th tap will be coming in a few hours (amazon same day), i'll wait 60 days to see how it goes.
 
Totally agree, but alas I can't do Insteon or UPB as I have my house was built in 1911 and still has knob & tube wiring for sections. I'll figure out next steps later.

 

[IVB]

Well, one of my first two taps stopped working, and one of the lux stopped working. Wife doesn't mind the color but isn't wild about it. $60/bulb is out of the question esp with the reliability issues, so there's a very very high chance I only use the already-purchased lights in those areas that I cannot use zWave in. The taps feel plastic & cheap, so thats another strike against it.

 

[LarrylLix]

Totally agree, but alas I can't do Insteon or UPB as I have my house was built in 1911 and still has knob & tube wiring for sections. I'll figure out next steps later.

I don't why an RF system, like Insteon, wouldn't work other than you will have trouble with any system switches without a neutral in your switch boxes the same as any other wiring technique used.
 
Insteon is mostly rf signals but  requiring powerline synchronisation for the repeating mesh network signals. Of course battery type devices do not use the powerline at all.

 

[IVB]

Totally agree, but alas I can't do Insteon or UPB as I have my house was built in 1911 and still has knob & tube wiring for sections. I'll figure out next steps later.

I don't why an RF system, like Insteon, wouldn't work other than you will have trouble with any system switches without a neutral in your switch boxes the same as any other wiring technique used.
 
Insteon is mostly rf signals but  requiring powerline synchronisation for the repeating mesh network signals. Of course battery type devices do not use the powerline at all.

 
I thought Insteon required a neutral, switches wouldn't work without it?
 
It looks like as long as I stay within the Leviton brand, life is okay.  The VRUSB gets thrown into a hissy fit if I include non-Leviton devices, goes into a bad place and sulks. Sticking with just Leviton is good.  For Philips tap, I have to hit the button 3-7 times for the light to come on. Sometimes there's a delay, so i'm about to hit it again then the light will come on.  Thats seriously annoying for something as trivial as a light switch. 

 

[LarrylLix]

I doubt many of these HA systems will work without a neutral at the switches.
 
Insteon has switches that do not require a neutral but once you install LED bulbs, any series device that depends on the nature of the load is going to have problems with reliability. Insteon does have micro modules that fit inside existing boxes and use existing switches/lamp sockets.

 

[IVB]

I doubt many of these HA systems will work without a neutral at the switches.
 
Insteon has switches that do not require a neutral but once you install LED bulbs, any series device that depends on the nature of the load is going to have problems with reliability. Insteon does have micro modules that fit inside existing boxes and use existing switches/lamp sockets.

Intermatic and some leviton zwave work fine. But it looks like LED capable ones won't so I'm going to price out running a new wire just to the 4-5 ones that don't have one that are on a lot, hence using lv more better.

 

[jkmonroe]

oh yeah, i forgot about the micro switches - which is strange because i have some.
 
what are these switches controlling?  because even if you don't have a neutral at your switch location, shouldn't you have one on the fixture itself?
 
you could throw one of the z-wave microswitches up at the fixture, and then control it via zwave associations.  

 

[jkmonroe]

Yeah, your fixture itself would have a neutral coming from your breaker.  You would be able to use the micro switches up at the fixture, and then any zwave switch that doesn't require a neutral (and supports associations) to control it.
 
---Hot from Breaker---| Switch |------| Fixture |
_______________________________|
   ^Neutral from Breaker

 

[LarrylLix]

With Insteon you could use smart bulbs and Insteon wireless remotes stuck on the walls beside the wired in switches and run the whole thing wireless.
 
The Insteon bulbs and almost all Insteon devices are repeaters and will repeat the signals on the powerlines and RF with it's dual mesh network. The range and reliability  of this system is much greater on the powerline and repeated RF, up to three hops each signal. This injects the signals in your wiring without touching one screw or wire.

 

[jkmonroe]

Insteon runs near 900Mhz, right?  Given all of his issues in the higher ISM bands, I can only imagine the lower bands would be completely saturated as well.  I don't use Insteon, but id be curious to see their reliability side by side.

 

[IVB]

Yeah, your fixture itself would have a neutral coming from your breaker.  You would be able to use the micro switches up at the fixture, and then any zwave switch that doesn't require a neutral (and supports associations) to control it.
 
---Hot from Breaker---| Switch |------| Fixture |
_______________________________|
   ^Neutral from Breaker

 
I know you're speaking english as I can understand every word, but I have no idea what you're saying. Microswitch? Huh?
 
Anyhow, ima gna hire someone to run some new 3wire to a variety of locations, so I have neutral/white in the box. Right now, no neutral.  I dunno about the fixture, or what a microswitch is, but the new wiring should be $1K or less, in which case the issue goes away.

 

[jkmonroe]

the micro switch. a tiny zwave module, maybe 2" square that fits into junction boxes made by aeotec/aeon labs. google it, theyre actually really cool and useful.
 
this thing:
 
http://www.amazon.com/Aeon-Labs-Aeotec-Z-Wave-DSC27103-ZWUS/dp/B00IRI1CEK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1433937422&sr=8-1&keywords=zwave+microswitch
 
you can put them wherever you need one - not just at a switch location, but above your light fixture itself.  and even knob/tube wiring has (should have) a neutral to the fixture, so even if you don't have any at your switch location you can still automate the fixture.

 

[Deane Johnson]

jk, this is probably obvious, but is it safe to assume you would simply removed the fixture itself, install this in the box, then replace the fixture.  I'm assuming the only issue that might pop up would be that the box was full of wires already.  Seems to me I remember those ceiling boxes usually being pretty deep.

 

[jkmonroe]

Yeah, that's what I would do.  And then use an association to link it to a switch.
 
See, Z-Wave sounds really cool, and there are a lot of neat things you can do with it.  I wish it wasn't such a pain in the ass to setup/configure.

 

[Deane Johnson]

I wish it wasn't such a pain in the ass to setup/configure.

Roger That!