Sorely Disappointed in UPB
- Thread starter chambro
- Start date
Thanks Digger, that was really my only point and you stated it nicely.
Hi Steve-You didn't strike any nerves, at least with me, you are entitled to your disappointment. I was disappointed too. I think where we disagree is in the fact that you want to blame the manufacturer for something that is outside of their control. There are several examples the guys stated here. The fact is the switches ARE reliable, its the TRANSMISSION MEDIA that is faulty. Name one piece of equipment that depends on a transmission media and will work properly even if the transmission media has issues? You can't, its the nature of the beast. UPB is a powerline control technology, it depends on the quality of the powerline to communicate properly. If there are issues with that powerline then the signaling can and will be affected. You have SEVERE noise on your powerline which is causing signal degradation. That's nobody's fault, just the nature of the beast. You can, and people do, have the same issues with wireless. It depends on air as the transmission media. If I put high quality wireless switches in and then I take a 'noise' generator to fill the air with all kinds of garbage on the same wireless frequency, you wireless switches won't communicate either. Does the switch still operate the light - yup, its reliable. It's just the path between switches that isn't.
And I don't mean to be argumentative at all but as AnthonyZ said, if you did the research beforehand, especially here, you would see that there is only one truly reliable system and that is hardwire. That's because only you control that transmission media. And even hardwire can have issues - what if a rat eats thru your wire or you nail it and short it, guess what - connectivity between devices is lost. So you really have to understand the difference between the hardware and the transmission/connection path.
I won't disagree that manufacturers can make things clearer, etc and some do marketing that maybe doesn't spell everything out, but that's where sites like this come in. There are hundreds before you that have done this and this is well documented. So, no struck nerves, arguments or issues, the rest of us just won't blame the mfg for something that isn't their fault, we have plenty of other stuff to blame on them!
I understand your point, but I still think I'm not getting mine accross well. First of all, I'm not interested in *blaming* anyone for my current situation; I take responsiblity for my decision to try UPB, and am only interested in making it work (if possibile), and improving the system so these problems are less likely for other folks down the road. Unfortunately, you can't improve a system unless you get down to the root cause(s) of the problem, and this can trigger defensive behaviour in some folks.
Anyway, here is how my analysis of the situation goes:
1. The existing powerline network was designed and intended to be used to distibute electric power throughout a region and within individual buildings, so that the consumers can operate their electric appliances. In other words, it's sole purpose is a distribution network so the Power Utilities can transport and sell their product (electric power) to the end customers in a reliable manner.
2. The power line network was NOT designed or built for any other reason, including (and especially relavant to this discussion) as a wired network that can do double duty transmitting home automation contral signals.
3. Some amount of noise on the AC waveform is inherent and expected, and the Utilities must ensure that it is below the threshold that could cause any reasonable interference with their end customer's typical electic appliances that consume their power product. On the rare occasion that there is a problem, the utility will come out and fix it. (Note: I intend the qualifiers reasonable and typical to convey a very high percentage (>99.99%) of consumer electric applications)
4. If someone decides to design and provide a new product that uses the existing powerlines as their transmission media, the onus is on them to ensure that their product works on the platform they chose to piggyback on.
5. It is unreasonable to hold the Utilities accountable for noise below this threshold that interfers with applications (PLC) that were never intended to run on the network. If my UPB isn't working because of powerline noise below the Utility quality thresholds, they will almost certainly not address it, nor should they.
The points above are what led me to make my original (and apparently contentious) statement: "Sorely Disappointed in UPB". Hopefully this explains why my disappoint lies with UPB, and not the power utilities as some have suggested.
So this is not about "fixing the blame", it's about "fixing the problem". In my opinion, one of the root causes of this problem is that expecations for the reliability of UPB have been set too high in the manufacturers' marketing materials (I think Digger's post illustrates this nicely). Quality perception is all about how actual performance measures up against the expected performance. Although fixing this expectation issue will not help me with my problem now, hopefully it will prevent other from stepping into the same pile I did, and more importantly improve the quality perception of this technology.
Finally, I firmly believe that if the manufacturers of this technology ever want to move from the realm of the hobbyists to mainstream (which I assume they do, but I could be wrong), they will have to make their products robust against this inherent system noise (any Taguchi fans out there?) and get away from poor quality patches and bandaids (i.e., slapping filters that may or may not work on applicances and even neighbor's houses). I know they are working on it, and hopefully one day we will see the results, but I don't think that day is today.
Good idea, I'll check it. They did break the underground feed line into the house during the excavation process, and patched it with a splice ball. Maybe there is some leakage.
Thanks
No aluminum, all copper.
Ahhh, saving the best for last this morning!
Well thanks for thoughts 123, but if your condescending and sanctimonious posts on this thread are your idea of a welcome, then you’ll have to forgive me if I respond in kind. I notice Rupp was reprimanded for being rude and unhelpful, but I guess if you do it with pompous language it’s OK?
Anyway, I explained my points in this morning’s earlier post. If you have something of value to add to the debate, please do so, but please lose the patronizing tone.
All manufacturers word their advertisements to maximize the amount of people to pull the trigger and buy the product. There should be some accountability if a mfg misleads someone on the capabilities of the product. Since I quoted SA I will also quote a competitor.
From the Smartlabs website:
Developed by SmartLabs, INSTEON is the most reliable and best-selling wireless home-control networking technology, which offers more flexibility than any other home management system on the market. With over five years of R&D and testing, INSTEON technology relies on its dual-mesh network to send signals both through the air (RF) and over the existing electrical wires (power line) in the home.
Reliable
Since every INSTEON-compatible device is a repeater (see how this works), the signal gets stronger the more devices you have in your home to give you unsurpassed reliability. In addition, each INSTEON message contains error detection, so lights turning on accidentally will virtually never happen.
Is this entirely accurate (but then again they are saying they are the most reliable and best selling wireless system not saying they are the most reliable PLC)? They also say every Insteon Compatible device is a repeater which is also not an accurate statement. Last they state that Insteon gives you unsurpassed reliability (I would think a hard wired system beats Insteon hands down).
Insteon was marketed by Home Deport and even sold in some Home Depot stores. That made it more of a consumer product then other some other automated lighting technologies. The misleading information by any mfg. that is directed to a consumer can have severe repercussions with financially and even in some cases with safety if the consumer misuses the product based on advertising.
Interestingly enough the Smarthome website and catalogs no longer touts Insteon as the most reliable.
From the Smartlabs website:
Developed by SmartLabs, INSTEON is the most reliable and best-selling wireless home-control networking technology, which offers more flexibility than any other home management system on the market. With over five years of R&D and testing, INSTEON technology relies on its dual-mesh network to send signals both through the air (RF) and over the existing electrical wires (power line) in the home.
Reliable
Since every INSTEON-compatible device is a repeater (see how this works), the signal gets stronger the more devices you have in your home to give you unsurpassed reliability. In addition, each INSTEON message contains error detection, so lights turning on accidentally will virtually never happen.
Is this entirely accurate (but then again they are saying they are the most reliable and best selling wireless system not saying they are the most reliable PLC)? They also say every Insteon Compatible device is a repeater which is also not an accurate statement. Last they state that Insteon gives you unsurpassed reliability (I would think a hard wired system beats Insteon hands down).
Insteon was marketed by Home Deport and even sold in some Home Depot stores. That made it more of a consumer product then other some other automated lighting technologies. The misleading information by any mfg. that is directed to a consumer can have severe repercussions with financially and even in some cases with safety if the consumer misuses the product based on advertising.
Interestingly enough the Smarthome website and catalogs no longer touts Insteon as the most reliable.
Steve
Senior Member
This will be my last reply in this thread because I don't think I can help or add any value. If after this you are still locked into your opinion, then it is pointless to keep debating this, regardless of how friendly we keep it.
The ONE thing you can blame on SAI is their advertising, but NOT how you think. Their advertising is very accurate. UPB is much more reliable than x-10 or other technologies. It is 99.9 reliable. I proved that myself a long time ago. It was a situation where x-10 would not work at all, even on the same circuit with everything else off and everything else disconnected from the circuit. I can't, and won't, try to explain it or try to figure it out again, but that was the fact. Now try UPB in the same exact configuration and it worked perfectly. So, there was something (and not noise), maybe a signal sucker (although there was nothing identifiable to do that) that prevented x-10 from working but UPB worked despite that. So, in that regard, their advertising is accurate, UPB is more reliable than some other technologies.
Now, here's the rub, and the crux of the situation imho and why you are so frustrated and wanting to blame (even though you say you aren't) the manufacturers. It's what they don't tell you that is killing you. They don't say that all of the above is true until you have severe noise or something else that compromises the powerline, then we don't work just like anyone else. That's the part that we are trying to get across. I am not an EE so I'm not going to pretend to explain the why's or why nots. I don't know what a power company looks for as far as 'clean' power, I doubt too much. I think all they really care about is if you get steady power to your place and stuff works. I don't think you can compare a typical consumer electrical product running to a special signal piggybacking on the power line. You are right in some of your points, the powerline was not designed for these signals.
But here is where we digress and sorry, but I (and many others) think you are wrong and misplacing your disappointment.
That's true, but the disclaimer should be 'typical, not infected with noise powerlines' I agree that ALL manufacturers that make these products should add a disclaimer that outside influence of noise can render the system unreliable. But they need to be careful, it doesn't break or make their device useless, it will just sever communication and make the 'system' not work. Remove the outside interference and it will work as designed.
Since it's easy to mix in the power company and their lines, let's take another example, a point I tried to make earlier, that shows we are not trying to blame the power company or their lines or service, although it very well could be. Let's take a look at wirleless. Let's use an example from earlier which apparently didn't make any impact. So lets say we have a tower built and setup by American Tower Company. That tower is designed to broadcast wireless tv signals over the air where it is received by say a Radio Shack antenna. Both American and Radio Shack designed their products to transmit and receive signals respectively and say they even claim their stuff is 99.9% reliable. So you live in this nice house 35 miles from Americans tower and you sit in your family room where the Radio Shack antenna picks up the signal transmitted by Americans tower and feeds it into your nice Samsung tv and there you sit happy as can be with this beautiful picture. This goes on for years and you are extremely happy. Even you would agree American and Radio Shack are 99.9% reliable because you have never even seen a hiccup in your beautiful tv picture. And the transmission media, the AIR, is perfect. Now, big bad XYZ company comes along and builds a 15 story building a few miles from your house. So there you are watching this same beautiful setup you've enjoyed, but now, alas, the picture is garbage - it is pixelating like crazy. OMG, what do we do? Do we blame American and say their claims are wrong and their towers don't work as advertised? Do we go after Radio Shack with the same claim? Do do we blame, I don't know, the planet because the air does not work any more? The answer is simple, the problem is a new source of interference that neither American, Radio Shack or anyone else would have known would be there but could certainly impact the transmission of the signal. So, what do you do? Well, you could look for the problem and identify it? Maybe you can, like in this case, but what if the problem was a huge flock of birds that just flew right by the tower occasionally which only sometimes impacted your picture? Or what if there were some weird atmospheric anomaly which bounced the signal around and also impacted your otherwise 99.9% reliable picture? Those would be tougher to identify, but certainly an issue.
Do you get the point? The same thing can happen with FRS radios, or guess what, even Rupp's ZWave switches. What happens if you have a house full of ZWave switches and they are working perfectly. You are happy, right? The mfg claims that the stuff is reliable is accurate, right? But now say you remodel and put up a new wall and it just so happens it was in the path of a switch that was not in a mesh, it only had the one path to another switch but you now weakened the signal with the new wall. Now half of your ZWave switches don't work any more. Who's fault is it? Did Leviton mess up and are their claims wrong now because you put a new wall up and broke the system?
The bottom line is manufacturers can't design to every possible unforeseen and outside influence. Sorry my friend, but nothing in this world is perfect and if you think it should be, you will have many more disappointments in life. I can guarantee you will have many more disappointments in HA.
Closing random thoughts - you mentioned
I'm sorry for your disappointment, really and truly. I am disappointed that I have UPB issues as well. But I only have myself to blame. But I was not smart enough to predict that my new electric cooktop would spit out 15-30 lesters of noise. I was not smart enough to predict that my Pentair Intelliflow pump would create 3-10 lesters of noise. And I guess SAI was not smart enough to design around that either. Oh, and that stupid Heath/Zenith motion light that does weird things to my signal. I wish I were smart enough to warn people to not waste all the time I did troubleshooting this stuff. I wish I was smart enough to tell them what to use so they wouldn't have problems or disappointment, but alas I am not, I can't predict what interference may come along and break their system, or prevent a new one from working. All we can do is urge people to use a hardwired system like we have here for years and then at least external interference would be eliminated. Perhaps one day a technology will come along that truly is perfect...
Now, lets go have a beer!
The ONE thing you can blame on SAI is their advertising, but NOT how you think. Their advertising is very accurate. UPB is much more reliable than x-10 or other technologies. It is 99.9 reliable. I proved that myself a long time ago. It was a situation where x-10 would not work at all, even on the same circuit with everything else off and everything else disconnected from the circuit. I can't, and won't, try to explain it or try to figure it out again, but that was the fact. Now try UPB in the same exact configuration and it worked perfectly. So, there was something (and not noise), maybe a signal sucker (although there was nothing identifiable to do that) that prevented x-10 from working but UPB worked despite that. So, in that regard, their advertising is accurate, UPB is more reliable than some other technologies.
Now, here's the rub, and the crux of the situation imho and why you are so frustrated and wanting to blame (even though you say you aren't) the manufacturers. It's what they don't tell you that is killing you. They don't say that all of the above is true until you have severe noise or something else that compromises the powerline, then we don't work just like anyone else. That's the part that we are trying to get across. I am not an EE so I'm not going to pretend to explain the why's or why nots. I don't know what a power company looks for as far as 'clean' power, I doubt too much. I think all they really care about is if you get steady power to your place and stuff works. I don't think you can compare a typical consumer electrical product running to a special signal piggybacking on the power line. You are right in some of your points, the powerline was not designed for these signals.
But here is where we digress and sorry, but I (and many others) think you are wrong and misplacing your disappointment.
That's true, but the disclaimer should be 'typical, not infected with noise powerlines' I agree that ALL manufacturers that make these products should add a disclaimer that outside influence of noise can render the system unreliable. But they need to be careful, it doesn't break or make their device useless, it will just sever communication and make the 'system' not work. Remove the outside interference and it will work as designed.
Since it's easy to mix in the power company and their lines, let's take another example, a point I tried to make earlier, that shows we are not trying to blame the power company or their lines or service, although it very well could be. Let's take a look at wirleless. Let's use an example from earlier which apparently didn't make any impact. So lets say we have a tower built and setup by American Tower Company. That tower is designed to broadcast wireless tv signals over the air where it is received by say a Radio Shack antenna. Both American and Radio Shack designed their products to transmit and receive signals respectively and say they even claim their stuff is 99.9% reliable. So you live in this nice house 35 miles from Americans tower and you sit in your family room where the Radio Shack antenna picks up the signal transmitted by Americans tower and feeds it into your nice Samsung tv and there you sit happy as can be with this beautiful picture. This goes on for years and you are extremely happy. Even you would agree American and Radio Shack are 99.9% reliable because you have never even seen a hiccup in your beautiful tv picture. And the transmission media, the AIR, is perfect. Now, big bad XYZ company comes along and builds a 15 story building a few miles from your house. So there you are watching this same beautiful setup you've enjoyed, but now, alas, the picture is garbage - it is pixelating like crazy. OMG, what do we do? Do we blame American and say their claims are wrong and their towers don't work as advertised? Do we go after Radio Shack with the same claim? Do do we blame, I don't know, the planet because the air does not work any more? The answer is simple, the problem is a new source of interference that neither American, Radio Shack or anyone else would have known would be there but could certainly impact the transmission of the signal. So, what do you do? Well, you could look for the problem and identify it? Maybe you can, like in this case, but what if the problem was a huge flock of birds that just flew right by the tower occasionally which only sometimes impacted your picture? Or what if there were some weird atmospheric anomaly which bounced the signal around and also impacted your otherwise 99.9% reliable picture? Those would be tougher to identify, but certainly an issue.
Do you get the point? The same thing can happen with FRS radios, or guess what, even Rupp's ZWave switches. What happens if you have a house full of ZWave switches and they are working perfectly. You are happy, right? The mfg claims that the stuff is reliable is accurate, right? But now say you remodel and put up a new wall and it just so happens it was in the path of a switch that was not in a mesh, it only had the one path to another switch but you now weakened the signal with the new wall. Now half of your ZWave switches don't work any more. Who's fault is it? Did Leviton mess up and are their claims wrong now because you put a new wall up and broke the system?
The bottom line is manufacturers can't design to every possible unforeseen and outside influence. Sorry my friend, but nothing in this world is perfect and if you think it should be, you will have many more disappointments in life. I can guarantee you will have many more disappointments in HA.
Closing random thoughts - you mentioned
Well, I can tell you that UPB is used by literally thousands of professional installers that make their living off of it. Why? Because it is a quality product that typically is very reliable. It is definitely not just a hobbyist product.
I agree, so go and figure out where the noise is coming from. And if you can't, hire a professional in this area (don't miread that as you are not a professional - I'm sure you are in your field of expertise). And if they can't then try another technology like wireless, but be cognizant of the fact IT CAN BREAK TOO! You are actually lucky in that you have this problem now before you install 8000 sq ft of it. Imagine how you feel if you installed 150 devices that worked perfectly THEN your noise started.
Well, you are not the first to be sorely disappointed by marketing materials. And HA and electronics are not the only realms. I bet if we did a poll here, > 90% of respondents would say their actual performance does measure up to their expected performance. The only 'fight' you have here is to urge manufacturers to put some sort of disclaimer about noise. But the only way you are going to know if it works is to try it. Any you do that as a hobbyist by reading the wealth of information here, then work with a 99.9% reliable (sorry) vendor like AO or others around here. You get a starter kit and see what happens, if there are issues you either buckle down and find them or return the stuff and try something else.
I'm sorry for your disappointment, really and truly. I am disappointed that I have UPB issues as well. But I only have myself to blame. But I was not smart enough to predict that my new electric cooktop would spit out 15-30 lesters of noise. I was not smart enough to predict that my Pentair Intelliflow pump would create 3-10 lesters of noise. And I guess SAI was not smart enough to design around that either. Oh, and that stupid Heath/Zenith motion light that does weird things to my signal. I wish I were smart enough to warn people to not waste all the time I did troubleshooting this stuff. I wish I was smart enough to tell them what to use so they wouldn't have problems or disappointment, but alas I am not, I can't predict what interference may come along and break their system, or prevent a new one from working. All we can do is urge people to use a hardwired system like we have here for years and then at least external interference would be eliminated. Perhaps one day a technology will come along that truly is perfect...
Now, lets go have a beer!
123
Senior Member
It was a genuine welcome. It was also a genuine recommendation to perform more research. Other newbies have received similar advice from the community.Ahhh, saving the best for last this morning!
Well thanks for thoughts 123, but if this condescending and sanctimonious reply is your idea of a welcome, then you’ll have to forgive me if I respond in kind. I notice Rupp was reprimanded for being rude and unhelpful, but I guess if you do it with pompous language it’s OK?
Anyway, I explained my points in this morning’s earlier post. If you have something of value to add to the debate, please do so, but please lose the patronizing tone.
As for the balance of your comments, they simply confirm what you have already established:
As a new UPB user, you are correct and existing UPB users are wrong. It doesn't work for you so it is a completely flawed technology.
Anyone who tries to tell you different, is branded with a few choice adjectives. That's not a winning strategy for drawing support ... but I doubt you'd agree with me.
The OP is just saying that the advertising is misleading. Everyone is jumping into defending UPB when he is actually trying to get it to work by finding the noise which according to the advertising should not be a problem 99.9% of the time. UPB works and works great unless there is an unusual amount of noise. The advertising should state that.
I personally find UPB to work perfectly. Others will not have the same luck. This is not a case of devices failing out of the box or within months as with another type of automated lighting. This is just somewhat misleading representation of how well the product works.
I personally find UPB to work perfectly. Others will not have the same luck. This is not a case of devices failing out of the box or within months as with another type of automated lighting. This is just somewhat misleading representation of how well the product works.
kwilcox
Active Member
Did you try switching over to the generator to see if the noise problem changes? Have them conduct a "generator test" then plug the PIM in. At least you'll be able to potentially isolate the source. If it is coming from the line then you may have a potentially dangerous installation fault.
In my original troubleshooting session, I completely shutdown all power to the generator, (including the trickle charger and current sensing circuits), and then actually turned it on and let it run. Neither case had any significant change to the noise level. Eventually, I had every circuit in the entire house off except the single outlet to which the PIM was in, and I actually had a slightly higher noise level than when all circuits were switched in. I'm assuming this means the noise source is external to the main panel, but I wouldn't stake my life on it. I don't understand at all why the noise level would increase as circuits are switched out.
Well, I think we can agree on at least one point Steve! This will also be my last comment on this topic, and then I’d like to turn the thread back to a solution to my particular issue.
I read all your points and examples and believe me, I do understand your viewpoint, but you are right, I still do not agree with them. My background maybe gives me a different perspective; I've spent the last 25 years of my career as an engineer and later executive in technology manufacturing companies. Quality and Continuous Improvement are two concepts that I believe are essential to any manufacturing company that wants to compete in today's business environment. In my early days, I was fully entrenched in the old attitudes of making excuses for poor product performance, using the same arguments of "that defect is outside the spec limits we set", or "the customer can't use it under those conditions", etc, only to watch as we lost market share to companies whose products did work in those conditions. The bottom line is the customers don't really care about our excuses or rationalizations; they just buy the product that works best for them, and if it’s a good product, they do it in droves. It was very painful, but I and many others finally were dragged, kicking and screaming, to the realization that we had it wrong. When our attitudes changed, and we made a strong commitment to Continuous Improvement and started looking hard at every failure and defect, (regardless of spec or operational limits) our product quality and performance began to improve and we not only eventually recovered our lost market share, we actually increased it. I am a zealot about this stuff because I lived through both ends of it. I don't expect everyone to understand or accept it; heck it took me almost 5 years to get it.
Instead of preaching anymore, I'll just make a prediction: If the UPB manufacturers get serious about continuously improving this technology to make it robust in all the conditions that their potential customers use it, then this will be a very successful technology that could finally bring home automation to the mainstream. If they don't, then they will all be out of business as soon as someone else does. And someone definitely will...
I'm ready for that beer now!
fcwilt
Active Member
OK there goes that idea.
You said they damaged the feed to your house and it was repaired? I would suspect, at this point, that is the most likely source of the noise. A little bit of arcing and you would have a lot of noise. Perhaps you can find someone to bring a scope and look at the characteristics of the noise on the line. This could tell you a good deal.
As far as the advertising goes 99.9% reliability (when looked at in one sense) would allow for 1 house in a 1000 to have problems. Looks like you are that unlucky 1 house.
Perhaps you could take your laptop (and CIM) to some neighbors and check noise levels in nearby homes?
