Elk M1 not receiving UPB device status

[mikefamig]

I like to give credit where credit is due  so thank you Trey at AO for coming to this solution quickly. It's the first time that I've worked with him and he is very knowledgeable, confident and objective and got it right the first time. He has won Automated Outlet a customer.
 
Mike.

 

[mikefamig]

If I remember right there's a FPN in the XSP manual about this, or at least was one of Elk's white papers on their old site.....from memory, I believe it can be done but the polling slows down the panel or XSP significantly so they put some guidelines out.
 
Been a while.

DEL
 
The xsp installation manual states that the Elk will see status sent from the upb switch by telling  the switch to transmit status when switched using upstart. It will not see a link which may contain several state changes of several switches, the elk is not programmed to receive all that information.
 
Here is a quote from the manual:
 
 
UPB Device Status Broadcasts:
UPB devices contain a programmable option called "Transmit Changes" or "Report light level after rocker switch is pressed."
Enabling this option in a UPB device allows the M1XSP and M1 to receive "Load Status Change" broadcasts from the device.
This UPB UPStart PC Software is required for enabling this option. Look under the "Rocker Switch" tab.   SEE LIMITATIONS.
 
 
LIMITATIONS -
 
UPB Devices DO NOT BROADCAST their change after a UPB LINK Command
UPB LINKs are powerful commands, capable of simultaneously affecting from 1 to 256 devices on the network.  LINKs
can provide some impressive visual lighting affects, but they also have one undesireable negative trait.  UPB devices
DO NOT Broadcast their current status when changed by a LINK command.  The principle reason is if a lot of devices
attempted to broadcast all at once the network could be overwhelmed.  This could result in traffic collisions, slow
network response, and/or lost communications.  Basically the UPB protocol does not allow devices to broadcast their
status following LINK commands.  And if the UPB devices aren't broadcasting their status after LINK commnands then
M1 cannot accurately display the lighting status.  This is a UPB protocol limitation and there is no workaround of
solution that ELK can offer to resolve this limitation.  The bottom line is: UPB devices DO NOT and CANNOT be
programmed to broadcast (report) their status when changed by a LINK command.
 
Mike.

 

[drvnbysound]

I'm about to be between homes and have been considering selling my Zwave stuff in an effort to try something different in our next home; leaning toward UPB. Having said that, I've been trying to find some answers to the device status questions and came across this thread which has most of the information I was looking for.
 
Having said that, does anyone know if the PCSPIM will receive device status? I understand the LINK limitation addressed above, but curious if Mike's reported issue was due to a defective device or lack in firmware, which may have been addressed since 2014... 

 

[mikefamig]

Tech support at Automated Outlet strongly advised me to put the PCSPIM behind me and replace it with an XSP and PIM. The status problem went away and all is well.
 
Elk insisted that the PCSPIM reported status of each device but it never worked here.
 
Mike.

 

[mikefamig]

I should add that the PCSPIM is a neater solution which is why I chose it in the first place and also that there have been a few firmware upgrades to the M1 since that may have corrected the problem.
 
Mike.

 

[ano]

LIMITATIONS -
 
UPB Devices DO NOT BROADCAST their change after a UPB LINK Command

The Omni Pro II has created a solution to this problem which is implemented in firmware that works well, as its a basic part of HLC.  It may be possible to do it on the ELK as well. Explaining HLC is involved, but basically the Omni watches for links that might turn on/off/or dim lights, and after it receives one it polls each of the effected lights to get their status.  HLC is designed different links assigned to different rooms, so when it sees one of these links, it knows which lights it needs to poll.  When a switch is switched, its transmits is status, but when it receives a link and switches, it does not transmit status, nor could it because many lights might respond to a single link.

 

[mikefamig]

The problem with the Elk PCSPIM is not the same as the problem with reporting status of a link with more than one device change.  Even a single tap of a UPB dimmer is not reported to the Elk with the PCSPIM.
 
Mike.

 

[drvnbysound]

Mike, was that due to an hardware issue, or is that standard operation?

 

[mikefamig]

Automated Outlet seemed to be at odds with Elk on that. When I pressed the paddle on the UPB dimmer switch I could see the light on the PCSPIM flicker so I know that the dimmer sent a link and that it arrived at the PCSPIM. From there there was no way that we could get the Elk to respond to that link via rules ar anything else that we tried. AO spent a couple of hours on the phone with me and we could not make it work. i switched to an XSP and PIM and all is fine.
 
i would like to hear from anyone who has the M1 with PCSPIM working to receive staus from a UPB device. My switches are Simply Automated.
 
Mike.

 

[drvnbysound]

Automated Outlet seemed to be at odds with Elk on that. When I pressed the paddle on the UPB dimmer switch I could see the light on the PCSPIM flicker so I know that the dimmer sent a link and that it arrived at the PCSPIM. From there there was no way that we could get the Elk to respond to that link via rules ar anything else that we tried. AO spent a couple of hours on the phone with me and we could not make it work. i switched to an XSP and PIM and all is fine.
 
i would like to hear from anyone who has the M1 with PCSPIM working to receive staus from a UPB device. My switches are Simply Automated.
 
Mike.

 
I'm going to reach out to Elk tomorrow and see what they have to say... I'll report back. 

 

[mikefamig]

My experience with it was quite a while ago and they may have gotten some bugs out since then. I'll be interested to hear what they say.

 

[drvnbysound]

A summary of what I was just told:
 
If the switch/device is capable of reporting status, the PCSPIM should receive that message and update the Elk panel accordingly. Obviously, there is a limitation with UPB and Links, but other than that it should not be an issue.

 

[mikefamig]

Give it a go, I'm very interested to see if it works.
 
When I had a problem it was solved by replacing the PIM-E with the XSP/PIM combination and there were no other changes. No changes in the M1 and no changes to the UPB system in Upstart.
 
Back in 2014 I pushed to continue troubleshooting the PSCPIM and it was AO who convinced me that it was the cause of the trouble and that I should not spend any more time troubleshooting it. They seemed frustrated that Elk insisted that there was no trouble with the device. I got the sense that mine was not the first problem they had seen with it. The technician ran down a list of things for me to check and when everything here checked out they immediately asked me to return the PCSPIM. They offered to replace it with a new one to try in case mine was defective but highly recommended against it. I took their advise.
 
Mike.