MrGibbage said:
Interesting replies--thanks. I am having a hard time deciding between the Icons and Switchlinks. This is a long shot, but I am wondering: are any of you HA'ers in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia? Hopefully with one or the other (or both) type(s) installed.
Btw, my house is built. I had a lot of pre-wire carefully installed. I doubt if anyone will be stealing my wiring now. But who knows nowadays?
Skip
The big difference is in the wattage of the loads to be attached. Icons, as I recall, can handle only up to 300 watts. I thought I saw a recent piece from SH that listed them as only 150 watts, but you can verify this by checking their website.
Standard switchlincs can handle up to 600 watts, and they make a heavy duty version that can handle up to 1000 watts. Note that if you are installing these in multi-switch (mutli gang) wall boxes, SH recommends that you lower the rating of the switch by 200 watts for each switch beside the one you are replacing. That can lower a 600 watt switch to 200 watts, which has always seemed like a lot to me, but it's one of the reasons I installed primarily 1000 watt versions in my house.
The other things to consider are that Switchlincs have a LED light scale for brightness level of the load on the side, while Icons do not. Also, the ramp rate for Switchlincs is adjustable, and it allegedly is not for Icons (although some have reporting adjusting it in X10 mode).
Personally, I have each of these switches and find them all acceptable. All of my Switchlincs are out of view, so the LED scale doesn't matter to me. I use Icons for all slave switches, too, because I personally prefer the small, single LED and since slave switches don't have loads attached, the wattage hasn't mattered.
Also, remember to use relay type switches on any fluorescents.
Hope that helps.
