Insteon RF

Mike Boulanger said:
Quality control on the other hand, I'm not so happy with. I feel I receive too many switches with issues out of the box. They need to do more stringent testing at the factory.
Amen to that. :blink:


Digger said:
I HAVE troubleshooted BEFORE I call and they still insist on spending over a half hour trying everything they have on a checklist. I had a switch that died from a static discharge. I was the one that was turning on the switch and it died from the discharge. They had me turn on and off the circuit breaker, change the light bulb, check the wiring, and then asked me if I would put in a regular switch. I started telling them to jump in a lake and they conceded the switch was probably defective and they RMA'd it. It was a HASSLE for a switch that obviously died.

What? You're not familiar with:
Me: "Hang on... (sip of beer...) okay, I did that."
Support: "What! That fast?"
Me: "Yup. All the way out the breaker box then up to the attic and back in three seconds."
Support: "Now the light bulb."
Me: "Hang on... (mute... where's that beer...) okay, new bulb."
Me: "Listen, it'll probably take me about 30 seconds to replace all the wiring in my house if you ask for that... or you can RMA this thing. I got lots of patience and you're asking silly requests to which I'm giving silly replies. Your call."
Support: "Hang on... your RMA number is..."
I haven't had to do that with SmartHome, but it's never failed anywhere else.

I have not resorted to telling them to jump in a lake in a decade or two... but I never give up either. And I'm having a beer while they're working... I'm happy... and I get what I want. :P

LOL.... Ok I will have a case of beer on standby for SH. If the guy is nice I will send him one to LOL

Hah... sounds like you've had some frustrating experiences. Not necessarily in defense of Smarthome, but crap like that is not uncommon with most electronic companies. I once had Dell tell me I was "refusing" to troubleshoot a problem because I didn't want to take apart a good notebook I had to swap parts into a notebook I had JUST received from them that would not boot up. That's the last time I'll ever mention to Dell that I had another working PC nearby!
 
Got a call and email today that said that the folks that gave me the kit were supposed to have informed me that this was a "confidential" test. They were very understanding ("our fault, not yours") but asked that I not post any further.

I will add only this: the factory reset is acting exactly as it should... I'm just not used to factory resetting devices because I always use software to program the devices. Thanks for helping me understand that, Mike.

I'll certainly post more when approved. :blink:
 
Got a call and email today that said that the folks that gave me the kit were supposed to have informed me that this was a "confidential" test. They were very understanding ("our fault, not yours") but asked that I not post any further.

I will add only this: the factory reset is acting exactly as it should... I'm just not used to factory resetting devices because I always use software to program the devices. Thanks for helping me understand that, Mike.

I'll certainly post more when approved. :blink:

I guess Big Brother at SH is watching us after all.
 
well since SH Mike is watching I will admit publically that the "Buy More" they will work better may in fact be a true statement. I am over 16 installed and a few that were flakey are more relaible (not 100% mind u). I have a bunch more to install and I HOPE that reliability goes up as far as commands.

If I remember correctly out of the original 11 or so I bought 4 dropped dead and about as many would not link. I have RMA'd the dead ones (or exchanged them where I bought them since others had sales when SH did not). I chucked 4 that did not link along with one that had an arcing sound. Also I chucked the controlinc since it didnt work. I got another one since but havent tried it yet. I find customer support at distributors to be less of a hassle. One distributor who will remain nameless is extremely helpful but they track the device address's and only exchanges what you buy from them. Cant blame them.

So More is better is not just a sales pitch it seems. Only wish it it was clearer that you need a minimum amount if in fact it is a true statement.

Newer Icons seem a little better so far but I had to buy from SH since nobody has them anymore. Older V2's are hanging in there for the most part except one with a bad paddle that I need to replace this weekend. I hate having to press the switch 2 or 3 times etc. but I start getting really frustrated after the 4th try.

I bought some keypadlincs to try also. I havent heard any recent horror stories so maybe the bugs are out of that. Did not buy from SH though.

Out of the 11 original devicess 2 are going strong for about a year. Newer ones admitedly seem better (bought 8 in February and a few more recently).

I spent about $800 at SH in February alone but I guess I am small potato's to them.
 
well since SH Mike is watching I will admit publically that the "Buy More" they will work better may in fact be a true statement. I am over 16 installed and a few that were flakey are more relaible (not 100% mind u). I have a bunch more to install and I HOPE that reliability goes up as far as commands.

If I remember correctly out of the original 11 or so I bought 4 dropped dead and about as many would not link. I have RMA'd the dead ones (or exchanged them where I bought them since others had sales when SH did not). I chucked 4 that did not link along with one that had an arcing sound. Also I chucked the controlinc since it didnt work. I got another one since but havent tried it yet. I find customer support at distributors to be less of a hassle. One distributor who will remain nameless is extremely helpful but they track the device address's and only exchanges what you buy from them. Cant blame them.

So More is better is not just a sales pitch it seems. Only wish it it was clearer that you need a minimum amount if in fact it is a true statement.

Newer Icons seem a little better so far but I had to buy from SH since nobody has them anymore. Older V2's are hanging in there for the most part except one with a bad paddle that I need to replace this weekend. I hate having to press the switch 2 or 3 times etc. but I start getting really frustrated after the 4th try.

I bought some keypadlincs to try also. I havent heard any recent horror stories so maybe the bugs are out of that. Did not buy from SH though.

Out of the 11 original devicess 2 are going strong for about a year. Newer ones admitedly seem better (bought 8 in February and a few more recently).

I spent about $800 at SH in February alone but I guess I am small potato's to them.

That sounds like an incredibly high failure rate, even compared to other horror stories I have heard. I can't believe you just threw all those devices away! Sure there's nothing going on with your powerline that could be causing those failures? I've heard plenty of paddle issues, but not many 'completely dead' or 'will not link' issues. For comparison, I have 60+ Insteon switches installed in my house, and maybe 5 had paddle issues (too high of a number, in my opinion), 1 had a bad contact in the switch, and 1 displayed various flakey issues and would not link.

As for communications reliability, I think it varies dramatically (and that stands for all powerline technologies) depending on your house. I have a bunch of CFLs, computers, battery backups, etc. in my house and I didn't experience any signal reliability issues even when I had 3 or 4 installed. That being said, I hear of people all the time with the devices I have causing signal issues. Installing filters in key places and/or removing the offending devices helps.

Adding Insteon devices to increase reliability is certainly no myth - each device acts as a repeater. With pretty much every switch in my home being Insteon, its EXTREMELY rare that something that was supposed to happen doesn't.
 
well since SH Mike is watching I will admit publically that the "Buy More" they will work better may in fact be a true statement. I am over 16 installed and a few that were flakey are more relaible (not 100% mind u). I have a bunch more to install and I HOPE that reliability goes up as far as commands.

If I remember correctly out of the original 11 or so I bought 4 dropped dead and about as many would not link. I have RMA'd the dead ones (or exchanged them where I bought them since others had sales when SH did not). I chucked 4 that did not link along with one that had an arcing sound. Also I chucked the controlinc since it didnt work. I got another one since but havent tried it yet. I find customer support at distributors to be less of a hassle. One distributor who will remain nameless is extremely helpful but they track the device address's and only exchanges what you buy from them. Cant blame them.

So More is better is not just a sales pitch it seems. Only wish it it was clearer that you need a minimum amount if in fact it is a true statement.

Newer Icons seem a little better so far but I had to buy from SH since nobody has them anymore. Older V2's are hanging in there for the most part except one with a bad paddle that I need to replace this weekend. I hate having to press the switch 2 or 3 times etc. but I start getting really frustrated after the 4th try.

I bought some keypadlincs to try also. I havent heard any recent horror stories so maybe the bugs are out of that. Did not buy from SH though.

Out of the 11 original devicess 2 are going strong for about a year. Newer ones admitedly seem better (bought 8 in February and a few more recently).

I spent about $800 at SH in February alone but I guess I am small potato's to them.

That sounds like an incredibly high failure rate, even compared to other horror stories I have heard. I can't believe you just threw all those devices away! Sure there's nothing going on with your powerline that could be causing those failures? I've heard plenty of paddle issues, but not many 'completely dead' or 'will not link' issues. For comparison, I have 60+ Insteon switches installed in my house, and maybe 5 had paddle issues (too high of a number, in my opinion), 1 had a bad contact in the switch, and 1 displayed various flakey issues and would not link.

As for communications reliability, I think it varies dramatically (and that stands for all powerline technologies) depending on your house. I have a bunch of CFLs, computers, battery backups, etc. in my house and I didn't experience any signal reliability issues even when I had 3 or 4 installed. That being said, I hear of people all the time with the devices I have causing signal issues. Installing filters in key places and/or removing the offending devices helps.

Adding Insteon devices to increase reliability is certainly no myth - each device acts as a repeater. With pretty much every switch in my home being Insteon, its EXTREMELY rare that something that was supposed to happen doesn't.

The ones that failed were the older ones (bought Jan/February 06). the newer ones seem a lot better as I mentioned.
 
The ones that failed were the older ones (bought Jan/February 06). the newer ones seem a lot better as I mentioned.

Good point. My oldest Insteon switches are about 6 months. (fingers crossed)
 
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