Insteon vs UPB (again)

[TonyNo]

Sloop said:

when you press a upb device, the light will come on eventually - with craplincs, its a crapshoot

Oh, come on! I'm running Insteon here and have seen zero commands sent that don't get acted upon to by the target device(s). There are other issues to be aware of, but this is not one that I've ever seen.

wuench said:

I2.) Insteon reliability is not 100%. Every install requires signallincs to bridge phases, and you have to be careful where you install them

Not every install. For my house, I don't need them. YMMV, of course.

3.) The Insteon linking paradigm takes some getting used to. For Insteon scenes/groups are locally significant. So there are no global groups, like in other protocols like X10 (and maybe UPB). This really becomes an issue with keeping devices in sync. For example, if you have a PC, and Elk, and a Keypadlinc. And you have a group of switches you need to control. You have to crosslink everything. So you setup the PC as a controller for the scene, the switches/lights as responders, and the keypadlinc button as a responder. Then you setup the Elk the same way. But if you have the PC turn on the group, there is no way for the Elk to know that scene was activate and vice versa, although you can have them poll the switches individually so it can figure out which lights are on eventually. This is because you turned on the PC's group A, NOT the Elk's group A and groups are significant locally to the switch. This is where the ISY comes in to save the day. It becomes your central controller, you create a single group, and all devices use the ISY to control the lighting.

Since I run PowerHome, this is not really an issue. All my linking and scenes are set up from there.

 

[Digger]

Sloop said:

when you press a upb device, the light will come on eventually - with craplincs, its a crapshoot

Oh, come on! I'm running Insteon here and have seen zero commands sent that don't get acted upon to by the target device(s). There are other issues to be aware of, but this is not one that I've ever seen.

You have never had a tact switch fail? It was a major problem for a year or so. You go to turn a light on and it did not go on. Or, you go to turn a light off it did not go off. Now SH has admitted to the problem and extended the warranty for 5 years. I would say it is a valid complaint that affected many customers (perhaps not all such as those with no dimmers or switches).

 

[Steve]

I'm not sure if they're quite as quick as Insteon, but very close.

My understanding is that there is a 300ms delay built into Insteon as well. So, if you configure a US240 to 300ms then they should be identical.

I would also like to hear more about UPB issues between vendors. Including the whole LED debate. I think depending on the vendor you get different LED colors.

I have never seen operational issues between different UPB manufacturers. The protocol is the protocol and the all inter operate fine. While I currently have mostly SAI switches, I have a few PCS and HAI as well and have never even had a hint of an issue. But yes, each manufacturer makes a different physically switch, so there are physical differences. With SAI the LED is used as an air gap, HAI has a tiny lever in the bezel and PCS uses a series of taps. The feel of the switches are slightly different with SAI (imho) being the most distinct click. The LED's are the one the always come up. PCS lists 'new cool blue LED' in their Gen II marketing but I think that is a disservice. That is simply a hardware/firmware change for the LED. If you have older SAI/SAI/PCS switches you will definitely see big color differences. Today they are still different but at least there is some commonality in color. Aside from the look, SAI being a larger/wider LED since it is a big plastic lever as the LED vs the smaller built in bezel LEDs as in HAI and PCS, the colors are some similar now. SAI is Blue/Light Blue and Green (with very little difference between Blue and Light Blue), PCS is now Blue, Green and Red and HAI is Blue, Green and Magenta. So... each manufacturer now at least shares 2 color in Blue and Green. Keep in mind that you can configure the LED color yourself in UpStart for On/Off - You can have any of the 3 colors (or off) for each state, so even if you decise on something like Blue=Off and Green=On, you can now have that standard with all manufacturers. You still have the aesthetics, but that may not be an issue in different rooms, etc.

 

[Event5]

(Regarding insteon......), but what can be an annoyance for me is that if you press 2 non-load devices in the same box simultaneously (or very close to simultaneously) the commands may not make it through. I think this is a pretty major flaw as many people like to flip multiple switches at once. That being said, in real-world use I very rarely have a missed command. But, I can duplicate this problem easily. I haven't seen any similar issue with UPB.

UPB has this same problem. I suggest that the buttons on a US240 be used as scenes so only 1 will be pushed at a time. If you use the buttons to control individual devices you will need to get used to delaying almost a second between each press for each command to get through.

There are smart X10 controllers that hold in memory the button pushes and wait for a clear line to send the next signal. This would be a good feature to be added to devices like the US240

Dave

 

[Digger]

Are UPB device flash upgradeable?

Insteon could be if they wanted to. They would have to fix their firmware bug as previously mentioned to be able to transfer the data fast enough. Its a shame they did not own up to that bug and make things better for all of the third party devices and software. Perhaps some day they will learn.

 

[Steve]

Are UPB device flash upgradeable?

Not by the user.

 

[sloop]

Sloop said:

when you press a upb device, the light will come on eventually - with craplincs, its a crapshoot

Oh, come on! I'm running Insteon here and have seen zero commands sent that don't get acted upon to by the target device(s). There are other issues to be aware of, but this is not one that I've ever seen.

sloop's a trip like that

it happens here - but like i said, i have lots of craplincs and 24 are keypads - so i have lots of scenes - most have several buttons that control each scene (some scenes have as many as 14 controlling buttons) - so when you operate the scene the lamplincs flash for several seconds - during that time nothing else should be touched because as i understand it, commands or responses are abandoned if new message traffic arrives on the powerline - i suspect with the devices repeating commands, i have mayhem on the powerline - of course i don't know because there is no scope or sniffer type device to examine the traffic

one of my scenes has over 100 resources in it - the chances of all 100 resources operating correctly are slim - people say i am pushing it too far - smarthome never said that when they sold me the thousands of dollars of carplincs though

when i bought all this i had x10 from smarthome - no signal problems - the only controller available was the plc and housecrap - i mean houselinc - to have the buttons syncronized (reflect the status of the light), you had to use x10 addresses - and while many people say it can be done, i contend it cannot with 60 something craplincs the x10 signal can't get through

as far as the aesthetics concrened, the laser etched buttons might look good - i have never seen them - but at $7.99 each, it would cost me an additional $1,230.46 - the paddles on the dimmers and relays look cheap because the light bleeds through and you can see where the posts are attached - there is a good chance that the blue/white leds will be different colors (and different brightness levels) - which is annoying in multiple gang boxes

as much as some people want to say that upb has just as many problems as insteon, i do not believe them - nor do i believe that a neighbor's house noise would make upb unusable - i have never seen a upb switch but i know they can't have the problems insteon does

never inflict insteon on anyone

 

[TonyNo]

You have never had a tact switch fail?

OK, I see what you meant now.

For a new adopter, this has been fixed. For recent adopters, the warranties have been extended.

one of my scenes has over 100 resources in it

Wow. One of these days, I'd like to hear about that scene.

Insteon could be if they wanted to. They would have to fix their firmware bug as previously mentioned to be able to transfer the data fast enough.

What about via the 6-pin header in there? There's even a hole in the frame that can be seen when you take the paddle off.

 

[Digger]

You have never had a tact switch fail?

OK, I see what you meant now.

For a new adopter, this has been fixed. For recent adopters, the warranties have been extended.

one of my scenes has over 100 resources in it

Wow. One of these days, I'd like to hear about that scene.

Insteon could be if they wanted to. They would have to fix their firmware bug as previously mentioned to be able to transfer the data fast enough.

What about via the 6-pin header in there? There's even a hole in the frame that can be seen when you take the paddle off.

There are comments (maybe rumours only) that the header is not isolated from mains. If they fix the data transfer rate tehy could do it over teh powerline if they wanted to.

They have to "want" to do things.

 

[sloop]

http://mysite.verizon.net/respkm62/topology/index.html

click on 'page title' - this is a report generated by the isy - the devices are listed first followed by the scenes (with the participating resourses) - the 'dusk' scene is the one with about 120 resources - but several are fairly large

 

[mustangcoupe]

http://mysite.verizon.net/respkm62/topology/index.html

click on 'page title' - this is a report generated by the isy - the devices are listed first followed by the scenes (with the participating resourses) - the 'dusk' scene is the one with about 120 resources - but several are fairly large

http://mysite.verizon.net/respkm62/topology/id1.html

Corrected link for everyone... It didnt work at the first one sloop posted

 

[MikeB]

But yes, each manufacturer makes a different physically switch, so there are physical differences.

Yes, and I should clarify - when I said I thought UPB switches had a more solid feel than Insteon, I was referring to the switches I own - which are PCS and SAI. I actually don't like the feel of HAI UPB switches.

UPB has this same problem.

Interesting. I haven't seen it because the majority of my home is Insteon, UPB is primarily in my office area.

 

[SnyperBob]

never inflict insteon on anyone

Wow, those are powerful words

 

[Techno_Goof]

After following this thread the past few days I feel I need to post my experience with Insteon.

I've been using Insteon with HomeSeer for the past 2 years. I've encountered only two issues, that's right ... 2. The first was with the PLC/SDM combo, it simply did not work well with HomeSeer. Whether it was bad programming by Smarthome or by the HomeSeer plug-in, I don't know. But it just didn't work well.

I then switched over to the PLM. Which brings me to the second issue I had, lockups. This was fixed by Smarthome and they swapped out my PLM without question or cost to me. I have not had a single lockup since!

I have just over 50 Insteon devices in my system. I have not had a single switch, module, or keypad go belly up. I believe others when they say their experience is different, very different. But this is one very happy Insteon user, period!

The HomeSeer plug-in has also come a long way. I can only speak for the PLM version but on my system it is rock solid. All of my lighting is controlled using motion sensors and the BLRadar plug-in. Basically, you walk into a room, it senses motion, the lights come on.

I not interested in a debate or a cat fight over Insteon. I simply wanted to post that not all Insteon users have had the problems that a few users have had (again, I'm not doubting that you did). Remember, most people that don't have a problem, don't post!

Thank you for your time.

 

[Digger]

After following this thread the past few days I feel I need to post my experience with Insteon.

I've been using Insteon with HomeSeer for the past 2 years. I've encountered only two issues, that's right ... 2. The first was with the PLC/SDM combo, it simply did not work well with HomeSeer. Whether it was bad programming by Smarthome or by the HomeSeer plug-in, I don't know. But it just didn't work well.

I then switched over to the PLM. Which brings me to the second issue I had, lockups. This was fixed by Smarthome and they swapped out my PLM without question or cost to me. I have not had a single lockup since!

I have just over 50 Insteon devices in my system. I have not had a single switch, module, or keypad go belly up. I believe others when they say their experience is different, very different. But this is one very happy Insteon user, period!

The HomeSeer plug-in has also come a long way. I can only speak for the PLM version but on my system it is rock solid. All of my lighting is controlled using motion sensors and the BLRadar plug-in. Basically, you walk into a room, it senses motion, the lights come on.

I not interested in a debate or a cat fight over Insteon. I simply wanted to post that not all Insteon users have had the problems that a few users have had (again, I'm not doubting that you did). Remember, most people that don't have a problem, don't post!

Thank you for your time.

Not disagreeing with you but would you say that some of these problems must be significant if SH is extending warranties for 5 years etc for the specific problems with some devices (switches, dimmers, lamplincs etc), recalling other products (rare but happened) and taking some off of the market all together? So many people lost a lot of money up until the point that SH started to admit to the problems and honor and in some cases extend warraties.