Motorola Premise

While the application source code isn't currently available, they do also provide for free their development kit that allows one to create their own .NET (C#) drivers.

In the community forum, there is already a free third-party Insteon driver. There is also a UPB driver as well. Premise may be dead as a commercial product, but I still feel that it's an interesting alternative for the DIY crowd.

What would be great is if Motorola could be persuaded to release the source. It's still nice that they released the product free though. In addition, the 2.1 version is current as of May 2006, so it's not too outdated yet.
 
Maybe it's part of their strategy. Release it for free for a while - let people build drivers, etc for it then when it has become more popular and used in peoples homes, bring it back again.
 
Steve said:
Maybe it's part of their strategy. Release it for free for a while - let people build drivers, etc for it then when it has become more popular and used in peoples homes, bring it back again.
I had wondered about that as well. Build a larger community through a free product and then release the Premise 3.0 that had been rumoured to be in development before the current situation.

All I know is that Motorola Premise has been used in some fairly high end installs and tends to show up more in the Electronic House magazine in relation to HomeSeer, etc.

For example, here's their Home of the year profile for 2006: http://www1.electronichouse.com/homeshow/h...review/372.html

Look under the control section of the components used (vital statistics) and you'll see that it's Motorola Premise 2.0 (the version prior to the latest release). The owner of the home also runs a company that developed an Avatar software that works with Premise.

What's interesting is that on average we see those complaining about the increasing prices in HomeSeer, where as Motorola Premise was considerably more expensive. I think this is why you didn't see as much penetration in the DIY crowd as many thought, if I'm paying that much why not just go full bore Creston?

Now that it's free, it'll be interesting to see the results in the HA DIY crowd.

Anyways, I got excited about it being free as I'm currently in the market for a HA software package. The irony is that the $200.00 price tag of HomeSeer was a show stopper as I need to do it on the cheap (WAF is high for security system, but very skeptical for HA). I wanted to start out slowly with a couple Insteon switches (why I haven't used the X10 capabilites of my Caddx NX8 security system) and look at integrating whole house audio and other features down the road. MisterHouse and other "free" applications just seemed to not meet my needs, but after looking at the free Premise it looked like a much closer match. I can even use my 3Com Ergo Audrey with an Xbrowser plugin.

HomeSeer's MCS Audrey pluggin has been discontinued. http://forums.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=114903 Existing customers can use it but you can no longer purchase unlock keys for it. This happened during my decision making phase and pushed me into Premise. I can't afford to add a bunch of LCD panels at this point in time (will do this after the WAF proves out over the next year or two) and using my Audrey for that capability was important to me.
 
What's interesting is that on average we see those complaining about the increasing prices in HomeSeer, where as Motorola Premise was considerably more expensive. I think this is why you didn't see as much penetration in the DIY crowd as many thought, if I'm paying that much why not just go full bore Creston?
I don't know how much Premise cost, but I'm sure there was still a HUGE gap between it and Crestron. Crestron is simply not targeted at diy and that is evident in their pricing and support. And $200 for Homeseer is really not alot of money imho for a proven package that is supported. Sure there are alot of things that can be debated about it, but the cost is not that high for the functionality and support you get.

If you want basic, fairly inexpensive HA with best in class support for Insteon, did you check out Powerhome?

Unfortunately if you want best in class touch screen interface development ability, you need to step up to ML or CQC which is considerable more expensive, although Netremote/Girder may also fit the bill for you.

Or just go ahead and try Premise, but understand it is not a supported product and the support you get may be very spotty.
 
Steve said:
If you want basic, fairly inexpensive HA with best in class support for Insteon, did you check out Powerhome?

Unfortunately if you want best in class touch screen interface development ability, you need to step up to ML or CQC which is considerable more expensive, although Netremote/Girder may also fit the bill for you.

Or just go ahead and try Premise, but understand it is not a supported product and the support you get may be very spotty.

As to the cost, when it was in retail, The full Premise Systems software product (not the limited "homeowner" version) cost $750 at Worthington. It's even still listed: http://www.worthdist.com/premise/packages.htm

Thanks for the PowerHome suggestion, I'll take a look at that as well.

As for Premise, I know that there is not any offical support at all any more. I'm just hoping that the community may have some suggestions or solutions if I do encounter problems. If not, oh well.

On a separate note, and perhaps it should be a different thread, what does anyone recommend in terms of the Caddx NX-8 V2 controll panel?

I'm not going to need more than 48 zones, so the 192 zone ability of the NX-8e isn't the attraction, just the built in serial interface. I can pick up a new NX-584 serial interface for $39.00 for my existing panel, so I'm just wondering what additional advantages there may be to upgrade the panel itself to an NX-8e (about $99.00 for a NX-8e only).

Thanks!
 
Hightest:

Do you already have a security system setup using the NX-8 panel with all of your zones (necessary zone expanders, keypads, and all)?

If so, maybe that wouldn't be a bad deal just to get the NX-584. Of course the NX8e would only be an additional $50 (AutomatedOutlet sells the NX8e Board Only for $90).

I have an NX8e (with the needed Serial Adapter) and not at all familiar with the NX-584 (since I don't need it). I'm running a relay output module and 16-port wired expansion module with it.

I use HomeSeer ver 1.7 and older versions of MainLobby as a front end, plus a free plugin which talks to my NX8e (using David Crawford (aka Nitrox) plugin).

This along with my Ocelot (and SECU16I and RLY8XA expansion modules) represent the heart of my automation system.

I have 24 zones, all wired which include glass break and motion sensors, along with three keypads.

The interface to HomeSeer is flawless and this HA setup is rock solid (using the older versions of the sofware described above though).

HERE are some screen shots of my system and software.
 
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