ellesshoo

After power cycling the ISY I can connect to it for maybe 5 minutes but after that it can no longer be accessed via the web or admin console. Sometimes I think it's still working on the Insteon side of things because programs seem to be running even though it can't be accessed (this isn't always the case, maybe 50% of the time). This has just started happening this past week for no apparant reason. I'm considering nuking the whole thing to see if it's just something deep down that's all jacked up. I have a few questions about this: 1) How do I completely nuke the ISY back to factory settings, no programs, devices, etc? 2) If I restore a recent backup should I expect to have problems because the backup was done while I had problems? 3) Will restoring a backup restore all my device nodes, scenes, programs, PLM, etc or are there some things that are not captured in the backup that I should know about? 4) Has anyone else had this issue and found a way to resolve it?

I have iMeters that I query at regular intervals. I do it like this: If: (nothing) Then: Repeat every 15 minutes query iMeter Else: Nothing Set to run at startup. That simple.

No photos or videos of this but whenever we use the feeders, like if we are gone for a day or two, the bowl is usually separated from the feeder and both have been relocated by at least a few feet, it probably is quite comical if we could see what they do to make it that way.

I have a hungry cat in the morning problem... Actually 2 cats. They go bonkers at ungodly hours of the morning when they're hungry, locking them out of the bedroom is pretty useless and requires me/wife to get out of bed to do it. My wife bought 2 auto feeders a few years ago but the smallest serving size is 1/4 cup which is half of what they eat in a day and having only two meal servings just doesn't calm these beasts. Basically, I'm looking for an auto feeder that has more serving size granularity and can be controlled via insteon in some way. Bonus if it doesn't give away free meals when the cats knock it around (something the current ones do).

After reading all the responses I think I would consider leaving it behind but severely dumb things down to avoid any and all "lights going off on people" or other non-braindead intuitive functions. I would also limit everything to insteon scenes and take the central controller out of the equation. The guy who said if it sells a month or two earlier makes it worth it is right, one ore even 2 extra months on the market can easily cost me/you more than the cost of the HA hardware. Of course if a buyer just doesn't want it as part of the sale then I'd gladly take it with me. I definitely wouldn't want a buyer thinking they deserve a lower sale price in that event though, I certainly wouldn't base themy sale price on the fact that there is automation in the house so I wouldn't want them using the removal of it as a bargaining point.

Tech support for 2 years?! That's definitely a deal breaker for me. I'm at the point where I basically wouldn't even buy an electronic gadget to give anyone at Christmas/birthday because I'm so sick of being their tech support.

What have you done or plan to do with all your HA/Insteon stuff when you sell a house or move? As cool as it may look when your house is being shown I imagine all the Insteon stuff wouldn't do much to increase the selling price and unless the buyer is already into this sort of thing would end up getting really annoyed with things that may have suited your lifestyle but they can't quite figure out why lights keep turning off behind them. Am I wrong on this? While part of me thinks "I don't want to re-buy a bunch of stuff, I'm ripping it out and taking it with me!" the other part says "if it makes up for it in sell price why not get all new stuff w/ latest rev firmware etc". Was wondering what others have done in this situation. I'm not selling a home right now but I'm starting to realize the substantial $$ I've put into things and wondering what I will do when faced with this.

ISY/PLM are in a closet with A/V equipment, the iMeter is really there to monitor the A/V equipment but it's the first thing on the power source for the whole closet thus it is also in-line with the PLM. I think I'll try the iMeter such that it's only measuring the AV equipment and the PLM bypasses it like you suggest. Probably not until tomorrow, if I cut power to the cable box/dvr right now I'll be sleeping somewhere other than my bed tonight.

Is there any consequence to having another Insteon device in-line with my PLM. It's not piggy backed in the sense that their plugged into each other (they're separated by a 3ft cord) but whatever the PLM sends out over the powerline must "go through" an iMeter Solo before reaching the main elec panel. Would I get better/same/worse communication in a different configuration?

I've seen this numerous times with my new 994iz units. My older 99i's never did this. Perchance are you on the newer hardware as well? This has been happening with my 994iZ/IR PRO.

Not home now so I can't look at level 3 diagnostics right now but I can assure you all that all boxes are plastic, all face plates are plastic, and all switches are controlling normal incandescent loads. Only one switch is a dimmer, all others are just relay switch lincs.

I've got 3 dual band switchlincs on one side of a room and a single dual band device on the other and I've been having intermittent issues among all of them and especially the one opposite the other 3. Sometimes I can't communicate with a switch in the same double gang box as another switch. I can't help but think smarthome is run like a mom & pop cottage industry b/c it's almost impossible to believe that between powerline and rf these things can't reliably communicate. Do they have the engineering chops of a big time or even up and coming consumer electronics company? What could possibly be wrong with my setup? Even if there is something wrong how can they expect to break through the enthusiast only market and into mainstream if it's this finicky?

Is this just an organizational feature or does it have some implication with programs, scenes, or other insteon controlling of the devices? I've seen the term "group" used a lot on the forums and in the wiki some times interchangeably with scene but also different from scene but used in context as if it had implications on actual device control. I'm not sure if this is being used referring to the "group devices" context option when you right click on a KPL/motion sensor/etc in the admin console. Is it just an organizational feature in the admin console or does grouping a device have implications, sort of like a scene?

I don't know if this would help with your intentions and certainly isn't a fix for your query issues but I use an imeter on my AV closet (closet is next to TV and TV power comes from the closet). With everything except the DVR & a network switch turned off it usually pulls about 30-40W. Its very easy to determine if someone is watching anything because with the AV Receiver and TV on it pulls >400W (63" plasma will do it). Pretty simple to make a program based on that. Anyway, just mentioning one more way to skin the proverbial cat.

Let's say I have two scenes, each containing the same dimmer switch and nothing else (so the ISY is the controller). Can the ramp rate in one of them be 0.3sec and in the other 30 seconds? Basically there are times when I want the light to be turned off with a long ramp rate but turned on with a short one but with this setup I seem to be getting unpredictable results. Do I need to make it one scene only and use adjust scene commands to swap between the on/off ramp rates? To be clear, I'm talking about the light being controlled via programs, not the physical switch. Basically, I have some motion sensors that are used in programs where after a certain period of inactivity I want the program to turn off the light with a long ramp rate but when there is activity I want the light to go on with the much shorter ramp rate. I have the motion sensing part all right my issue is sometimes the light will turn off fast or turn on slowly and I'm not sure I'm implementing scenes correctly. I always want short on/off when using the physical switch.

I don't know for sure since I've never used a synchrolinc but couldn't an appliancelinc with load sensing turned on accomplish the same thing as a synchrolinc? If so, and you have an appliancelinc laying around, you may want to try that (assuming it doesn't have query issues as well).

ellesshoo, my earlier post expressing uncertainty about whether programs based on "status" would be triggered by anything but a direct paddle press was, apparently well founded. Xathros was, indeed, correct. While I was pretty certain that program conditions based upon "control" would be triggered only by direct paddle/switch press, programs conditions based upon "status" will be triggered by change of status regardless of how/why achieved. I apologize for my confusion. Awesome, thank you to everyone that has helped. From reading all the responses and implementing these concepts when I got home from work, I think I finally bullet-proofed the programs that I've been working on. Prior to today I thought I had everything perfect but over the course of a couple of days of real world living I would find bugs in my code... even worse, my wife stumbled upon some bugs, nothing like the lights shutting off while she's taking a shower . I still feel I have a lot to learn w/ regard to scenes/KPL stuff but for now things are good. If there's one lesson I've learned that I would pass along to anyone else that's new to the ISY is to take it slow, start simple and build complexity (if at all) slowly, don't attempt to have your house do every little thing for you from day one. I have a good handle on computer logic and that wasn't enough to hop right into ISY & Insteon... it's definitely a little different.

Also, am I understanding correctly that if I were to hit the first floor switch for a stair case light that's in a 3-way circuit that a "control 2nd floor stair-case light switched on" would not trigger even though the switches are linked in a scene (both as controllers)? Would the status of the 2nd floor switch even change in this scenario?

If this is true. Why does the code in the UDI Wiki Bathroom Light Motion Sensor example contain this? If Control 'Main Bath Motion.1-Sensor' is switched On And Control 'Main Bath Motion.1-Sensor' is not switched Off Then Set 'Main Bath Lights' On Else Set 'Main Bath Lights' Off Also, if a program makes a scene or node "fade up" does that make the scene/node "on" after the fade is complete?

I thought I was finally over the "hump" in fully understanding this but it turns out that's not the case. I think my issue is understanding how various actions trigger or don't trigger control and status. These are my questions: 1) Which of the following will trigger an "if switched" condition to trigger? a) physically pressing a switchlinc or load button on a KPL? physically pressing a non-load button on a KPL? c) a program turning the light on or off d) a program turning a scene on which the light is a member of e) a linked sensor or KPL button turning the light on via a scene which both are members of 2) Which of the above scenarios will trigger an "if status" condition to evaluate? 3) How is fade up/fade down interpreted? If one program fades down a light will another program with "if status not on" trigger during the fade? Does the status get set to "on" or "off" after the fade is complete? 4) If a scene containing both switches of a 3-way circuit is turned on by a program do both switch nodes also get set to on? 5) If a switch in the above scene is physically switched off does the scene and both switches get set to off? 6) If a program "then" causes it's own "if" to be "false" does it complete the "then" followed by the "else" or does it terminate the "then" and immediately run the "else"? I'm sorry to ask some questions which I'm sure are answered in various places but I can't seem to figure out some of these as I've specifically worded it or some of the things I've read were from much earlier firmware revisions that I'm not sure whether they are accurate currently. I'm sure I'll have a couple of follow-up questions so I would definitely appreciate sticking with me in this thread for a little bit. Thanks!

I'm no expert on the underlying methods of insteon networks but was curious about this. Let's say I start with two devices in two different rooms connected by a hallway. Let's say they can communicate directly. What happens if a bunch of devices are added in between? Would the commands hop between all those closer devices to reach the target at the end or just go directly to the target bypassing all those devices?

please please tell me

Is it possible to change the button that controls the load to a different button other than the top left? If so can someone walk me through the process?

I've read a lot of KPL related stuff but for some reason I'm finding it difficult to wrap my head around, particularly LED backlight control. I installed an 8-button KPL in the bedroom which I've since converted to a 6-button KPL. My main issue is I absolutely need all the backlight LEDs to be off at bedtime. I can get them to all be off except the large bottom button ("OFF"). I'm guessing that the reason I'm struglling with it is that when I use it to turn off the main lights in the bedroom the button is considered "on" at that point. Can someone walk me through how to get them to all be off?

I wish I knew a way ( apart from remoting in to a PC), but as far as I know you can't natively.