JacktheRipper

Update: All of the Insteon and UDI equipment I had has been spoken for and shipped as of this morning. Thanks to everyone who expressed an interest in it. ...Jack

I have three ASUS routers in play in my homes. One house has an ASUS GT-AC5300 (my son configured it for his gaming addiction) and another has an ASUS RT-AX82U). Both of these houses have fiberoptic internet connections (500 Mbps up & down), and have worked flawlessly for the past year or so. My living hell is my main house in Orange County. It has an ASUS RT-AX3000) but is connected to "AT&T Internet 100", which uses two bonded DSL phone lines to get to 100/20 Mbps, at least in theory. Believe it or not, cable service is not available for my home, located in Orange County, CA, population 3.2 million. Things were so flaky I programmed an ESP32 to log internet outages, and was shocked at the results.This AT&T service experiences many "micro-outages" each day (about 1 to 10 seconds each), and often goes down hard for minutes if not hours many times a month. The router seems to cope with this, but some connected devices get confused and lost. So I programmed a Feit switch to restart the router (and the pass-through AT&T modem/router before it) upon remote command. That has always fixed things. I'm waiting for Verizon, T-Mobile or Starry to finally roll out their promised 5G-Home service to my area, and will switch the minute it's available.

Michel... thanks for understanding my decision, and thanks for the tip regarding the MoesGo controllers. My new house is full of Control 4 controllers including some 4-button switch panels, and I may be able to change them out for something I can work with directly (as opposed to the Control 4 service company I called, who wanted $85 for just showing up!). All the other homes in the track have Control 4, and their porch lights are all on 7/24 because my neighbors are loathe to pay the Control 4 monthly fees. The Feit products work OK once you know how to properly configure them (turn OFF phone bluetooth before programming them. Otherwise they only work if bluetooth is there!). There are gaping holes in their product mix (only wall dimmers, not switches, and they make fluorescents buzz like crazy). Very poor motion detectors. No integrated switch/motion detectors (California Title 24 requires them in all baths/kitchens--how did Feit miss this?). So I had to go to tp-link Kasa for some devices, and they work fine. I use Alexa to weld them to Feit devices if needed. And I'm learning just how unreliable and limiting Alexa Routines can be. The promise is much bigger than what's delivered. I don't have any experience with Google to know if it's any better. My security cameras, doorbells and robo-vacs are mostly Eufy, which work flawlessly. I do have a Lorex NVR and six 4K cameras on one of my houses, and they have worked fine, but the app is clunky. But the thing I'll miss the most is this forum. Neither Feit no tp-link has anything like it. The support of other knowledgeable forum contributors, and you, in particular, has been outstanding. Thanks very much, and fair winds and following seas for your future endeavors...Jack

"...to speak of many things. Of ships and shoes and sealing wax, of cabbages and now, sadly, the death of kings..." With apologies to Lewis Carrol, I have decided to withdraw from using Insteon and ISY products for my home automation needs. I was an early adopter of Insteon (maybe 2002), and bought my first ISY 99x in 2005 as I recall. I was on the waiting list for six months as Polisy was developed, and got an early Polisy PRO. I still think the dual band mesh technology is the best thing out there, so why have I made this decision? Well, we all know the sad tale of SmartHome and Insteon, and the false starts of trying to rekindle the brand. I bought a new house and could not find a reliable source of Insteon products to outfit it. I was walking through Costco and came across deals for FEIT smart switch modules (three for $14.99) and wall light switches (two for $19.99). For $85 I had nine switch modules and four switches, all that I needed initially. I downloaded the FEIT app and got it working in a few hours. Alexa discovered everything automatically along the way. Between the native FEIT app capabilities and Alexa Routines, I can do some pretty fancy things (FEIT works with WiFi only, but Alexa needs an internet connection too). I then changed out all the Insteon/ISY products in our other two homes for another $200 or so. I can see and control all devices in all homes from one easy to use, modern app. So my decision provides an opportunity for you. I have three perfectly good ISY 994i's (two with IR), and one Polisy. I have some 30 Insteon devices, all but three dual band. I have contact sensors, mini remote keypads and one motion detector (2844-222). Does anybody want them? I'm not looking to get rich (I already am), but I would like to have the FedEx delivery costs covered. Just pm me. And I would like to take a moment to thank those of you who have helped me in this forum over the years. You know who you are. And, of course, Michel you are a gem. ...

I have two ISY994i's, #1 running 5.3.4 and #2 running 5.3.0. Both are running normally, and I can log into the Admin console on both if I do it correctly. I have downloaded the zip for 5.3.4, and when I try to manually upgrade #2, I get to 95%, and then get an error "Upgrade Failed: Failed uploading file(reported written size is invalid)". This happens while it's loading udi.css. Windows 10, current Java, cleared the cache, etc., etc., etc. Any thoughts?

No, sir, I did not. My MS II gradually lost range to just a few feet over a period of a few months, and I ultimately removed it from my installation and did not replace it. I have followed this thread with interest, though. I do most home automation things now with Arduinos, specifically ESP32s. That way I'm in complete control of things. Here is an excellent tutorial on how to use a HC-SR501 PIR motion sensor in a simple Arduino program. In particular, read the "Advanced Uses" section at the bottom of the tutorial for insights on how these sensors work.: https://arduinogetstarted.com/tutorials/arduino-motion-sensor In that advanced section, there's a good discussion on two sensor adjustment pots (range and time delay) and a jumper that controls single event vs. repeated event signal outputs from the sensors.

idkayaker... Precisely my original intent when I started the thread, so I would be glad to help. There's a lot of insights sprinkled in the exchanges above, and boiling all that down to a coherent document would be great. Please feel free to make a draft and circulate it for community comment. lilyoyo1... I wish it were simple to first understand, and then correct, communications issues that interfere with Insteon operation, but it is not. While Insteon and ISY were a vast improvement over X10 when I first got into using them (circa 2004 or so), I have found them to be far from perfect. Modems seem to gradually lose robustness (I'm on my third one, just for my own house), Motion sensor sensitivity seems to degrade over time too, for both MS 1 and MS 2 sensors. Switch reliability has been a problem for me as well. I have two at the moment that occasionally report back that they have toggled state, but in fact they have not done so. That is not a communications issue, it's a device reliability issue. Sending repeated commands has helped. Some lessons I've learned over the years include... (1) Get rid of 100% of your fluorescent devices, particularly the bulbs with built-in mini-ballasts. They simple put too much junk out on your wiring, which kills that avenue of Insteon robustness. I discovered this (duh) when I had some porch lights that could be turned on by an Insteon switch, but could not be turned off. (2) Lamplincs don't operate very well with smaller led loads, such as small Christmas light strings. When the load is very small, it confuses the Lamplinc sense feature. Use on/off (relay-based) devices instead. (3) Don't use LAN devices that transmit their traffic over your power lines. When I had solar put in a few years ago, the installer snuck of those systems in on me, and it killed my Insteon operation. (3) Don't use (non-Insteon) three-way switches that communicate over your power lines. Begs for a list that might be titled "The Top Ten Things You Can Do to Improve Insteon Reliability"...

Boomerang... I just installed 5.0.16, and my MS I here in my home works fine. My MS II is on a remote ISY in my son's home in another state, and I have 5.0.14A running there. His MS II works fine with that software version. I won't be upgrading his ISY to 5.0.16 until Thanksgiving, when I'll be there. The only thing I can suggest is to uninstall the MS II from your ISY, then reinstall it. If that doesn't work, there may be a way to do a factory reset on it. I haven't researched that....

I have my MS II set to 255, and it seems to work fine. I would think a higher sensitivity setting would mean it's more sensitive. Don't know what value a motion detector with zero sensitivity would have.

Be glad to. In my garage I have an Insteon wall switch near the door into the house, a wireless contact sensor on my garage door and a MS II. I have a scene (Gr Lights) that has the wall switch as a controller/responder, and the MS II that is a controller (although listed as a controller/responder, as noted above). The MS II is configured to turn the lights on, but not off (done in its config settings). Note that the contact sensor is not in the scene, because I don’t want the lights to be turned off when the door closes. I have a program “Gr Lights Timed Off” that is normally disabled when the lights are off, but is enabled by the following program below when any on command is received. It has the following code: Gr Lts Timed Off - [ID 000D][Parent 0010][Not Enabled] If - No Conditions - (To add one, press 'Schedule' or 'Condition') Then Wait 20 minutes Set 'Gr Lights Scene' Off Disable Program 'Gr Lts Timed Off' Else - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action') I have a second program that turns the lights on and enables the above program, with the following code: Gr Lights On Command - [ID 000B][Parent 0010] If 'Garage Light Switch' is switched On Or 'Gr. Door Sensor-Opened' is switched On Or 'Gr MS II.Motion' is switched On Then Set 'Gr Lights Scene' On Disable Program 'Gr Lts Timed Off' Wait 5 seconds Enable Program 'Gr Lts Timed Off' Run Program 'Gr Lts Timed Off' (Then Path) Else - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action') You have to noodle this a bit, but the lights only turn off if either the wall light switch is turned off (it’s in the scene), or if the timer program times out. The timer program is enabled, or re-enabled, for every ON command issued, including possibly multiple ON commands from the MS II if I’m in the garage for an extended period (it’s my woodshop). So while I’m in the shop, the lights never turn off. One final detail: If the MS II senses motion, but it thinks it's already on, it does not issue an on command, so set the timer to a very short value to make it work consistently.

mwester... I did write such a program, and the temp and luminance values do seem to be updated with each motion detected. Battery level did not change, but that might be correct, given the short time span of my testing. Is there a way to get these variables available to a program? I don't have a need to do this, but others might. For instance, a freeze alert message might be of use. I'm an Arduino guy, so I already have notifications of freeze alerts from the garage at my second home in Oregon (where my MS II is located) issued by an Arduino derivative that has a temp and humidity sensor connected to the internet.

See next corrected post

I just verified that when a Motion Sensor I is added to a scene, the only option that is offered is for it to be a Controller. The MS II came up as a Controller/Responder as the default, as I remember it. That led to my confusion. I'm aware that the only way to make the MS II "respond" to anything sent to it is to put it in linking mode (although mwester suggested (here) that a program could be written to sneak in commands immediately after a motion detected event happened. I haven't tried to do this. Might be a way to do a Query and get that temperature updated.). The solution I outlined above using programs works both with and without the MS II being in the scene to be controlled. I leave it in because the light turns on immediately, whereas when the program issues the on command, there is a slight delay. So, relative to my goal stated at the top of this thread, of having a coherent user manual/tutorial for the 2244-222, I've learned a few things from the MS I user manual (traditional Insteon manual with good explanations), the MS II user manual (new style written for the hub and light on details), and this and other Forum threads I've participated in. Thanks to all of you for helping me learn about this.

Lily... Yeah, I finally figured that out. As a newbie, I was confused by the Admin Console listing the MS II as a "Controller/Responder" for my garage scene. Perhaps that misrepresentation ought to be corrected, don't you think? Relative to what I want, I did the following: I included the MS II in the Insteon Scene with the garage light switch that is a true controller/responder for the scene. I set the MS II to issue on commands only. I wrote a timer program, normally disabled, that turns the lights off after a time-out, set at 10 minutes. If the light switch or the MS II turns on the scene, the timer program is enabled and starts the timer. If the MS II detects subsequent motion, it triggers a second program that (1) sends an on command for the scene, (2) disables the timer program, (3) waits 5 seconds, then (4) re-enables the timer program and runs it. This refreshes the timer program to always time out 10 minutes after the last detected motion. When the timer program reaches the time-out, it turns the scene off, then disables itself. This works fine for all use-cases, but is rather complicated. I was just looking for a simpler implementation that could have been possible if the MS II could be configured to always issues on commands if it detected motion, whether or not it thought the lights were already on. I guess it can't, so I'll stick with my solution. Thanks...Jack

Hey, thanks for replying. What I did initially was to configure the MS II to issue on commands only, and I had a "timer-off" program that was normally disabled, but was enabled and run by virtue of the lights coming on (from either switch or MS II). After it timed out (10 minutes), it issued a scene off command, and then disabled itself. A second program was triggered by the MS II's On commands to (1) wait 5 seconds, (2) disable the time-off program, then (3) re-enable it, to get a fresh timer going. Seems like it should have worked, but it proved unreliable for some reason. I'll go back and give it another try. Thanks again...Jack