Best Practice - Links

[jeffbott]

Maybe i missed this, so forgive me if i have. I have a variety of Insteon devices that were installed and linked either manually or using HouseLinc (all up and running fine). Now i have just installed a new ISY99i / IR Pro and added all the devices, created scenes, programs, etc. I selected to keep existing links (maybe a mistake) as it created a bunch of numbered scenes. As i am going through the scenes, it appears that they were created using the existing device link tables. So, before i go ahead and clear all the scenes and corresponding device links i thought i would rely on your wisdom.

 

Now to the question; should the only links in devices point to the modem and therefore all control be managed vis the ISY, OR should i leave the existing links and have a mixed environment?

 

Hope that made sense.

[upstatemike]

I'm not sure I understand what you are asking but I want to be sure you are clear that the ISY is MANAGING links not CONTROLLING them (unless you set up some programs to do control).

 

I did the same thing as you because I had so much stuff to keep track of that starting from scratch would have taken too long, so I left the existing links in place. This caused problems in some areas so once I got everything arranged the way I wanted, I started deleting and re-adding devices one to a time. When I re-added them I chose the option to clear the existing links in order to ensure all the junk was cleared out of the modules link table. If you don't do this then any junk that was in the link table will not be reflected in the ISY gui but WILL be faithfully restored any time you do a restore on the module. There is currently no way to see what that junk might be so you have a potential troubleshooting nightmare if you don't let ISY get rid of everything it does not manage.

[Stowaway]

I would like to reiterate what Mike said about the junk in old links,

 

Having gone through the same process of saving old HL created links and then piece-by-piece cleaning out devices, I finally had to follow the original advice of all the veterans here. I was tired of the false signals etc. In other words, I started from scratch with a complete clean ISY and did a complete clean of all devices and setup new links.

 

Since I was feeling more comfortable with the ISY and with how I wanted to lay out my scenes and programs I found it went very easily. One valuable tool I used from my first ISY install was the Topology. It provided me a checklist of devices and locations so that I could just sit at my console and get it done!

 

The end result is a much cleaner setup and operation, you can forget spurious X-10 signals or other conflicts.

 

JIM

[jeffbott]

Thanks guys. I suspected this was the case. I will take your advice and find a hardware factory reset on the ISY and start over by adding devices with the clear all links option.

 

Jeff