Communication Failures all over the place

[dsstrainer]

Been running fine for 3 years... then 3 weeks ago, my open/close (door) sensor stopped updating for my Garage closed check program. So even while closed, ISY thought it was open. I think the cause of this was that both of my Access Points were burned out... one probably months before.. but I think the second one just burned out that weekend, and it had no way to communicate with RF devices. So I replaced both with 2 new ones.. but there are still issues.

Before this assumption about the access points came to fruition, I went ahead and updated my 4.3 ISY firmware to 4.6.2 official. After that, things went bad. Now I get hit or miss connectivity to my switchlincs and iolincs throughout the house... even on the ones that are literally 10 feet away from the PLM and access points. Everything is on the main floor and we have open concept so it should all be covered on RF and Powerline.

 

Steps taken:
 - Added 2 new Access points and a LampLinc since it also doubles as an access point
 - Replaced the 2412S PLM with a 2413S PLM
 - Deleted, factory reset my switchlincs and re-linked them. They relinked fine and actually worked fine last night afterwards... but this morning I see communication failures on those same switches.
 - I've restored the PLM... and devices. When I do that.. different devices start to work, but others that were working start to fail.

I'm running out of ideas here.

My event viewer looks ok at times... but I seem to be running out of hops. Don't see why though as this switchlinc device is literally 20 feet away from the PLM and has one access point between them. Here you can see I was able to issue the ON command.. but when I went for the OFF command, it ERR'd out and lost comms.

This all started out of nowhere 3 weeks ago. I would say maybe the devices are going bad but the devices that fail changes after a restore. It's unlikely multiple devices purchased at different times would fail at the same time.

 

I'm open to any ideas or things to try. I was going to try the Insteon Hub next and see if that works any better. But prior to this I was still using X10 devices around the house and they were also working great.

[smokegrub]

How old is the PLM? 

[dsstrainer]

Brand New 2413S

But same symptoms with my 3 year old 2412S (rev2.4)

[Techman]

35 minutes ago, dsstrainer said:

Brand New 2413S

But same symptoms with my 3 year old 2412S (rev2.4)

 

In the Admin console, under Tools, Diagnostics. Run a PLM link count, preferably when the ISY isn't busy.  What do you show for link counts?

About how many devices are linked to the ISY?

On the admin console under help, about. What do you show for Firmware and UI versions?

Did you add or change any electronics in the house just prior to your problems starting?

 

[Brian H]

When you swapped the PLM.

Did you power down both the old PLM and the ISY994i.

Connect the replacement PLM and power it up to let it initialize.

Then power up the ISY994i.  The new PLM six digit Insteon ID is only found at the ISY994i starting. If not powered up after the PLM was changed. The ISY994i will still use the old PLM six digit Insteon ID.

[dsstrainer]

4 minutes ago, Brian H said:

When you swapped the PLM.

Did you power down both the old PLM and the ISY994i.

Connect the replacement PLM and power it up to let it initialize.

Then power up the ISY994i.  The new PLM six digit Insteon ID is only found at the ISY994i starting. If not powered up after the PLM was changed. The ISY994i will still use the old PLM six digit Insteon ID.

It wouldn't work at all if I didn't do that. Assume the basics were done correctly.

[Goose66]

How many SwitchLincs do you have? I have had, at two different times in my 10 years with Insteon, a single dimmer switch device all of a sudden begin to play havoc with my Insteon network, and the offender was hard to identify. You may want to start with your oldest SwitchLinc and pull the air gap and leave it out for a while, and then move on to the next oldest, and so on until you find the one that's causing you problems.

[dsstrainer]

Just now, Goose66 said:

How many SwitchLincs do you have? I have had, at two different times in my 10 years with Insteon, a single dimmer switch device all of a sudden begin to play havoc with my Insteon network, and the offender was hard to identify. You may want to start with your oldest SwitchLinc and pull the air gap and leave it out for a while, and then move on to the next oldest, and so on until you find the one that's causing you problems.

Thx.. I'll give that a try

[Michel Kohanim]

@dsstrainer

Also, if you have any INSTEON thermostats, unplug and retry. And, please move the PLM to a different outlet and one which is not shared with other transformers and power supplies.

 

With kind regards,

Michel

[dsstrainer]

It just gets worse..

I just added a NEW door open/close sensor, trying to see if my access points were working. It added fine.

But now when I move the second piece away from the sensor... my garage door iolinc opens!!

This has NEVER been linked or set as a controller or responder to the iolinc. This is maddening!

I'm just going to do a full delete and start from square one.

[dsstrainer]

The one thing that does still work fine is my X10 motion sensors... going on 3 years with the same batteries... perhaps I should have just stayed with that.

[dsstrainer]

Ok.. started from scratch.. deleted everything.
So far I've added back my 3 switchlincs, 3 motion sensors, 3 leak sensors, and 3 door sensors.
Everything running great. Consistently seeing 2 hops left. Getting immediate updates from sensors. All is well.

Going to try to add the IOLincs back tomorrow, then my KeyPadLincs.
 

[dsstrainer]

Added back one IOLinc. Things seemed ok at first. But the next morning I got an error with regard to one of the switchlincs losing communication .
So I'm scaling back a bit trying to find where things break bad. I also tried adding the other IOLinc and still had some comm issues on different switchlincs.. so either one or more switchlincs are flaky.. or both iolincs are flaky.. or something else.

[Techman]

19 hours ago, dsstrainer said:

Added back one IOLinc. Things seemed ok at first. But the next morning I got an error with regard to one of the switchlincs losing communication .
So I'm scaling back a bit trying to find where things break bad. I also tried adding the other IOLinc and still had some comm issues on different switchlincs.. so either one or more switchlincs are flaky.. or both iolincs are flaky.. or something else.

Take a look at these troubleshooting tips    https://wiki.universal-devices.com/index.php?title=INSTEON:_Troubleshooting_Communications_Errors

 

 

[dsstrainer]

So I'm still having issues.. and I thinking it must be something I've plugged in recently. So I'm going to start tearing apart my house.

As I mentioned before, I already bought a new PLM and the resulting comm failures are no different than with my old one, so I don't think either of the PLMs are faulty.

But some thoughts...

1. Even if there is powerline noise.. why isn't the RF backup taking over for some of the plugin modules? The whole point of Dual Band Insteon is the "Belt and Suspenders" combo of powerline and RF. If one doesn't work the other one should. Especially surprising since my office shares a wall with my living room but the dual band on/off module out there is constantly getting intermittent failures. To that point, motion sensors, door sensors, and leak sensors are all working swimmingly. Even the leak sensors in the basement report cleanly to my ISY in my office upstairs according to the Event Viewer. I have one access point in the basement (near the breaker box) and one on the second floor. So RF signals are working fine as far as I can tell. At the very least my dual band on/off module should be rock solid using RF as the backup.. but has the same intermittent issues as the rest.

2. X10 commands also work perfectly. I have some ActiveEye motion sensors for outside perimeter motion sensing for flood lights and they are solid as a rock and I see all them in the event viewer.

3. I tried moving the 2413S PLM to another outlet in my office, opposite corner from my PC and ran a longer ethernet. Oddly nothing would talk to the PLM then. ISY could see it.. but all devices failed comms. Not sure what is going on there.

4. I have a 2413U PLM so I hooked it up to Houselinc, plugged into the same outlet as my ISY PLM (2413S) and linked a few of the devices that have been having comm problems (1 switch linc, 1 on/off module, and one IOLinc. Using the testing tools in houselinc, everything tested 100% success rate in 100 tests.

Things I'm going to try:

- Adding more devices to Houselinc and see if and when things start to break bad.

- Unplugging everything in my house to see if some other noise is causing it (which I assume is the underlying cause, but surprised the 2413U hasn't seen an issue with its tests)

[dsstrainer]

I think I may have found the culprit!

Last night I was trying to add back some of my sensors. I had a door open/close sensor on my desk in my office and I was linking it. The nearest access point was in the hallway, 6 feet from me (tho not line of sight).  I watched the Event viewer while linking and it could not get responses. Time after time I got "Could not get insteon engine" and reason 3 errors (communication failure). I outstretched my arm a bit towards the hall and I saw it start to get some response.. I finally put the sensor directly on the AP and it linked.

So then I tried a new dual band lamp linc and swapped it for the AP, just to be sure it wasn't the AP. Tried again from my room with another sensor.. same issue.. moved closer to the Lamplinc and it linked. So it wasn't the AP since the lamplinc has the same issue. So now I'm seeing its not (just) a powerline noise issue... something is interfering with my RF signal too. That got me thinking about what devices I've added recently that have a signal.

Back around the time things broke bad.... I recall I added some of those wifi outlets to some new lamps we got. 
https://www.amazon.com/Monitoring-Compatible-Required-Control-Anywhere/dp/B07547F8FM

They worked great and the Smart Life app is actually pretty decent. They also look a bit more attractive than the blocky lamplincs so it was a cheap way to automate those lights in that room which I had no other need for connectivity other than Alexa and ifttt. Didn't really need those on my insteon network.

So last night in a fury I walked around unplugging random items that were new in the past 3 months, including those wifi plugs. I again tried to link a sensor from my office. It worked! I didn't have to run to the hallway.

I started testing more by opening and closing the magnetic sensor.. and I see Max Hops 3, Hops Left 2

so I plug them back in and test and see Max Hops 3,  Hops left 1 or Hops left 0

Boom! 

So I removed all wifi plugs and added back some other insteon modules last night... now we wait.. but I think we are back!

So Beware those Wifi smart devices!

PS. I had another brand of wifi plugs that I wanted to try as well, so far they seem to be co-existing without causing problems.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075QH6DXK
 

fingers crossed

[MWareman]

FYI, it’s my understanding that if there is a device interfering with the power line signal, it will affect the wireless signal as well as devices still need to get a sync signal via power line.

Someone with greater low level knowledge may know more that I.

[dsstrainer]

In my research I believe I read something that implied that same notion.. So think you may be right.

Thanks!