Insteon vs Homekit for new home

[ahwman]

Hello,

I’m moving to a new home soon and trying to future proof my smart home as best as possible. That said, I’m fully embedded in the apple ecosystem and trying to decide whether to go all in with HomeKit in-wall switches and outlets, or use Insteon in conjunction with Homebridge and my ISY, which has been rock solid for me. The two most important considerations, are reliability and future proofing.

Any thoughts?

[lilyoyo1]

11 minutes ago, ahwman said:

Hello,

I’m moving to a new home soon and trying to future proof my smart home as best as possible. That said, I’m fully embedded in the apple ecosystem and trying to decide whether to go all in with HomeKit in-wall switches and outlets, or use Insteon in conjunction with Homebridge and my ISY, which has been rock solid for me. The two most important considerations, are reliability and future proofing.

Any thoughts?

I would (as most on here would agree) never use anything that is cloud based as the foundation for my home automation system. In doing so, you're begging to be screwed in the future when apple no longer wants to support older systems on their servers. You're better off having a local option such as the isy with homebridge to add the support you desire

[ahwman]

2 minutes ago, lilyoyo1 said:

I would (as most on here would agree) never use anything that is cloud based as the foundation for my home automation system. In doing so, you're begging to be screwed in the future when apple no longer wants to support older systems on their servers. You're better off having a local option such as the isy with homebridge to add the support you desire

Great point.  I guess I just assumed that Apple would continue to support HomKit devices well into the future - unless of course older devices stop functioning with newer iterations of HomeKit going forward...

[lilyoyo1]

13 minutes ago, ahwman said:

Great point.  I guess I just assumed that Apple would continue to support HomKit devices well into the future - unless of course older devices stop functioning with newer iterations of HomeKit going forward...

That assumption gets most people. In some ways EOL is already built in. For remote access, you need an apple device inside the home at all times. Since apple TV's, iPads, and such has a shelf life when it comes to updates, it's only a matter of time before that capability is broken unless you upgrade. Technically, I could be running an isy99 as long as I didn't add new devices over the years. 

Apple has generally supported their devices for many years so I'm sure it'll be around for a very long time. Unfortunately, I would rather control when and how I upgrade vs it being forced on me at any given moment even if that moment is years from now

[ahwman]

1 minute ago, lilyoyo1 said:

That assumption gets most people. In some ways EOL is already built in. For remote access, you need an apple device inside the home at all times. Since apple TV's, iPads, and such has a shelf life when it comes to updates, it's only a matter of time before that capability is broken unless you upgrade. Technically, I could be running an isy99 as long as I didn't add new devices over the years. 

Apple has generally supported their devices for many years so I'm sure it'll be around for a very long time. Unfortunately, I would rather control when and how I upgrade vs it being forced on me at any given moment even if that moment is years from now

Excellent points. Thanks so much for your input! ??

[oberkc]

I like apple HomeKit.  It seems easy to set up and has a nice and simple interface.  Unfortunately, my minimal experience with it has been a little frustrating with a couple of devices that loose connection with the mother device (an iPad, in this case).  Coupled with that is a modest (when compared to the ISY) automation capability and the cloud considerations.  This would be an easy decision for me: ISY is my choice.

[ahwman]

5 minutes ago, oberkc said:

I like apple HomeKit.  It seems easy to set up and has a nice and simple interface.  Unfortunately, my minimal experience with it has been a little frustrating with a couple of devices that loose connection with the mother device (an iPad, in this case).  Coupled with that is a modest (when compared to the ISY) automation capability and the cloud considerations.  This would be an easy decision for me: ISY is my choice.

Yeah, my biggest concern is the “device not responding” issues with HomeKit which is never an issue with my Insteon devices via ISY and Homebridge...

[mwester]

Ok. Let me play the devil's advocate (which may be hard, since I'm not an Apple person)...

You state that you're "fully embedded" in the Apple ecosystem -- I presume that to mean MacOS, iPads, iPhones, iHeadphones, iAccessories, the works...  You're accustomed to some of the finest (perhaps THE finest) industrial design in the world.  You enjoy Apple's gorgeous (and very functional) Walled Garden -- everything fits together, plays together, enjoys similar high degrees of quality, everything "just works".  And by everything, I mean hardware, software, design, look and feel -- and that's true even for software (and some hardware) that isn't Apple's software and hardware... it just comes with the whole "Apple thing".  Of course you pay for that, but from those I know who I'd consider to be "fully embedded", they'd say it's very much worth it (and they laugh at me struggling to make my printer driver work on Windows, and almost fall on the floor laughing when I pull out my Android phone/brick...)

So, whatever you do, GO HOMEKIT!  Avoid the ISY, at all costs.  Not only are these devices not easily able to play with your Apple devices, and not only do they not have a look and feel that's fits in with what you've spent all that money with Apple to get, but the very culture that is associated with the ISY is anathema to the world of Apple.  ISY is all about experimentation -- making it do things even if it means breaking out a soldering iron.  Making the ISY and some oddball Chinese junk device do something amazing, something not even the manufacturer thought of -- which is way cool, but it's ugly, and doesn't have a UI, and what painful user experience it does have is based on software technologies that don't play well in the Apple universe (Java on the desktop, things like Safari auto-extracting zip files -- all solvable, but did you spend all that money on that Apple stuff just to treat it like you would a Windows box or a Linux box, and hack on it?)

So, armed with just a guess based on your original post -- I'd say you'll be sorely disappointed in the entire world of the ISY and surrounding technologies.  Don't go there.  Go Homekit instead.

 

(Now, if you'd tempered your original post by mentioning that you have a Linux machine in your workshop, for example, I might respond differently...)

 

(Edited to note that the above is somewhat tongue-in-cheek -- I certainly know some Apple-users who are first-class geeks and very happy with soldering irons and hackery...  )

[oberkc]

8 minutes ago, ahwman said:

which is never an issue with my Insteon devices via ISY and Homebridge..

I would be lying if I said insteon device never fail to communicate.  It can happen and it can be very frustrating.  It is also not easy to troubleshoot.  As hard to troubleshoot and fix insteon as it might be, however, I find it easier to troubleshoot than HomeKit devices, having adding wifi into the equation.  Furthermore, I have a couple of apple HomeKit devices that consistently stay connected, never showing any errors, yet fail to constantly respond to scheduled events.  I don't even have a clue how to fix that problem.

[lilyoyo1]

1 hour ago, oberkc said:

I would be lying if I said insteon device never fail to communicate.  It can happen and it can be very frustrating.  It is also not easy to troubleshoot.  As hard to troubleshoot and fix insteon as it might be, however, I find it easier to troubleshoot than HomeKit devices, having adding wifi into the equation.  Furthermore, I have a couple of apple HomeKit devices that consistently stay connected, never showing any errors, yet fail to constantly respond to scheduled events.  I don't even have a clue how to fix that problem

You've touched on another issue which is troubleshooting. Insteon and zwave can be a pain to troubleshoot but ultimately you know where to look. With homekit there are many extra things to look at when it comes to troubleshooting. Ultimately, should one run into issues, who's going to be there to help?

[madcodger]

7 hours ago, oberkc said:

I like apple HomeKit.  It seems easy to set up and has a nice and simple interface.  Unfortunately, my minimal experience with it has been a little frustrating with a couple of devices that loose connection with the mother device (an iPad, in this case).  Coupled with that is a modest (when compared to the ISY) automation capability and the cloud considerations.  This would be an easy decision for me: ISY is my choice.

The small consulting company I own is almost 100% Apple, and I personally own and regularly use a half-dozen Apple devices personally. But I could never get Homekit to work reliably. In contrast, my ISYs are and have been rock solid reliable across three homes over the years. I left them in each home we sold and those owners seem happy as well.

That said, I went with Z-wave in my last two buildings (on same property, with two ISYs) as part of my future proofing. After two homes with Insteon,  I grew tired of replacing Smarthome's switches (granted, most replacements were of Icons). So, I switched to Z-wave to get a choice of hardware manufacturers as a form of future proofing. Just a thought to consider. So far, I'm happy with Z-wave.

[jec6613]

I know of nobody who has good luck with HomeKit without going with enterprise type networking gear.  Every device needs an IP, and needs to be on your WiFi network.  Every device needs to update itself, often in a short period of time.

You'll also need to have a large enough single broadcast domain (e.g. subnet) to hold all of the devices you'll ever want to use.  /23 is the bare minimum, and the larger the subnet the more your broadcast traffic and the slower your network gets.

Cool concept, but until you're native IPv6 it's not practical for a full home.

[larryllix]

1 hour ago, jec6613 said:

I know of nobody who has good luck with HomeKit without going with enterprise type networking gear.  Every device needs an IP, and needs to be on your WiFi network.  Every device needs to update itself, often in a short period of time.

You'll also need to have a large enough single broadcast domain (e.g. subnet) to hold all of the devices you'll ever want to use.  /23 is the bare minimum, and the larger the subnet the more your broadcast traffic and the slower your network gets.

Cool concept, but until you're native IPv6 it's not practical for a full home.

In addition most routers do not have the capability to address enough WiFi devices. I have about 35 WiFi HA devices and my ASUS AC1900 router (3 years old) wouldn't handle all the addresses. Just because you set a range of 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.0.255, doesn't mean the router can handle that many devices.
Ohh... they make it look like it can handle that many devices, and they take turns showing up in the LAN network table,  but constantly drop out. When you have a power blink, things compete to get an IP address and some just can't get one. Sometimes that may be your smart thermostat or even your ISY while you are in another country or on a cruise ship. Now try to reset things and get it back!

WiFi is not a good HA protocol unless you are only going to use a few items.

[ahwman]

Thanks everyone for your great input as it gives me a lot to ponder. I’m definitely leaning towards sticking with my ISY and either Insteon or Zwave devices in conjunction with Honebridge which has so far been rock solid for me...

[Teken]

Thanks everyone for your great input as it gives me a lot to ponder. I’m definitely leaning towards sticking with my ISY and either Insteon or Zwave devices in conjunction with Honebridge which has so far been rock solid for me...

What is it with Apples Home Kit that you personally like? To put it another way I’m just some random guy.

Sell me on Apple Home Kit . . .


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[jec6613]

7 hours ago, larryllix said:

In addition most routers do not have the capability to address enough WiFi devices. I have about 35 WiFi HA devices and my ASUS AC1900 router (3 years old) wouldn't handle all the addresses. Just because you set a range of 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.0.255, doesn't mean the router can handle that many devices.
Ohh... they make it look like it can handle that many devices, and they take turns showing up in the LAN network table,  but constantly drop out. When you have a power blink, things compete to get an IP address and some just can't get one. Sometimes that may be your smart thermostat or even your ISY while you are in another country or on a cruise ship. Now try to reset things and get it back!

WiFi is not a good HA protocol unless you are only going to use a few items.

Yep, an ISY is cheap compared to a setup like mine that can handle ~500 wireless devices, and a few thousand more wired.  Cisco SB router, five Cisco SB WAPs, half a dozen managed L2 switches, and a Netgear L3/L4 fiber switch.  For less than half the price of just my core switch you can have an ISY Pro, Polisy, Insteon PLM, Z-Wave 500 board, enough Z-Wave extenders to cover the house.

[larryllix]

2 hours ago, jec6613 said:

Yep, an ISY is cheap compared to a setup like mine that can handle ~500 wireless devices, and a few thousand more wired.  Cisco SB router, five Cisco SB WAPs, half a dozen managed L2 switches, and a Netgear L3/L4 fiber switch.  For less than half the price of just my core switch you can have an ISY Pro, Polisy, Insteon PLM, Z-Wave 500 board, enough Z-Wave extenders to cover the house.

Yup. My bottleneck was the router ran out of memory to store enough IP addresses in usage, at any time. All the ports and WAPs and switches didn't make any difference. The central router DVRAM was the weakest link. Of course, nowhere can those capabilities ever be found, and nowhere can any errors or clues of that trouble be found, but all the public hype numbersshow boldly t with multi-cores, 510 wireless devices, and x GHz etc.. etc..

Is your DHCP server inside your router? Mine overrode my 512KB DVRAM and occasionally crashed the router ....I think. Third party save-the-day firmware made the problem worse with added features there wasn't enough room for.

[jec6613]

52 minutes ago, larryllix said:

Yup. My bottleneck was the router ran out of memory to store enough IP addresses in usage, at any time. All the ports and WAPs and switches didn't make any difference. The central router DVRAM was the weakest link. Of course, nowhere can those capabilities ever be found, and nowhere can any errors or clues of that trouble be found, but all the public hype numbersshow boldly t with multi-cores, 510 wireless devices, and x GHz etc.. etc..

Is your DHCP server inside your router? Mine overrode my 512KB DVRAM and occasionally crashed the router ....I think. Third party save-the-day firmware made the problem worse with added features there wasn't enough room for.

The right switch could solve that, actually.  A proper L3/L4 can reduce the routing table substantially, and offload the DHCP as well.  The Asus would have to handle static routes of course, but some do have that tucked away in their settings.  One big reason I use enterprise level equipment: they publish their capabilities

My DHCP server is stand-alone, though if it weren't I'd still probably be in the switch and not the router, since the router doesn't see the bulk of devices directly.  The edge router itself handles NAT, site to site VPN, a small subnet for client to site VPN, IDS and AV scans, and that's it.  It has a RIP link to my core switch, where almost all traffic is forwarded directly to, which handles all of the VLANs, inter-VLAN routing, and can route traffic at 144 Gbps (line rate).

The router is capable of 40,000 NAT sessions per second worst case (with everything loaded up), but with two site to site VPNs running and constant traffic in and out, usually about 40 Mbps each direction constant flow, and my working and streaming and everything going on, peak CPU is around 20% (dual core 900 MHz with hardware routing engine).  RAM usually sits around 20-30% utilization out of 1 GB, and it has 256 MB of flash.  With normal load, I could scale to about 250,000 NAT sessions before the router bottlenecked, which it does gracefully (and would SNMP trap to alert me if it occured)

The switch usually sits at 2% CPU, peaks at 4% CPU, and has a constant 500 Mbps of routed traffic going through it (IP cameras), not to mention literally every other piece of traffic on the network.

The switches, aside from the core handling most routing, are configured as L2 (though several are indeed L3 switches should I want to utilize that in the future).

[ahwman]

I hadn’t considered that when using HomeKit, each WIFI device will consume an IP address and put further overhead on my network. With all this in mind, the next question is Insteon or Zwave for wall switches and dimmers?  Pros and cons?

[madcodger]

11 hours ago, ahwman said:

I hadn’t considered that when using HomeKit, each WIFI device will consume an IP address and put further overhead on my network. With all this in mind, the next question is Insteon or Zwave for wall switches and dimmers?  Pros and cons?

Just watched a 20-minute write-up of this disappear on my iPad (yeah, that sucked). Anyway,  no time to rewrite all, but after having two homes with Insteon and now a small office building and another home (with two buildings) that use z-wave, here's my experience.

-Insteon powerline is better than z-wave for coverage, if no noise on the powerline. However, if noise is present, the radio aspect of Insteon often doesn't overcome it and filters are required, which can be expensive. And, sometimes it's nearly impossible to find and/or isolate  the powerline noise.

- The PLM is a bigger Achilles heel than the z-wave radio, and some batches of the thing have been better than others. I had one last for almost 8 years, and another die in a few months. Many similar stories on the forum here. 

- BIG concern with Insteon: One, proprietary manufacturer. You have no other choice, and over the years and models I have personally had widely varying quality. They should have replaced all Icon switches under warranty, IMO. I lost count of the early switches I had to replace. Some under warranty, but they fought me hard on those purchased from a dealer. Left a bad taste.

- On the other hand, z-wave coverage can be flaky, and the "repeater" function is sometimes questionable. Dedicated repeaters made my system solid, but without them it was unreliable.

- z-wave battery devices are not great, often unreliable, and quality between manufacturers varies greatly. But at least you have a choice of manufacturers.

In the end, I now prefer z-wave, but your mileage may vary.

Would write more, but battery almost gone. Good luck, and sure many others will comment.

 

 

[lilyoyo1]

11 hours ago, ahwman said:

I hadn’t considered that when using HomeKit, each WIFI device will consume an IP address and put further overhead on my network. With all this in mind, the next question is Insteon or Zwave for wall switches and dimmers?  Pros and cons?

This debate has raged on for years with many posts about it so I won't go into as deeply as I used to do. 

You'll find divided answers in your responses. Those who hate insteon due to having problems with it in the past or questioning the long term viability of the company. Some do not like insteon being sole source and want options.

For those who like insteon, we see things for what they are. They may be the only company but even if they go out of business their product would still work. You'll still be able to get product for a while and you could always switch to something else later if that were to happen. That's what one would do if their chosen zwave MFG. went out of business so to me there's no difference. From the outside looking in, more zwave companies have shut down over the years while insteon keeps on living. Besides that, I want 1 provider for my devices. The most tacky thing in the world is to have a lovely home but come inside, the homeowner skimped on the details and have mismatched stuff all around.

By using the Isy w/zwave, you have the best of both worlds so take advantage of it. I prefer insteon for lighting due to its ability to set direct links in devices. That way should my isy fail, my system would still work. With zwave not so much. The devices would work themselves locally but anything linked would no longer work. I also like the fact that when buying a switch from insteon, you don't have to research what it can do. All switches have the same features regardless of whether it's. A dimmer or a relay (obviously you can dim a relay and shouldn't use a dimmer or a non-dimmable source). With zwave you must research to ensure something will work the way you intend. This forum is filled with posters biting the device they felt would die what the wanted only to find out it works as a device but can't control another because it's not a scene controller or doesn't support a certain command class. 

Unlike zwave, all devices are controllers and show status regardless of how controlled (as long as the isy does the configuration). The main thing for me is the popcorn effect. Due to how zwave works, devices turn on/off 1 at a time. This is a non starter for me as it's simply unappealing. With insteon, devices in a scene turn off together. Have relays...1 harmonious click. Zwave...click , click, click all through the house. Dimmers are quiet but if you have devices in the same room it looks tacky watching them turn off 1 at a time. Insteon switches are also much more configurable. It's much easier to make dynamic setups than it is with zwave

Sensors are another story. This is where zwave shines and insteon fails. I'll use zwave over insteon any day for those. My house is full of zwave receptacles to build out the network with a couple of occupancy sensors in select locations such as the laundry rooms and some bathrooms. Once again, due to the nature of zwave, you'll want to research before buying as all devices are not made equally. 

[larryllix]

One myth that many people have perpetuated is about Insteon only being one source. This was no different for Zwave devices.

While many manufacturers were building Zwave devices,  only one company held the patent and could manufacture the Zwave radio chips. This was discovered late last year when they decided to allow other companies to manufacturer the radio chip,  Zwave devices were totally dependent on.

If the company holding the patent went belly up Zwave would have collapse also.

[larryllix]

12 hours ago, jec6613 said:

The right switch could solve that, actually.  A proper L3/L4 can reduce the routing table substantially, and offload the DHCP as well.  The Asus would have to handle static routes of course, but some do have that tucked away in their settings.  One big reason I use enterprise level equipment: they publish their capabilities

My DHCP server is stand-alone, though if it weren't I'd still probably be in the switch and not the router, since the router doesn't see the bulk of devices directly.  The edge router itself handles NAT, site to site VPN, a small subnet for client to site VPN, IDS and AV scans, and that's it.  It has a RIP link to my core switch, where almost all traffic is forwarded directly to, which handles all of the VLANs, inter-VLAN routing, and can route traffic at 144 Gbps (line rate).

The router is capable of 40,000 NAT sessions per second worst case (with everything loaded up), but with two site to site VPNs running and constant traffic in and out, usually about 40 Mbps each direction constant flow, and my working and streaming and everything going on, peak CPU is around 20% (dual core 900 MHz with hardware routing engine).  RAM usually sits around 20-30% utilization out of 1 GB, and it has 256 MB of flash.  With normal load, I could scale to about 250,000 NAT sessions before the router bottlenecked, which it does gracefully (and would SNMP trap to alert me if it occured)

The switch usually sits at 2% CPU, peaks at 4% CPU, and has a constant 500 Mbps of routed traffic going through it (IP cameras), not to mention literally every other piece of traffic on the network.

The switches, aside from the core handling most routing, are configured as L2 (though several are indeed L3 switches should I want to utilize that in the future).

With an overloaded DHCP server all of that would be moot. No IP address, no LAN , and no switching.

[jec6613]

20 minutes ago, larryllix said:

With an overloaded DHCP server all of that would be moot. No IP address, no LAN , and no switching.

Both my router and switch can handle several thousands using their built-in DHCP server without issue ... I think 30,000 on my switch, 3,000 on the router?  And that's each for IPv4 and IPv6.

And even without a DHCP server, the routing does indeed work fine - static IP addresses are still a thing.  The larger issue than the DHCP server tends to be the routing table and NAT table size when you get lots of subnets.

[larryllix]

4 minutes ago, jec6613 said:

Both my router and switch can handle several thousands using their built-in DHCP server without issue ... I think 30,000 on my switch, 3,000 on the router?  And that's each for IPv4 and IPv6.

And even without a DHCP server, the routing does indeed work fine - static IP addresses are still a thing.  The larger issue than the DHCP server tends to be the routing table and NAT table size when you get lots of subnets.

None of my WiFi bulbs or RGBW strips or thermostats allow static IP addresses and are all DHCP dependent.