Smarthome forum appears to be offline

[upstatemike]

2 hours ago, asbril said:

Interestingly I saw that Inovelli is coming with a Zigbee device. I had hopes for Inovelli as they came out with (as their name suggests) with innovative Zwave products, but for a while now they seem to have gone the Smarthome way, sold out and no customer service. Also, the quality of their products is far from perfect. Therefore going into Zigbee may be their swan song.

Interesting comment by Eric at Inovelli:

"This brings up the question – why do you sell Z-Wave then?

This is one we’re wrestling with internally – and we’ve landed on the strategy of selling Z-Wave to security companies who require the security that Z-Wave offers and then if the home automation enthusiasts want Z-Wave, they can certainly have them.

However, our focus from a consumer standpoint is going to be ZigBee/CHIP/Matter as that’s where the big dogs are playing and where we can fill more of the gaps in the industry."

[lilyoyo1]

3 hours ago, upstatemike said:

It just seems like Zigbee based products like Hue and Control4 are better positioned to integrate with the unsophisticated mass market products to create a natural and incremental upgrade path that new users can follow over time.

C4 is installer only so i wouldn't group then with hue. The only similarities between the 2 is the fact that they both use ZigBee. Outside of that, they live in different universes

[apostolakisl]

1 hour ago, Michel Kohanim said:

What I know is that they were going to sell but it didn't go through, so they just decided to shut down. 

With regard to PLM and devices, the outlook is grim. If they would offer me their PLM code/chip in return for $ per unit, I might consider (all we need is the chip since we already designed it once before they shut us down). I will not entertain up front $. The only goal would be to support existing customers. 

With kind regards,
Michel

It sounds like someone is bankrolling them, losing money, and just wanting to cut their losses.  So no bankruptcy auction of the patents etc.  But I can't imagine why they wouldn't agree to license the plm chip to you.  How would that be anything but money in their pocket minus some attorney fees for drawing up the contract???  It may be a small negative to someone wanting to buy the whole lot of their product technology, but some simple time/quantity limits would take care of that.

We appreciate your interest in making the plms and supporting your customers.

[Techman]

 

Just did some research.

The one-story Industrial property Smarthome / Smartlabs was located in at 16541 Millikan Ave, was sold to developers for $21,000,000 in December 2018. At that same time the developer got approval to demolish the property and replace it with a large multi story residential complex.

Not sure if Smarthome was a just tenant or had an equity interest in the property. But it seems the writing on the wall several years ago.

Maybe it's time to reach out to them and try to make a deal on the PLM chip. Any idea how much time remains on their patent?

 

 

 

 

[asbril]

3 hours ago, upstatemike said:

Interesting comment by Eric at Inovelli:

"This brings up the question – why do you sell Z-Wave then?

This is one we’re wrestling with internally – and we’ve landed on the strategy of selling Z-Wave to security companies who require the security that Z-Wave offers and then if the home automation enthusiasts want Z-Wave, they can certainly have them.

However, our focus from a consumer standpoint is going to be ZigBee/CHIP/Matter as that’s where the big dogs are playing and where we can fill more of the gaps in the industry."

Very interesting and it explains a lot. This being said, as enthusiastic as I was about Inovelli when they started,  I have the strong feeling that they are taking water and that Zigbee / Matter is a struggle for survival.

Their customer service is nil.  Exactly a year ago, I ordered (and paid for) a 5-scene switch that was supposed to come out soon.  No updates for along time and when I asked to cancel my order and asking for a refund, I received no reply.  I have GE/Jasco, Homeseer, Inovelli and Zooz switches and the fail ratio of Inovelli is worse than all others.

[lilyoyo1]

52 minutes ago, Techman said:

 

Just did some research.

The one-story Industrial property Smarthome / Smartlabs was located in at 16541 Millikan Ave, was sold to developers for $21,000,000 in December 2018. At that same time the developer got approval to demolish the property and replace it with a large multi story residential complex.

Not sure if Smarthome was a just tenant or had an equity interest in the property. But it seems the writing on the wall several years ago.

Maybe it's time to reach out to them and try to make a deal on the PLM chip. Any idea how much time remains on their patent?

 

 

 

 

That had nothing to do with it. They were leasing the place. A developer was trying to purchase multiple properties in that area. 

Some were already sold, torn down and apts built down the street from there on Alton

[upstatemike]

1 hour ago, asbril said:

Very interesting and it explains a lot. This being said, as enthusiastic as I was about Inovelli when they started,  I have the strong feeling that they are taking water and that Zigbee / Matter is a struggle for survival.

Their customer service is nil.  Exactly a year ago, I ordered (and paid for) a 5-scene switch that was supposed to come out soon.  No updates for along time and when I asked to cancel my order and asking for a refund, I received no reply.  I have GE/Jasco, Homeseer, Inovelli and Zooz switches and the fail ratio of Inovelli is worse than all others.

Maybe but I had an extended email exchange last week with somebody at Zooz and they remarked on how things were moving more toward Wi-Fi. I wonder if they are also considering adding some products using other protocols besides Z-Wave? Homeseer also added a self branded Wi-Fi plug to their store recently. Seems like even the most hard core Z-Wave suppliers are looking at ways to hedge their bets around the future.

[asbril]

1 hour ago, upstatemike said:

Maybe but I had an extended email exchange last week with somebody at Zooz and they remarked on how things were moving more toward Wi-Fi. I wonder if they are also considering adding some products using other protocols besides Z-Wave? Homeseer also added a self branded Wi-Fi plug to their store recently. Seems like even the most hard core Z-Wave suppliers are looking at ways to hedge their bets around the future.

All I am saying is that I see similarities between Smarthome and Inovelli...... No phone number, sold out of their products, no customer support

[apostolakisl]

2 hours ago, upstatemike said:

Maybe but I had an extended email exchange last week with somebody at Zooz and they remarked on how things were moving more toward Wi-Fi. I wonder if they are also considering adding some products using other protocols besides Z-Wave? Homeseer also added a self branded Wi-Fi plug to their store recently. Seems like even the most hard core Z-Wave suppliers are looking at ways to hedge their bets around the future.

I can't see how anyone even remotely serious about HA could go with wifi.  You would have to have enterprise grade wifi to support all those devices.  Wifi is just fine for a few toys around the house, but not HA.

[stillwater]

@apostolakisl Future WiFi will have features to make it more friendly to numerous low power/low data rate IoT devices....  

https://www.electronicdesign.com/technologies/iot/article/21182189/nordic-semiconductor-why-wifi-6-will-be-a-key-component-of-tomorrows-iot

Whether this tips the balance to WiFi for HA I can't say. 

Unfortunately I notice that the new WiFi 6 Unifi Access Points only have WiFi6 on the 5 GHZ band.  

For my current project (new construction and retrofit with access to stud bays) I am going with maximum ethernet and wired low voltage stuff and some wifi devices (mostly dimmers in light fixtures).  Sensors all wired.    Switches/keypads will be dumb low voltage so completely agnostic to future technology.   This is painful but the alternative was completely dumb with no comms.  

[larryllix]

1 minute ago, stillwater said:

@apostolakisl Future WiFi will have features to make it more friendly to numerous low power/low data rate IoT devices....  

https://www.electronicdesign.com/technologies/iot/article/21182189/nordic-semiconductor-why-wifi-6-will-be-a-key-component-of-tomorrows-iot

Whether this tips the balance to WiFi for HA I can't say. 

Unfortunately I notice that the new WiFi 6 Unifi Access Points only have WiFi6 on the 5 GHZ band.  

For my current project (new construction and retrofit with access to stud bays) I am going with maximum ethernet and wired low voltage stuff and some wifi devices (mostly dimmers in light fixtures).  Sensors all wired.    Switches/keypads will be dumb low voltage so completely agnostic to future technology.   This is painful but the alternative was completely dumb with no comms.  

I am finding  few routers that are dropping support for WiFi 5 for some reason. My ASUS mesh system will not even talk to my Roku Stick 6-8 feet away. Signals levels are not bad but they are just not compatible. WiFi 6 is the WiFi that should have been implemented decades ago, with it's multi-device management.

For now, and until WiFi 6 devices are created, the old WiFi 2.4 works very well for lighting, but I wouldn't want to try it for switches and other fast response needed devices. Mind you, WiFi anything is faster than Insteon ever was. Somebody just needs to develop grouping commands (Scenes) in WiFi based devices for less pop-corn effect.

[upstatemike]

1 hour ago, asbril said:

All I am saying is that I see similarities between Smarthome and Inovelli...... No phone number, sold out of their products, no customer support

Maybe but the last post on the forum was 28 minutes ago. The CEO says we will be able to start preordering Blue Series (Zigbee) switches from the main web page within a couple of days with expected shipping in June. 

[asbril]

11 minutes ago, upstatemike said:

Maybe but the last post on the forum was 28 minutes ago. The CEO says we will be able to start preordering Blue Series (Zigbee) switches from the main web page within a couple of days with expected shipping in June. 

Yeah, like the 5 Scene switch that I ordered in April 2021 for shipping in June 2021......

[upstatemike]

35 minutes ago, asbril said:

Yeah, like the 5 Scene switch that I ordered in April 2021 for shipping in June 2021......

Well Eric claimed back on September 21st that a former employee/partner made some false claims to their manufacturer and screwed both them and the manufacturer, so that put a stop to the keypad until they covered the debts and came up with new capital to make it. Supposedly on March 14th of this year the board agreed to a partnership (aquisition?) with/by another IoT company which should give them the capital needed to move ahead. They are also supposedly honoring refund requests from those who don't want to wait but without a phone number or email address I don't know how you do that. Submit an online service ticket I guess?

Definitely a "believe it when you see it" situation.

[stillwater]

@larryllix  Re "Somebody just needs to develop grouping commands (Scenes) in WiFi based devices for less pop-corn effect."    

 

The following is just informational -- I am not advocating adoption of these but I am going to try some. 

I haven't tested this feature but the Shelly switches/dimmers/input devices have "webhooks"  and scripting and some scheduling so you can set them up hubless.  I vaguely remember the Gen 2 (ESP32-based ) devices have at least 5 webhooks -- so they can send http commands direct to 5 devices.  I don't know how much of a lag between commands there might be but probably short if no authentication/encryption is used.     There are drawbacks in that most of the devices are not (yet?) UL listed (though they are certified some other places), and there are no keypads (the input devices are designed to hide behind dumb switches) and most of the devices expose line voltage to the switches used to trigger them.  A 50 cent photo coupler solves the last problem if you have a DC source -- (an AAA battery  or a coin cell would have a very long life because it's only a momentary contact for something like 20 ma) and the input devices code separately for short, long, and double taps.  

And the Shelly Dimmer 2 can do a lot of tailoring in software (in addition to choosing between leading and trailing edge).  But with no heatsinks it's limited to something like 200 watts -- and it's still a Gen 1 (ESP8266) device -- Gen 2  probably will be released by end 2022... 

The Shelly devices can also post/subscribe to an MQTT broker which would get around the small number of webhooks in the devices but still result in near simultaneous turn on of lights.  There is a Shelly cloud but the devices can be set up to operate separately from it (and a router can enforce this gap if you don't trust the Shelly software to turn it off).  There are also Shelly LED bulbs but I am finicky about light quality and don't plan on trying them.  

Also I'd stay away from the "PM" devices that have built-in "power measurement" as they seem to rely on resistors for measurement rather than Hall effect sensors and so generate more heat than they should.  On the other hand the company seems to have rapid development cycles with frequent firmware releases  and a hardware cycle that seems faster than most competitors so maybe they will manage to survive.  

[lilyoyo1]

8 hours ago, stillwater said:

@apostolakisl Future WiFi will have features to make it more friendly to numerous low power/low data rate IoT devices....  

https://www.electronicdesign.com/technologies/iot/article/21182189/nordic-semiconductor-why-wifi-6-will-be-a-key-component-of-tomorrows-iot

Whether this tips the balance to WiFi for HA I can't say. 

Unfortunately I notice that the new WiFi 6 Unifi Access Points only have WiFi6 on the 5 GHZ band.  

For my current project (new construction and retrofit with access to stud bays) I am going with maximum ethernet and wired low voltage stuff and some wifi devices (mostly dimmers in light fixtures).  Sensors all wired.    Switches/keypads will be dumb low voltage so completely agnostic to future technology.   This is painful but the alternative was completely dumb with no comms.  

I doubt this will happen for the simple fact that everything else will consume more and more bandwidth. The faster our internet becomes, the more our devices will consume. 

For example, today's routers are 10x more powerful than routers 10 years ago but we're still in the same position as then. Why? Because 4k HDR streaming along with lossless audio/dolby Atmos, and high fidelity music.....and that's only on your smartphones, tablets, and laptops. How much more bandwidth do you think TV's and video game systems will require? 

In addition to that, your standard apps like Facebook, Instagram, and others also require more and more bandwidth. 

Router mfg and cable companies aren't going to suddenly supply cheap/free Enterprise quality routers. Content creators, media and tech companies aren't going to slow down or stop progress just so people can use their bulbs or wall switches at home either. Which puts is back in this same place again. The promise of a better future gets trumped by progress leaving other promising ideas behind

[lilyoyo1]

6 hours ago, stillwater said:

@larryllix  Re "Somebody just needs to develop grouping commands (Scenes) in WiFi based devices for less pop-corn effect."    

 

The following is just informational -- I am not advocating adoption of these but I am going to try some. 

I haven't tested this feature but the Shelly switches/dimmers/input devices have "webhooks"  and scripting and some scheduling so you can set them up hubless.  I vaguely remember the Gen 2 (ESP32-based ) devices have at least 5 webhooks -- so they can send http commands direct to 5 devices.  I don't know how much of a lag between commands there might be but probably short if no authentication/encryption is used.     There are drawbacks in that most of the devices are not (yet?) UL listed (though they are certified some other places), and there are no keypads (the input devices are designed to hide behind dumb switches) and most of the devices expose line voltage to the switches used to trigger them.  A 50 cent photo coupler solves the last problem if you have a DC source -- (an AAA battery  or a coin cell would have a very long life because it's only a momentary contact for something like 20 ma) and the input devices code separately for short, long, and double taps.  

And the Shelly Dimmer 2 can do a lot of tailoring in software (in addition to choosing between leading and trailing edge).  But with no heatsinks it's limited to something like 200 watts -- and it's still a Gen 1 (ESP8266) device -- Gen 2  probably will be released by end 2022... 

The Shelly devices can also post/subscribe to an MQTT broker which would get around the small number of webhooks in the devices but still result in near simultaneous turn on of lights.  There is a Shelly cloud but the devices can be set up to operate separately from it (and a router can enforce this gap if you don't trust the Shelly software to turn it off).  There are also Shelly LED bulbs but I am finicky about light quality and don't plan on trying them.  

Also I'd stay away from the "PM" devices that have built-in "power measurement" as they seem to rely on resistors for measurement rather than Hall effect sensors and so generate more heat than they should.  On the other hand the company seems to have rapid development cycles with frequent firmware releases  and a hardware cycle that seems faster than most competitors so maybe they will manage to survive.  

This is a pipedream. Regardless of what Shelly can potentially do, how many people will want to take the necessary time to update and flash those devices? 

Take this forum  Those here are generally above avg hobbyists to much more advanced....yet, most are not willing to do what it takes to make those devices work on a large scale installation. Imagine having to flash 30+ devices just to install in an avg home. Worse in a larger home as you're now talking 70+ devices. That's a lot of work to do before even having to install the devices or to start programming. 

Even with zwave. How many actually update their devices (if they're working)? It's easy to do 1 or 2 but most aren't going to run around pushing updates to a bunch of devices one at a time. Shelly sounds good on paper but in reality, it's a smaller niche product for a really small niche market

[upstatemike]

1 hour ago, lilyoyo1 said:

This is a pipedream. Regardless of what Shelly can potentially do, how many people will want to take the necessary time to update and flash those devices? 

Take this forum  Those here are generally above avg hobbyists to much more advanced....yet, most are not willing to do what it takes to make those devices work on a large scale installation. Imagine having to flash 30+ devices just to install in an avg home. Worse in a larger home as you're now talking 70+ devices. That's a lot of work to do before even having to install the devices or to start programming. 

Even with zwave. How many actually update their devices (if they're working)? It's easy to do 1 or 2 but most aren't going to run around pushing updates to a bunch of devices one at a time. Shelly sounds good on paper but in reality, it's a smaller niche product for a really small niche market

I agree. I want to focus my time on configuring cool integrations and automations, not configuring devices just to get basic functionality. Flashing hardware is a non-starter for me.

I also agree that in an installation you need to install, configure, test, and leave. I have always had an issue with the amount of time it takes Z-Wave to optimize itself after setup. You need to confirm things are in their final state before you walk out the door so the thing needs to be in its final configuration within hours, not days. You certainly can't keep going back to the site because you have to let things settle as you slowly build out the mesh from the controller.

I also don't know what kind of network equipment you would need for bulletproof IP based lighting and automation. A home with 70 lights and devices is also likely to have multiple TVs streaming 4K content plus IP based multi-room music like Sonos, plus a bunch of IP voice assistants, and maybe even a home office running Zoom meetings and a VOIP phone system. What consumer infrastructure router will support this? What consumer is going to learn to manage a commercial product, expand their domain address space, manage a huge DHCP table, etc. etc.?

I have to say I am a little surprised that the mesh networking offerings are so poor. None of them seem to support basic features like multi-WAN, POE power (or battery backup on each access point), CPU enough to manage large DHCP tables, and other basic features required for a large scale network environment. Consumers trying to base their Home Automation on Wi-Fi will quickly outgrow any easy to set up "consumer grade" infrastructure currently available in the marketplace.

[larryllix]

8 hours ago, stillwater said:

@larryllix  Re "Somebody just needs to develop grouping commands (Scenes) in WiFi based devices for less pop-corn effect."    

 

The following is just informational -- I am not advocating adoption of these but I am going to try some. 

I haven't tested this feature but the Shelly switches/dimmers/input devices have "webhooks"  and scripting and some scheduling so you can set them up hubless.  I vaguely remember the Gen 2 (ESP32-based ) devices have at least 5 webhooks -- so they can send http commands direct to 5 devices.  I don't know how much of a lag between commands there might be but probably short if no authentication/encryption is used.     There are drawbacks in that most of the devices are not (yet?) UL listed (though they are certified some other places), and there are no keypads (the input devices are designed to hide behind dumb switches) and most of the devices expose line voltage to the switches used to trigger them.  A 50 cent photo coupler solves the last problem if you have a DC source -- (an AAA battery  or a coin cell would have a very long life because it's only a momentary contact for something like 20 ma) and the input devices code separately for short, long, and double taps.  

And the Shelly Dimmer 2 can do a lot of tailoring in software (in addition to choosing between leading and trailing edge).  But with no heatsinks it's limited to something like 200 watts -- and it's still a Gen 1 (ESP8266) device -- Gen 2  probably will be released by end 2022... 

The Shelly devices can also post/subscribe to an MQTT broker which would get around the small number of webhooks in the devices but still result in near simultaneous turn on of lights.  There is a Shelly cloud but the devices can be set up to operate separately from it (and a router can enforce this gap if you don't trust the Shelly software to turn it off).  There are also Shelly LED bulbs but I am finicky about light quality and don't plan on trying them.  

Also I'd stay away from the "PM" devices that have built-in "power measurement" as they seem to rely on resistors for measurement rather than Hall effect sensors and so generate more heat than they should.  On the other hand the company seems to have rapid development cycles with frequent firmware releases  and a hardware cycle that seems faster than most competitors so maybe they will manage to survive.  

I don't see any switches on the Shelly webpages. Am I missing something?

 

I have done animations of lighting with a few dozen RGBW LED strips using WiFi 2 and a 40 year old router similar to what I am hearing people complaining about. Yeah it was supposed to have a limited DHCP reservation table but I have never found the end of it yet.  I am currently at about 78 devices, not all IP reserved.

However, my 20 year old ASUS router really did some stupid things once I loaded in some third party router firmware. Apparently the firmware didn't know the memory size and overran it. It seemed to act up after about 51 devices.

[lilyoyo1]

14 minutes ago, larryllix said:

I don't see any switches on the Shelly webpages. Am I missing something?

 

I have done animations of lighting with a few dozen RGBW LED strips using WiFi 2 and a 40 year old router similar to what I am hearing people complaining about. Yeah it was supposed to have a limited DHCP reservation table but I have never found the end of it yet.  I am currently at about 78 devices, not all IP reserved.

However, my 20 year old ASUS router really did some stupid things once I loaded in some third party router firmware. Apparently the firmware didn't know the memory size and overran it. It seemed to act up after about 51 devices.

Are you sure about those ages? Consumer wifi routers have only been available since the end of the 90s. Even 40 year old modems wouldn't work with today's networks

[Venicenerd]

Holy shit. This really sucks. Those 6/8 button keypads are amazing and my entire home is build around them. Damn. 

[PatPend]

On 4/11/2022 at 10:17 PM, Techman said:

I wonder what will become of the Insteon patent. Being that they pretty much ran the company into the ground I would assume its value is minimal. It's certainly a sad state of affairs.

Their patent 7,345,998 which covers the dual band mesh protocol doesn't expire until September 2026.  Until then the creditors/successors in interest, whoever they are, still own the rights.  After a patent expires it falls into the public domain, however unless you get the rights to the chip & mechanical designs you'd have to engineer a compatible product from scratch.  Whether this will make economic sense in 2026 is an open question.  

[stillwater]

I did not mean that the Shelly devices were ready for widespread US consumer adoption at this time -- in fact I raised several issues arguing in the opposite direction.  Just that someone had done more or less what @lilyoyo1 mentioned.  I specifically said I wasn't advocating them. 

Treat it as a proof of concept.  They do it with the ESP32 platform which is widely available to developers.  I doubt there are any intellectual property issues.    In terms of predicting the wave of the future I suspect Wifi6 plus something like the ESP32 with more flash memory  or RP2040 with wifi will win out over Zigbee or Zwave, though you have to worry about performance in urban areas with RF congestion.  Or maybe LoRa or something else low power on 433 or 915 mhz will prevail eventually.  The prevalence of wifi means that low-end of the market won't be available to fund the more exotic uses.

Re Routers and Wifi Access Points -- I have had great success with Ubiquiti  Unifi Edgerouter and Unifi access points.  (I wish their branding was less confusing!)  With several access points for 5G this leaves 2.4 GHZ open for IoT.  The only glitch has been with a Roomba -- had to disable some advanced features on the APs that weren't doing me much good anyway.    One of the new Wifi6 access points can handle 300 devices at a time.

In fact the Shellies are a little more ready for adoption than my post suggests -- for people who don't need keypads and are retrofitting, their existing AC switches will work fine.  From my reading of the various support forums it looks like there is abundant activity on Home Assistant to make using the devices more straightforward on that controller.  (The changeover from Gen 1 to Gen 2 Shelly devices has put some bumps in the road). 

Re:  No Shelly Switches

Yes, I referred to the lack of keypads and meant switches too.  As a Bulgarian company they have been more responsive to  230 v  form factors and have just come out with their first switch (4 buttons per gang)  but nothing yet for North American boxes.  From what I have seen their plastics manufacturing is not the best anyway.   

If you like paddle switches there are high voltage switches that would work fine with no modification.  For example the momentary SPDT Leviton 5657-2 (available in all the usual Leviton colors).  This could control a single shelly input or 2 different Shelly inputs.  And as mentioned  the shelly inputs distinguish between singe and double taps and long pushes so you could in theory use it for 6 control inputs.  (According to Shelly the i4 will later have additional  input combinations with evolved firmware)

[By input I mean either the switch input on a Shelly relay or dimmer or the input on a dedicated Shelly input device like the i4 or uni that communicates via wifi to other shelly devices or to a controller]

My plan is to use dumb Kyle Touch Plate low voltage switches (either Mystique or Ultra).  These are not cheap but they will never fail.  I have not seen them close up yet but the pictures look nice (the Classic switches look clunky).   You can get them engraved for $$$.   And while it probably would be safe to use them with the  non-isolated Shelly inputs, my plan is to connect them to the Shelly dimmers via opto-isolators so that there will be zero chance of shock.  The Kyle switches are available in 1-8 momentary buttons per gang, with or without LED indicators (need to energize and control these  separately).  

 

Update -- I received a sample Touch Plate Mystique 8 button switch in the Black color.   My spouse said they are "beautiful."  Not glossy like the Insteon or Lutron black (which always looks a little brown to me, btw).  I haven't tried the engraving though on the Touch Plate site you can order either engraved button caps or engraved switch covers, or both.    Touch Plate has been in business since 1946 so there is some likelihood that they will continue -- though this is only relevant for expansion or new houses -- there is no reason to think that these switches will ever break switching low voltage at minimal current  (in my case 3 volts at maybe 20-35 ma.). 

https://www.touchplate.com/product/mystique-series-wall-switch/   (I actually ordered from Kyle Switch Plate in CA before I located the actual manufacturer). 

[lilyoyo1]

24 minutes ago, stillwater said:

I did not mean that the Shelly devices were ready for widespread US consumer adoption at this time -- in fact I raised several issues arguing in the opposite direction.  Just that someone had done more or less what @lilyoyo1 mentioned.  I specifically said I wasn't advocating them. 

Treat it as a proof of concept.  They do it with the ESP32 platform which is widely available to developers.  I doubt there are any intellectual property issues.    In terms of predicting the wave of the future I suspect Wifi6 plus something like the ESP32 with more flash memory  or RP2040 with wifi will win out over Zigbee or Zwave, though you have to worry about performance in urban areas with RF congestion.  Or maybe LoRa or something else low power on 433 or 915 mhz will prevail eventually.  The prevalence of wifi means that low-end of the market won't be available to fund the more exotic uses.

Re Routers and Wifi Access Points -- I have had great success with Ubiquiti  Unifi Edgerouter and Unifi access points.  (I wish their branding was less confusing!)  With several access points for 5G this leaves 2.4 GHZ open for IoT.  The only glitch has been with a Roomba -- had to disable some advanced features on the APs that weren't doing me much good anyway.    One of the new Wifi6 access points can handle 300 devices at a time.

In fact the Shellies are a little more ready for adoption than my post suggests -- for people who don't need keypads and are retrofitting, their existing AC switches will work fine.  From my reading of the various support forums it looks like there is abundant activity on Home Assistant to make using the devices more straightforward on that controller.  (The changeover from Gen 1 to Gen 2 Shelly devices has put some bumps in the road). 

Re:  No Shelly Switches

Yes, I referred to the lack of keypads and meant switches too.  As a Bulgarian company they have been more responsive to  230 v  form factors and have just come out with their first switch (4 buttons per gang)  but nothing yet for North American boxes.  From what I have seen their plastics manufacturing is not the best anyway.   

If you like paddle switches there are high voltage switches that would work fine with no modification.  For example the momentary SPDT Leviton 5657-2W.  This could control a single shelly input or 2 different Shelly inputs.  And as mentioned  the shelly inputs distinguish between singe and double taps and long pushes so you could in theory use it for 6 control inputs.  (According to Shelly the i4 will later have additional  input combinations with evolved firmware)

My plan is to use dumb Kyle Touch Plate low voltage switches (either Mystique or Ultra).  These are not cheap but they will never fail.  I have not seen them close up yet but the pictures look nice (the Classic switches look clunky).   You can get them engraved for $$$.   And while it probably would be safe to use them with the  non-isolated Shelly inputs, my plan is to connect them to the Shelly dimmers via opto-isolators so that there will be zero chance of shock.  The Kyle switches are available in 1-8 momentary buttons per gang, with or without LED indicators (need to energize and control these  separately).  

 

 

I wasn't saying you were implying anything. Just voicing my opinion why I don't see adoption happening in that manner. Regardless of how consumer ready something may appear to be, the more steps involved, the less likely it'll become adopted.

Look at the polls and metrics for Amazon echo. With all they've added to it in regards to routines, most people still only turn things on, off, dim, and play music. This shows people have no interest in doing extra. Most will grab their phone to see who's at the door vs using their fire stick and tv that's already on and right in front of them because they don't realize that they can. 

Ubiquiti is enterprise grade though they play in the consumer/prosumer space. I have their wifi pro access points and they work great. However, what it took to configure it on my DMP, I just don't see most people doing that. Not that it's hard but it's more steps than most would want to take. That's not even including the cost of the system, running wires, and mounting the access points. 

Personally, I'm not sure why we are so focused on what protocol HAS to win. The market is big enough for multiple protocols and they each serve their own purpose with their own strengths and weaknesses.

Wifi for small setups and zwave/ZigBee for larger/true automation. 

My hope is that UDI can integrate with Radio Ra3 as I plan on using that next whether it's with polisy or C4.

If i didn't have access to the resources that i do, I'd probably swap to Ra2 keypads and hue bulbs for everything else. 

[apostolakisl]

1 hour ago, PatPend said:

Their patent 7,345,998 which covers the dual band mesh protocol doesn't expire until September 2026.  Until then the creditors/successors in interest, whoever they are, still own the rights.  After a patent expires it falls into the public domain, however unless you get the rights to the chip & mechanical designs you'd have to engineer a compatible product from scratch.  Whether this is makes economic sense in 2026 is an open question.  

I wonder if there are creditors.  This may have been venture capital and is just lost money.  If there are creditors, this will likely all go to auction.  I am a bit at a loss as to what the strategy is.  Someone is gong to offer at least some amount of money for the Insteon technology.  And any money is more money than no money, so why would it not sell?

It would be a real shame.  The Insteon protocol is so versatile and most complete of any I have seen.  The myriad ways to set up scenes and whatnot is pretty much unmatched.  Combined with ISY, it just works.  And dual band com, in my experience, is nearly flawless.  And of late, the quality seems to be great.  It seems like they finally got it figured out, but a day late and dollar short.