Smarthome forum appears to be offline

[mwester]

24 minutes ago, khag7 said:

Trying to convince a hub user to switch to an ISY 994i
The problem is: no PLM availability.

The Insteon Hub has the PLM functionality inbuilt.

But the Hub is now a brick.

How hard would it be to use the components in the Insteon Hub to make a PLM? If someone could figure out how to turn the Hub into a PLM at least then people could buy a 994i and connect it to their "hub/plm" and continue on

Rumor has it that this has been done.  I've a family member with a hub, and if I can find the details on how to do this, I may attempt it.  It'll take some time, though.

[khag7]

2 minutes ago, Teken said:

As noted there is / was a company that performed a retrofit to allow the HUB to act as a PLM to integrate with the ISY Series Controller or any controller. This is just one example of the information as to what one person found and what they did to make it work as a PLM.

https://www.reddit.com/r/HomeKit/comments/912rjm/insteon_hubpro_teardown/

THANK you! I had done some searching; I knew I wasn't likely to be the only person that had thought of this idea. 

It just seems like an obvious solution at this point. Take hundreds or thousands of bricked hubs, make them work as PLM's. If it doesnt cost too much to make it happen, it would drive sales of ISY's. UDI might be able to profit off it and make customers happy.

[RPerrault]

4 minutes ago, Teken said:

I'm not sure if there is a question here but let me add my $0.00000000000001. Assuming the Nokia branded hardware ever came out it uses the same technology as Insteon. One of our forum members has proven the Nokia branded hardware can be included to the ISY Series Controller but it shows up as a unsupported device.

Regardless, the only options as it relates to hardware is to repair existing ones - if you can. Buy used or NOS if and when they appear on the used market.

Lastly, it behooves every single person to install a SPD at the service entrance / service panel to offer some form of protection on their Insteon investment.

Dirty power is the primary killer of all electronics but especially true for Insteon. As almost every component used in their hardware is sub par junk!  

i posted

trying to think through if a nokia dimmer could be provisioned manually as an insteon dimmer 

with that provisioning, the device would be seen by the isy as an insteon dimmer -  what happens if a 'dim the light bar led indicator to 60%? - probably nothing - what happens if the isy sends a dim command to the dimmer?  it would probably dim - and probably could be included in scenes as a dimmer

i am looking for the flaw in my theory 

 

[RPerrault]

wonder if all that developer stuff sharthome had is available online somewhere...

 

[Teken]

7 minutes ago, khag7 said:

THANK you! I had done some searching; I knew I wasn't likely to be the only person that had thought of this idea. 

It just seems like an obvious solution at this point. Take hundreds or thousands of bricked hubs, make them work as PLM's. If it doesnt cost too much to make it happen, it would drive sales of ISY's. UDI might be able to profit off it and make customers happy.

Just to be clear to everyone who reads my reply. Almost all of the hacks involve the older generation of Insteon HUB's. I have not seen any hacks that relate to the last generation of Insteon HUB's.

Why is this a problem?!?

Because somewhere down the line that HUB had changes that precluded the previous hacks and integration. As I recall one of the major stumbling blocks was the fact the internal web site was locked and thus would not allow it to accept new enrollment / modifications of the device tables.

So please keep this in mind as there were other changes I don't recall and hence why nobody has tried to hack the same.

[Teken]

10 minutes ago, RPerrault said:

i posted

trying to think through if a nokia dimmer could be provisioned manually as an insteon dimmer 

with that provisioning, the device would be seen by the isy as an insteon dimmer -  what happens if a 'dim the light bar led indicator to 60%? - probably nothing - what happens if the isy sends a dim command to the dimmer?  it would probably dim - and probably could be included in scenes as a dimmer

i am looking for the flaw in my theory 

 

As I recall from one of our members the Nokia device can be added to the ISY Series Controller. It shows up as a unsupported device in the Admin Console. I don't recall if he said the Nokia device could be directly (manually) linked to a Insteon device.

I call this out because there have been incidences where the company (Smartlabs) changed something to disallow niche hardware from linking directly to other Insteon hardware.

One specific example is the Floodstop sensing grid . . .

[MrBill]

30 minutes ago, RPerrault said:

wonder if all that developer stuff sharthome had is available online somewhere...

 

I spent about an hour today downloading everything that google found with this search "site:cache.insteon.com"

these were the most interesting group of files:

[RPerrault]

thanks mr b - i never dug into the protocol - wondered if it was more akin to udp or if it provided acks - had integrity checks  - etc 

[Brian H]

3 hours ago, RPerrault said:

they do now (sorry - still aggravates me that the first generation devices were not dual band)

my point is - how does the hub send its signal on the powerline - the interface to the powerline - if it uses an external power supply

signal from hub ---> through transformer (?) to powerline?

 

The HUB has a power line and RF transmitter and receiver in it. Uses the AC cord to connect to the 120V power source.  Along with a Network Interface. Not a serial or USB port.

As for the 2413UH. As far as I can see it is a standard USB PLM. With a different subcategory number. So  the paid version of Houselinc. Knew you bought it for the program and did not use a standardized one and not paid the price for it. It also worked with the free version of Houselinc and is in the configuration file. Listed as a Powerlinc USB Modem.

[Brian H]

4 hours ago, apostolakisl said:

All the power to him if he can hack the access point, er I mean hub, and make it work as a hub again.

The Access Points where built on the 2412 base board with a separate RF daughter board for any V1 versions. The V2 where on a 2413 main board and used the built in power line and RF feature built in to it.

You most likely would have to change the firmware for PLM use and add a serial port daughter board.

[Brian H]

1 hour ago, Teken said:

Just to be clear to everyone who reads my reply. Almost all of the hacks involve the older generation of Insteon HUB's. I have not seen any hacks that relate to the last generation of Insteon HUB's.

Why is this a problem?!?

Because somewhere down the line that HUB had changes that precluded the previous hacks and integration. As I recall one of the major stumbling blocks was the fact the internal web site was locked and thus would not allow it to accept new enrollment / modifications of the device tables.

So please keep this in mind as there were other changes I don't recall and hence why nobody has tried to hack the same.

I also remember it was the older 2242-222 HUB with a separate network board.  From the photos. It looked like a serial board form a PLM was used to replace the normally used network board.

The 2245-222 HUB everything is on one board. I found a photo maybe from here. Looks like a 2245-222 with a external board then connected to an ISY994i.

[Brian H]

38 minutes ago, MrBill said:

I spent about an hour today downloading everything that google found with this search "site:cache.insteon.com"

these were the most interesting group of files:

There is also a section in gethub. With users manuals and developers manuals. Some are repeats or different revisions.

https://github.com/pyinsteon/pyinsteon/commit/2533494a8b13b30b2d0938c9a18afe782b740410

[RPerrault]

wonder if a device gets a rf command - if it repeats it on the powerline too

 

[MrBill]

23 minutes ago, Brian H said:

There is also a section in gethub. With users manuals and developers manuals. Some are repeats or different revisions.

https://github.com/pyinsteon/pyinsteon/commit/2533494a8b13b30b2d0938c9a18afe782b740410

Right... I wasn't worried about that set of documents disappearing... I grabbed 324 pdf's but there are a bunch of dups... I didn't have time to go thru the list yet.

[mmb]

2 minutes ago, MrBill said:

Right... I wasn't worried about that set of documents disappearing... I grabbed 324 pdf's but there are a bunch of dups... I didn't have time to go thru the list yet.

Smart to do this I think

[RPerrault]

1 hour ago, RPerrault said:

wonder if a device gets a rf command - if it repeats it on the powerline too

 

obviously i do not stay abreast of insteon - portable usb adapter - sounds like the commands are repeated in rf and powerline

"The single-band interface sends and receives radio frequency (RF) Insteon signals. If you are trying to control power line only devices you must have at least one Access Point or dual-band Insteon product for communication. For best Insteon network performance, be sure you have properly installed at least two dual-band Insteon products."

 

[tmorse305]

3 hours ago, MrBill said:

I spent about an hour today downloading everything that google found with this search "site:cache.insteon.com"

these were the most interesting group of files:

Thanks for sharing your hard work.  First document I opened I found schematics and parts list for the PLMs!  Vintage 2007 but still more than I had ever seen.

http://cache.insteon.com/pdf/INSTEON_Developers_Guide_20070816a.pdf

 

[ADY]

Just to clarify. Smartlabs is not bankrupt or out of business. They are now partnered with Nokia, but they seem to have left ALL of their legacy Insteon customers high and dry without support as they launch the Nokia line. At the very least this is unethical, possibly illegal given that many customers use these devices for safety purposes. This would be the equivalent of Nest not allowing their smoke detectors to connect to the internet.

https://nokia.smartlabsinc.com/pages/about-us

[jwagner010]

Quote

Just to clarify. Smartlabs is not bankrupt or out of business. They are now partnered with Nokia, but they seem to have left ALL of their legacy Insteon customers high and dry without support as they launch the Nokia line. At the very least this is unethical, possibly illegal given that many customers use these devices for safety purposes. This would be the equivalent of Nest not allowing their smoke detectors to connect to the internet.

https://nokia.smartlabsinc.com/pages/about-us

Smartlabs licensed the Nokia name for a new product line but you will see these products are also not available and will also not see the light of day.  Perhaps folks should contact Rob Lilleness on his LinkedIn page (interesting he has deleted all references to Insteon) seeking more information, perhaps he can comment.  

[larryllix]

7 hours ago, ADY said:

Just to clarify. Smartlabs is not bankrupt or out of business. They are now partnered with Nokia, but they seem to have left ALL of their legacy Insteon customers high and dry without support as they launch the Nokia line. At the very least this is unethical, possibly illegal given that many customers use these devices for safety purposes. This would be the equivalent of Nest not allowing their smoke detectors to connect to the internet.

https://nokia.smartlabsinc.com/pages/about-us

Gotta' love all the info on the web with no source name, or even dated.

This may have been true at one time, or just a pipe-dream at any time but things have changed, apparently.

[MrBill]

4 hours ago, jwagner010 said:

 Perhaps folks should contact Rob Lilleness on his LinkedIn page (interesting he has deleted all references to Insteon) seeking more information, perhaps he can comment.  

https://www.linkedin.com/in/roblilleness/

I had to go see this with my own eyes.  He has in fact deleted Smartlabs from his experience section.   Wish I had a screen shot of the original.

 

[MrBill]

11 hours ago, tmorse305 said:

Thanks for sharing your hard work.  First document I opened I found schematics and parts list for the PLMs!  Vintage 2007 but still more than I had ever seen.

http://cache.insteon.com/pdf/INSTEON_Developers_Guide_20070816a.pdf

 

If it disappears I may stick the whole lot of what I downloaded on my webserver until I get a DCMA take down notice... but I doubt anyone cares.

[jwagner010]

Quote

https://www.linkedin.com/in/roblilleness/

I had to go see this with my own eyes.  He has in fact deleted Smartlabs from his experience section.   Wish I had a screen shot of the original.

Cannot blame him, not exactly the best publicity for his personal PE firm Richmond Capital Partners !!!!   I guess he wants to erase the whole disgrace from his past and corporate history?  Makes you wonder how many other disasters he has caused and basically erased from his background !!  Perhaps some comments on some of his recent LinkedIn posts asking for comment on Insteon will get his attention !!!  So sad someone can get away with this in 2022 and just walk away from a large community, leave them hanging and offer zero comment. Perhaps rather than go to Harvard he should have studied ethics 101.  Oh well.  We move on.

[MrBill]

1 hour ago, jwagner010 said:

not exactly the best publicity for his personal PE firm Richmond Capital Partners !!!! 

Richmond Capital Partners is a much larger worldwide organization.  the 7.3 million they paid in 2017 is a drop in the bucket, but I am surprised they appear ready to just lose it all, rather than try to sell a functioning company.  It's worth much less dead in the water. 

Someone did point out on reddit yesterday that the domain name smarthome.com (just as a name, not the business it under it) is extremely valuable just as the name alone... it should sell for record .com values.

[captrickr]

1) Does anyone know if the new UD Polisy can use the PLM from Simplehomenet? Its labeled Model 5010N and has a USB cable connected to it.

2) Also noticed there is a guy on Ebay that will repair your PLM if you have a broken one.

3) Might be worth it for some "Smart Guy" to figure out how to redirect our Inseon Hubs and write an interface to get thousands of us back up and running. UD?

Just my random thoughts....