I have been heavily reliant on my ISY/Insteon lighting system for many years and have had almost no issues once I got the system set up.  Because of the recent Insteon/ ISY994i issues I have purchased backup hardware on eBay and from the newly reconstituted Insteon company; I just need the system to outlast me:)  I would like to test the new H/W by the connecting the newly acquired ISY, PLM and Insteon devices together in a test bed system, isolated from the operational system.  I made a couple of off-hand attempts at testing the new devices and scared myself out of experimenting using the operational system.

I suppose a Guest network could be used to isolate the operational and test devices network wise but I'm at a loss as to how to isolate the PLM from the Insteon dual band signals.  Maybe a filter on the power-line but I have no idea about the Insteon wireless signals.

Maybe I'll have to go out to the barn and build a Fariday cage?  Or maybe I'm just overthinking this?

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

If you bought a new ISY994 and a new PLM, then you can temporarily disconnect your existing PLM which will basically disable your current ISY

Then connect the new ISY and PLM and install a new (spare) Insteon device for testing. Be sure to first factory reset the new PLM.

 

 

 

@LarryWSmith

Multiple ISY's and PLMs can co-exist!   There is literally nothing to do.  I have 3 setups running in my house at the moment, 2 have PLMs.   I have a production and 2 test systems running.  If I add a module to the test system it only appears in the test system etc. no interference with the system that runs my house.

When opening the admin console you just pick which ISY you want to work with...

...and variables can be cloned and synced together between ISYs/ polisys, and eISYs, easily with NRs triggered by variable value changes.

If both devices can hear WiFi or Ethernet signals it's easy and it can be bidirectional also.

@MrBill

By having multiple PLMs on the power line at the same time aren't you at risk of having data collisions in the event that more than one PLM is sending data over the powerline at the same time?

6 minutes ago, Techman said:

@MrBill

By having multiple PLMs on the power line at the same time aren't you at risk of having data collisions in the event that more than one PLM is sending data over the powerline at the same time?

It can happen but the effects can be minimized. Like Mrbill, I run multiple systems at home. In fact, I ran half ofy house on 1 polisy and the other on my test unit until I combined the system and use the other for testing purposes without issue. 

It just depends on the user and how well he knows the system to keep collisions from happening. Insteon also has built in safe guards which helps as well 

@Techman While possible it doesn't seem to be a problem.  Also Insteon doesn't know what traffic it's repeating... that is whether it belongs to system A or system B etc.  So all Insteon traffic is repeated, and the same collision detection and avoidance works regardless of which system is talking.

So OK, I was actually overthinking this by a lot Thanks to all who replied; I'm anxious to fire up and test my backup ISY and PLM.