aaronw Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 I'm looking for an alternative. I added some more Insteon devices and can no longer access the admin console because UD could never advance beyond their broken Java UI. Link to comment
auger66 Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 Well, since you said "Goodbye Universal Devices" a few minutes before this post and you want to control your Insteon devices, I would say the Insteon Hub is your only choice. It's certainly not "plug and play" as you will have to start over from scratch with your devices, scenes, and programs. I recommend a factory reset on every device you have and start rebuilding from there with the Hub. There are other issues you will run into, but since you seem done with UD, the Insteon Hub is the only choice that I know of. Good luck. Link to comment
larryllix Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 What is stopping you from accessing your admin console? Link to comment
CandC Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 (edited) I ran the 994 for several years without a problem: A very stable device, virtually plug and play, programming intuitive. But I got rid of all my insteon devices and migrated to Home Assistant installed on a cheap mini-itx industrial motherboard (no fan, eSata ssd, low power, $75 total, used ebay) Home assistant works with insteon but there is a steep learning curve. I am using zwave, zigbee, and tasmota devices: no problems but a steep learning curve! @aaronw better off sticking with your 994... Edited January 2 by CandC Link to comment
slimypizza Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 I think Insteon runs very easily with Home Assistant (Pi4). But I guess YAML and the cards do present a learning hurdle. HA is a great front end with the heavy lifting handled by EISY. Link to comment
xlurkr Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 Not an expert, but from what I can see HA expects you to use something (like the Insteon Hub) to manage links. There's nothing better at link management than ISY. Definitely worth the pain of Java, in my opinion. -Tom Link to comment
CandC Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 (edited) No, HA does not require the Insteon Hub but it does require the Insteon PLM and the usb/serial adapter cable. Beyond that, only additional software addons and integrations. In a sense, Insteon runs on HA as virtually native integration, the insteon devices are integrated as all other devices like zigbee, zwave and Tasmota. Hardest part is to integrate the PLM with the right driver and connected to the appropriate port... I think it is similar to EISY, except not an automated migration... Edited January 4 by CandC Link to comment
CandC Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 @slimypizza: Much of programing in the newest HA versions can be done in the visual editor instead of code editor (YAML script) Link to comment
xlurkr Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 8 hours ago, CandC said: Beyond that, only additional software addons and integrations Do any of these allow you to easily set up scenes like the ISY can? That's what I can't figure out. If I want to make a double-click off on a switch turn off all the lights in a room, or in the house, can I easily set that up? I'm sure it can be done by programming, but in HA can I easily create a scene so all the lights change at once, and it works even if HA isn't responding? This is the part I don't understand. -Tom Link to comment
CandC Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 I am not sure I understand: Certainly scenes can be created with one device action being the trigger for an entire scene which runs while HA is active. For a scene to work when HA is off line or shut off, the individual device setups still allow direct interaction with other same devices: those features are independent of the controller and are native to the particular devices. But I only responded to the issue of using Insteon on controllers other than isy994. The easiest way to go is EISY, the cheapest is to build your own HA system. In order to add Insteon to HA, just add the Insteon HA integration, choose the PLM instead of the Insteon hub and set the plm device path as /dev/ttyUSB0 Link to comment
CandC Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 @xlurkr I have a Aeon Labs Keyfob scene controller: I could never make it work in isy994 but for HA someone posted a Blueprint and simply installing this Blueprint enabled the Keyfob scene controller in HA. There might be a HA Blueprint available for what you want to do in HA... Link to comment
xlurkr Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 Thanks, but I'm not looking to do anything I can't do already; I'm just trying to contribute. Since you've used Insteon on an ISY, I think you know what I'm talking about. I have a switch at the top of my stairs that I can double-click off and it turns off all the lights downstairs. I set it up on the ISY, which was really easy to do, and since it created all the controller and responder links in the devices, it still works if the ISY is unreachable for whatever reason. I have a lot of Insteon devices in my home that do these sorts of things, and I've reused the scenes with multiple controller devices after creating them. Again, the ISY made setting this up easy. I'm not sure how one would set it all up with HA and Insteon with just the PLM. Maybe it's easy; I just don't know. I'm also not too surprised you found it easier to get your Z-Wave fob working in HA. I haven't found the ISY to be the best solution for Z-Wave, but for Insteon, I think it's unbeatable. -Tom Link to comment
xlurkr Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 Put another way, UDI has done a great job of abstracting the links database design of Insteon, which I think is the protocol's greatest strength. Drag 'n drop, set controller/responder, level, etc., and it's all very graphical. Insteon's protocol is what allows scenes to function in the absence of any separate controller, and completely avoids the popcorn effect. Programming on the ISY is good, but probably not better than other solutions. Support of other protocols like Z-Wave is OK, but they don't fit into the link-centric paradigm of the ISY, and UDI is too small to add them all natively, so you end up relying on nodeservers if you have a lot of different protocols. As I'm diversifying, I'm looking to HA to tie multiple protocols together, but I think I'll always use ISY to manage Insteon, no matter what the "uber" controller is. To me it's worth the extra expense over the PLM alone. I'm doing a similar thing with Hubitat and Lutron. Nobody manages Lutron better. -Tom Link to comment
CandC Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 I found the Insteon mesh network more reliable than the zwave or zigbee mesh networks (more interference). Most reliable devices are the Tasmota devices, they are wifi devices. One of the main reason for quitting ISY is that there is no native support for Tasmota and MQTT. And I kind of liked the challenge of setting up HA, there is more control over the programing... google home integration can be setup without a third party service, plus https security (free Cloudflare) and two factor authentication.... I think the future will be with Zigbee and Thread and perhaps Matter. It seems to me that EISY is covering the same issues but ISY is showing its age and limitations... Link to comment
CandC Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 @xlurkr I never used the Insteon link protocol like you do. I simple have a different style using home automation. Devices are either automatic or I use google home voice commands and google home voice routines, like :"Good Night" and several devices all at once respond... thanks for sharing, I still have my old Insteon devices and now I am not too eager to get rid of them... Link to comment
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