Background: I had to replace a PLM recently, and I've had to rebuild several scenes, and 'scnCooking was one of them. The two switchlink dimmers in the "If" stanza of this program are also in a scene that creates a three way for the track lights. I've restored these devices, factory reset them, updated the scenes several times and updated this program several times.

For reasons I'm not understanding, this program will not work, as the "Fast Off" for either of these switchlink devices is not captured by the ISY software. I can run the "Then" stanza from the AC and the "scnCooking" is turned off correctly. A fast off does indeed turn off the track lights appropriately, but the program doesn't run.

The status of the switchlinks will not update in the AC unless a query is run, then the status is updates.

I'm a bit baffled by this. I'd appreciate any insights here.

Thanks!

CookingFastOff - [ID 0008][Parent 000A]

If

'Devices / dirKitchen / sldTrackLightNorth' is switched Fast Off

Or 'Devices / dirKitchen / sldTrackLightSouth' is switched Fast Off

Then

Set 'Scenes / scnCooking' Off

Else

- No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')

What controller and its firmware are you using

Try removing power from your plm and your controller, then power up the PLM, wait 15 seconds, then power up your controller

Let me know if that resolved your issue

Was the controller powered off when you replaced the PLM. It's important that you do that. If you didn't, then reboot it, and then do a restore device on those two switches.

12 hours ago, Techman said:

What controller and its firmware are you using

Try removing power from your plm and your controller, then power up the PLM, wait 15 seconds, then power up your controller

Let me know if that resolved your issue

eISY running ISY software 6.0.5_10. I did power cycle the eISY a couple of times, but not the PLM as well. I'll give it a try a little later today.

11 hours ago, Guy Lavoie said:

Was the controller powered off when you replaced the PLM. It's important that you do that. If you didn't, then reboot it, and then do a restore device on those two switches.

I initially did power cycle both the eISY and the PLM. The device restore doesn't resolve the problem. I'll give both devices another power cycle. My old PLM was actually over 10 years old before it failed completely. The system has been stable for years, but the new PLM has way fewer links than I expected, so I'm thinking that the old PLM has been somehow dropping links for some time before it failed (I don't know if that's even possible).

Did you remove power from the EISY before replacing the PLM. You may want to try a restore/replace PLM again (see attached).

Even if the old PLM was missing links, the EISY would have written the correct links to the new PLM

Replace PLM Procedure (EISY or POLISY).pdf

On 7/24/2026 at 8:43 AM, Bumbershoot said:

I initially did power cycle both the eISY and the PLM. The device restore doesn't resolve the problem. I'll give both devices another power cycle. My old PLM was actually over 10 years old before it failed completely. The system has been stable for years, but the new PLM has way fewer links than I expected, so I'm thinking that the old PLM has been somehow dropping links for some time before it failed (I don't know if that's even possible).

Hey @Bumbershoot ,

The fact that your device restores didn't work and your PLM record count is low is rather foreboding. This normally (not always) means that the ISY configuration itself is incorrect.

Could you perform a "Device Link Table Read/Compare" of one of your switchlincs and post it? Also, please provide your current PLM address. From this we can try to figure out the least painful path forward.

2 hours ago, IndyMike said:

Hey @Bumbershoot ,

The fact that your device restores didn't work and your PLM record count is low is rather foreboding. This normally (not always) means that the ISY configuration itself is incorrect.

Could you perform a "Device Link Table Read/Compare" of one of your switchlincs and post it? Also, please provide your current PLM address. From this we can try to figure out the least painful path forward.

No change in behavior after performing the PLM restore procedure to the letter. It looks like the switch sees the new PLM, and I can control it from the AC. I don't understand why the program doesn't work at all.

In the screenshot below, the links are the same from both the ISY and switchlink dimmer, and the dimmer appears to see the new PLM.

@Bumbershoot , your Switchlink is missing the Link that tells it to be a controller to the PLM. From my SWL table below, the E2 entry @0FC8 tells the unit that it is a controller of the device @53.BC.3A (my PLM).

Your device doesn't have this link. Without it, the SWL will not communicate to the PLM when it is activated.

Unfortunately, the ISY believes the table is correct. That means the ISY data is also corrupt. You could delete/re-add this device but you seem to have quite a number of scenes that it is involved with - that sound painful. You also mentioned that your PLM seemed to have surprisingly few Links - could you quantify that (number of links vs number of installed devices)?

Given the above, I'm leaning toward asking you to install from a previous backup (Restore ISY).

@IndyMike, if I'm understanding you correctly, I could restore an ISY backup that was working prior to the PLM dying, and after that's complete, perform a restore on the PLM? I have plenty of good backups, as I've been scrupulous about backing up whenever I've made a change. I've rebuilt a few scenes, and yes, it's painful to do that, and I've got probably 80 Insteon devices, and roughly 40 scenes. A restore sounds like a good solution, if I understand correctly. Right now, the PLM shows 0 links (after restarting both the PLM and the eISY).

Edited Saturday at 08:31 PM3 days by Bumbershoot

43 minutes ago, Bumbershoot said:

@IndyMike, if I'm understanding you correctly, I could restore an ISY backup that was working prior to the PLM dying, and after that's complete, perform a restore on the PLM? I have plenty of good backups, as I've been scrupulous about backing up whenever I've made a change. I've rebuilt a few scenes, and yes, it's painful to do that, and I've got probably 80 Insteon devices, and roughly 40 scenes. A restore sounds like a good solution, if I understand correctly. Right now, the PLM shows 0 links (after restarting both the PLM and the eISY).

You do understand correctly. It's great that you have good backups - this should be far easier than deleting/re-adding devices and re-creating scenes and programs.

I believe the ISY will restore the backup and the write PLM in one fell swoop. It may also ask if you want to restore devices (you do). Keep an eye on the messages from the ISY. The process should be:

1. Restore ISY (backup file)

2. Restore PLM (ISY should recognize that you have a new PLM)

3. Restore Devices

Very odd for the PLM to have 0 links. Had you checked it before? I ask because we had another forum member experience PLM resets due to serial communication errors.

Edited Saturday at 09:15 PM3 days by IndyMike

30 minutes ago, IndyMike said:

You do understand correctly. It's great that you have good backups - this should be far easier than deleting/re-adding devices and re-creating scenes and programs.

I believe the ISY will restore the backup and the write PLM in one fell swoop. It may also ask if you want to restore devices (you do). Keep an eye on the messages from the ISY. The process should be:

1. Restore ISY (backup file)

2. Restore PLM (ISY should recognize that you have a new PLM)

3. Restore Devices

Very odd for the PLM to have 0 links. Had you checked it before? I ask because we had another forum member experience PLM resets due to serial communication errors.

My mistake. I forgot to hit the "Count" button... I currently have 98 links, and I used to have many hundreds. I'll restore the ISY and PLM and see how it goes.

16 hours ago, Bumbershoot said:

My mistake. I forgot to hit the "Count" button... I currently have 98 links, and I used to have many hundreds. I'll restore the ISY and PLM and see how it goes.

The absolute minimum number of links in your PLM should be 2X the number of devices you have. Every device should have 1 responder link (A2) and 1 controller link (E2) in the PLM.

KPL's will increase this # drastically - a 6 button KPL requires a minimum of 6 responder links and 1 controller link if you have no scenes.

Scenes also add to the PLM link count.

If you have fewer than the Minimum link count you have missing links or the PLM read was interrupted by communications (happens frequently).

8 hours ago, IndyMike said:

The absolute minimum number of links in your PLM should be 2X the number of devices you have. Every device should have 1 responder link (A2) and 1 controller link (E2) in the PLM.

KPL's will increase this # drastically - a 6 button KPL requires a minimum of 6 responder links and 1 controller link if you have no scenes.

Scenes also add to the PLM link count.

If you have fewer than the Minimum link count you have missing links or the PLM read was interrupted by communications (happens frequently).

That's good information. I just did a PLM count with a quiet house and the count was 160, which is better, but still seems pretty short, given the scenes and devices (two six button KPL's and one eight button). The eight button controls an "All ON" and "All OFF" scene, which has 37 devices included, so it's still low.

1 hour ago, Bumbershoot said:

That's good information. I just did a PLM count with a quiet house and the count was 160, which is better, but still seems pretty short, given the scenes and devices (two six button KPL's and one eight button). The eight button controls an "All ON" and "All OFF" scene, which has 37 devices included, so it's still low.

That does sound low. For reference, I have 62 devices and 408 PLM links.

There is the unfortunate possibility that the file corruption occurred some time back. You may need to regress though multiple backups.

23 hours ago, IndyMike said:

That does sound low. For reference, I have 62 devices and 408 PLM links.

There is the unfortunate possibility that the file corruption occurred some time back. You may need to regress though multiple backups.

@IndyMike, I installed a backup from last winter and got a count of 560 links this time. That looks loads better. The system has been pretty stable for years, as we're comfortable with the way it operates. I doubt we'll see any functional difference, just ISY and related software being slightly out of date, and that's easy to update. Thanks for your help with this!

EDIT: By the way, the program that originated this thread now works as intended!

Edited yesterday at 12:16 AM1 day by Bumbershoot

14 hours ago, Bumbershoot said:

@IndyMike, I installed a backup from last winter and got a count of 560 links this time. That looks loads better. The system has been pretty stable for years, as we're comfortable with the way it operates. I doubt we'll see any functional difference, just ISY and related software being slightly out of date, and that's easy to update. Thanks for your help with this!

EDIT: By the way, the program that originated this thread now works as intended!

Perfect. There is just no substitute for good backups. Kudos

Try to keep an eye on your PLM link count. Report back if you see a sudden dive. As I said earlier, there have been issues with the PLM being reset due to communication errors.

Edited yesterday at 02:27 PM1 day by IndyMike

3 hours ago, IndyMike said:

Perfect. There is just no substitute for good backups. Kudos

Try to keep an eye on your PLM link count. Report back if you see a sudden dive. As I said earlier, there have been issues with the PLM being reset due to communication errors.

I had no idea that the PLM would fail in a way that make it lose links. I figured it would fail suddenly and completely due to power supply issues(which it eventually did). I didn't notice it, because most of the complex interactions with the system were by simple programs or through scenes activated by a KPL button press. Most everything seemed to work normally, right up the the PLM failure (and the KPL button presses even after). Anyway, I'll keep up the habit of backing up every time I make a change... Thanks again.

1 hour ago, Bumbershoot said:

I had no idea that the PLM would fail in a way that make it lose links. I figured it would fail suddenly and completely due to power supply issues(which it eventually did). I didn't notice it, because most of the complex interactions with the system were by simple programs or through scenes activated by a KPL button press. Most everything seemed to work normally, right up the the PLM failure (and the KPL button presses even after). Anyway, I'll keep up the habit of backing up every time I make a change... Thanks again.

@Bumbershoot , my apologies. I was mixing problems. I did not mean to infer that you PLM was having issues. I do not believe that is the case.

I do believe that your ISY had a filesystem issue at some point. That issue was present during your backup and your PLM replacement. This was your root cause of the issue. After this point, system, PLM, and device restores were corrupted.

Separately, there was 1 previous instance reported on the forum where a PLM was reset due to a communication error. My request regarding PLM counts was one of curiosity since you saw some extremely low PLM record counts. I'm sorry for mentioning this confusing issue.

One of the symptoms of a failing PLM was the Link Database having no or very small entries. It does not sound like yours had the issues.

47 minutes ago, Brian H said:

One of the symptoms of a failing PLM was the Link Database having no or very small entries. It does not sound like yours had the issues.

Well, whatever the cause, a good habit of making backups saved the day here. I've got a new PLM on the way, speaking of backups...