I'm looking for some guidance on how to fix my Insteon network.

Background. We had a power outage a couple of weeks ago which seemed to precipitated my issues. My EISY system is on a UPS but not the Insteon modem (for obvious reason). The UPS gave up after about 2hrs so both EISY and the modem were down. When the power came back on the EISY system couldn't talk to the Insteon network. I initially tried unplugging the modem, plugging it back in, and then rebooting EISY, all to no avail. I then tried completely powering off (removing power) EISY and that seemed to resolve the problem. Fast forward a week and now I have multiple Insteon devices showing up with an ! in front of the name and EISY is unable to talk to the devices. However, if I turn on a switch manually this change shows up in EISY for this device. Clearly EISY is getting messages from the ! devices but isn't able to communicate with them. Only about 15 devices out of 41 Insteon devices in the network have this problem. I have tried deleting some of the devices and readding them to the network which seems to allow EISY to control the devices but there is still an ! in front of these re-added devices. Another interesting clue is when I do anything with the network (for example checking the PLM status under Tools) it comes up with the PLM version and then starts updating the network (ie. shows the dialog box to not touch or change anything while the network is updated). This update goes on for 15 minutes or more before it finishes and I see Writes going on to Insteon devices that are not necessarily the ones that have the ! in front of their names.

My modem is an older serial modem (Ver v9E) that has worked reliably for years going back to my older ISY system. I suspect the modem flash is corrupted but am not sure how to proceed. I have a spare serial modem that I could try but I don't want to make things worse than they already are. I also have a spare USB modem but it is currently at a 2nd home so not something I can substitute in the near term.

BTW: The rest of the EISY system is working perfectly after the power outage. This includes multiple Z-Wave devices, multiple Plugins such as a Yolink network, an ELK system, Ambient weather system, etc. UD Mobile also works fine.

Can anyone tell me the conditions under which EISY show an ! in front of an Insteon node name? Is there a logical next step I should try in the debug process?

Thanks

Mike

Edited Wednesday at 04:30 PM2 days by MMAltair
grammar corrections

Well have you tried doing a "restore device" on these problematic devices? Give that a shot first.

@MMAltair , If your ISY is seeing manual device activations the PLM link table is intact (for that device at least). I believe that the V.9E firmware is the latest version (has not changed in some time).

This is sounding like a communication issue at the devices or the PLM:

1. Are the devices on the same circuit - could mean a problem with that circuit.

2. Any chance that a phase coupler died during the power outage - doesn't apply if you have newer dual band devices.

3. Most likely is a problem near the PLM (or the PLM output stage). You might try unplugging devices on the same circuit as the PLM.

If you could open your event viewer on Level 3 and perform a query of "My Lighting", then upload the results, we can get an idea how well your devices are communicating.

1 hour ago, IndyMike said:

@MMAltair , If your ISY is seeing manual device activations the PLM link table is intact (for that device at least). I believe that the V.9E firmware is the latest version (has not changed in some time).

This is sounding like a communication issue at the devices or the PLM:

1. Are the devices on the same circuit - could mean a problem with that circuit.

2. Any chance that a phase coupler died during the power outage - doesn't apply if you have newer dual band devices.

3. Most likely is a problem near the PLM (or the PLM output stage). You might try unplugging devices on the same circuit as the PLM.

If you could open your event viewer on Level 3 and perform a query of "My Lighting", then upload the results, we can get an idea how well your devices are communicating.

Thanks for the feedback. The devices are all dual band devices so I have assumed they are not having communication issues. As I stated in my description, changes made at the device show up in the EISY Admin console so communication seems to work in one direction but not the other. In addition once I delete a device and re-add it to EISY I can then send commands to the device but it still shows up with an ! mark indicating something is wrong. I may try doing a restore on a device that I haven't tried deleting and see if this helps.

Mike

3 hours ago, Guy Lavoie said:

Well have you tried doing a "restore device" on these problematic devices? Give that a shot first.

Will give it a try and report back.

Mike

5 hours ago, Guy Lavoie said:

Well have you tried doing a "restore device" on these problematic devices? Give that a shot first.

I tried "restoring" a device that wasn't working with no success. I also tried to restore the modem with no change in behavior.

Another thing I discovered is that many more of my devices aren't working although I don't know how many without testing them all. It turn's out the ! mark is only displayed if EISY tries to communicate with a device. I was aware of a number of devices not working (EISY not controlling them) since they are controlled programmatically and I notice when things aren't working. The only thing that has worked so far is to delete a device and re-add it to the network. It takes about 10 min to delete a device and 15-20 min to re-add it. It's going to take weeks to fix this. I may try to restore a new modem and go from there.

I wouldn't rule out a failing PLM.

22 hours ago, MMAltair said:

Thanks for the feedback. The devices are all dual band devices so I have assumed they are not having communication issues. As I stated in my description, changes made at the device show up in the EISY Admin console so communication seems to work in one direction but not the other. In addition once I delete a device and re-add it to EISY I can then send commands to the device but it still shows up with an ! mark indicating something is wrong. I may try doing a restore on a device that I haven't tried deleting and see if this helps.

• dual band devices are far better than powerline only, but that can still be affected by signal absorbers/noise. I have a filterlinc on my fancy linear compressor refrigerator because it takes 2 dual band devices offline without it (V.45)

• Devices can absolutely work in one direction and not the other (send vs receive). The fact that you have several devices affected normally indicates that the issue is near the PLM.

• The (!) indicates that a device did not respond to the ISY (On/off command, query, or programming command). A scene on/off will NOT cause a "failed to respond" (!) since it does not request status.

The fact that it takes 10 minutes to delete a device indicates that ISY/PLM are re-trying communications many times during the process.

I previously asked you to post an event viewer output from a query of "My Lighting" (event viewer on level 3). This will show which devices are having issues and the general status of your communications.

The following is a small snippet of a "My lighting" query from my system:

• Hops left = 3: excellent

• Hops left = 0: poor

• Multiple communications without a response: timeout (!)

My Lighting Query:

Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:53 AM : [INST-TX-I1  ] 02 62 0C C2 32 0F 19 00
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:53 AM : [INST-ACK    ] 02 62 0C.C2.32 0F 19 00 06          LTSREQ (LIGHT)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:53 AM : [INST-SRX    ] 02 50 0C.C2.32 53.BC.3A 2F 04 00           (00)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:53 AM : [Std-Direct Ack] 0C.C2.32-->ISY/PLM Group=0, Max Hops=3, Hops Left=3
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:54 AM : [INST-TX-I1  ] 02 62 18 93 83 0F 19 00
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:54 AM : [INST-ACK    ] 02 62 18.93.83 0F 19 00 06          LTSREQ (LIGHT)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:54 AM : [INST-SRX    ] 02 50 18.93.83 53.BC.3A 2F 11 00    LTONRR (00)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:54 AM : [Std-Direct Ack] 18.93.83-->ISY/PLM Group=0, Max Hops=3, Hops Left=3
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:54 AM : [INST-TX-I1  ] 02 62 58 B0 74 0F 19 00
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:55 AM : [INST-ACK    ] 02 62 58.B0.74 0F 19 00 06          LTSREQ (LIGHT)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:55 AM : [INST-SRX    ] 02 50 58.B0.74 53.BC.3A 2F 37 00           (00)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:55 AM : [Std-Direct Ack] 58.B0.74-->ISY/PLM Group=0, Max Hops=3, Hops Left=3
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:55 AM : [INST-TX-I1  ] 02 62 16 CD 80 0F 19 00
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:56 AM : [INST-ACK    ] 02 62 16.CD.80 0F 19 00 06          LTSREQ (LIGHT)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:56 AM : [INST-SRX    ] 02 50 16.CD.80 53.BC.3A 2B 37 00           (00)
Thu 07/30/2026 09:49:56 AM : [Std-Direct Ack] 16.CD.80-->ISY/PLM Group=0, Max Hops=3, Hops Left=2