Help with Insteon tweaking/troubleshooting

[windrockwater]

So I have had a full house of Insteon devices for almost 6 years. I have gone thru the pain of replacing almost 40 early insteon dimmers/relays because of the paddle issue. I have also had 5 or so dimmers/relays die for various reason (LED no longer work, device wont respond to linking, etc.) and Insteon will not replace them because they are older than 2 years but not the paddle issues. Ugh.

 

I have never gotten my entire house insteon system to work reliably other than having all my insteon devices work as simple switches! Very frustrating. But i have a new energy to try again to get a full robust system so I ordered two brand new Access Points to see if that helps. So these are the devices I have:

 

• two old Access Points (v1.2)
  two brand new Access Points (new)
  two Signalic RF (v1.0)
  ISY99ir with the latest beta (3.1.13)
  PLM
  Remotelinc 2 Keypad
  Lamplinc
  OutletLinc
  15 Dimmers (v35 thru v40)
  10 Relays (v35)
  Keypadlinc Dimmer (v2c-v2d)

 

I have two dedicated electrical outlets in my basement that i had the electrician put on each of the house electrical phase in order to use for the access points. At least I believe they are on each phase (both breakers on are the same side of the breaker panel. Is that okay?). My new Access Points did not connect and confirm according to the insteon manual but everything still seems to work?

 

I just replaced the last few erratic insteon dimmer and relay devices with new ones and the ISY now seems to update and query (most of them at least, i still have one or two that ISY seems to lose).

 

So here is my question: how should i rebuild or troubleshoot the overall system? Basically where should i plugin my old Access Points, my new access points, and the two signallincs? Right now I have each of the NEW access points plugged into dedicated electronics outlets (i hope each is on one phase). Then i plugged my old Access Points across the house along with placing the signallincs in open areas. One of teh old access points in plugged directly into the PLM in an upstairs room. I would think with all these devices my system would be bombproof but its not. For example, ALL ON and ALL OFF commands work for about 90-95% of my devices but then some just simply don't respond on the first try or at all.

 

Is it worth me doing some kind of a total restore on the PLM and the ISY? Or will that just take 20 hours of my life to have the same handful of devices that just simply dont respond reliably? I would like first to give a try to some simpler troubleshooting and testing before i start all the programming over again. I dont actually have that many devices or scenes right now since I gave up programming it years ago due to unreliablitly. But i would like to give another stab at taking the system to the next level since I just bought a motionlinc, triggerlinc and a remotelinc for the car.

 

PLease help! How should I troubleshoot and tweak my system with the devices I have? Is there some middle ground to rebuilding the system? (restore the access points or something like that)?

 

Sean

[oberkc]

I have two dedicated electrical outlets in my basement that i had the electrician put on each of the house electrical phase in order to use for the access points. At least I believe they are on each phase (both breakers on are the same side of the breaker panel. Is that okay?).

 

Same side of the panel is OK. Same side, adjacent numbers (2-4, or 1-3, for example) is almost certainly on opposite legs.

 

So here is my question: how should i rebuild or troubleshoot the overall system? Basically where should i plugin my old Access Points, my new access points, and the two signallincs?

 

What signalincs do you have? I see hardwired and plug-in. The options for either type are pretty limited.

 

For now, I would simply start with the two access points find two locations that are on opposite legs of your electrical system. Follow the directions to be sure they are on opposite legs. Once done, add the other two at a location to best ensure RF coverage throughout your house.

 

Right now I have each of the NEW access points plugged into dedicated electronics outlets (i hope each is on one phase).

Do more than hope! Follow the instructions to ENSURE they are on opposite legs (phases).

 

One of teh old access points in plugged directly into the PLM in an upstairs room.

 

Good idea. If you have not done so, make sure your PLM is not on the same outlet or circuit as a bunch of computer stuff, unless you filter the computer stuff.

 

Is it worth me doing some kind of a total restore on the PLM and the ISY? Or will that just take 20 hours of my life to have the same handful of devices that just simply dont respond reliably? I would like first to give a try to some simpler troubleshooting and testing before i start all the programming over again.

 

That is probably what I would do. I would remove all devices from your ISY-99 and factory reset each. Add them back. Use the "add device" button (don't manually input addresses). I don't think it will take 20 hours. Pay attention as you do so. One can get a sense of whether communication is slow or fast by how quickly devices are added.

 

Eliminate your programs. Create a scene with all devices included. Perform a scene test. Make sure it passes. If not, find out why.

 

Once there, have fun! Program away.

[windrockwater]

Thanks alot for the advice. Makes good sense. I will keep at it.