Do I want Vera's native Insteon support or Altseon?

Other Devices & Integrations More Home Control
1

Plain and simple. I have only two Insteon devices that I plan on installing. A garage door opener kit and in the future smoke alarm kit (Onelink Smoke Bridge).

The only things I want to do is:
Open/Close the garage door from Tasker (and see the current status)
Get an e-mail when a smoke alarm goes off.

I hear the native support is iffy, but I also am not trying to do anything complicated as I find everything else I want is Z-Wave.

2

I used the garage door IOLinc via native Insteon support for some time and found that it worked well. I am fairly sure the native support does not include the Smoke Bridge. You should verify if Altsteon does.

3

Thanks, Altsteon really sounds like a nightmare to install from all the forum messages that I have read.

4

I should qualify my statement about the IOLinc by saying that the open/close detection worked very well and better than zwave door sensors I tried. The relay worked reasonably well but was affected by a lag between Vera commands and the Insteon action. Occasionally the command to the relay would get lost.

5

Does the Vera see it as two seperate devices?

6

You are most likely out of luck for both altsteon and native insteon support for the smoke bridge.

  • Garrett
7

Yes, at least 2. I have it off native Insteon support so I cannot verify if it is 2 or 3. If I had to wager I would say 3, the actual device which does not have a function within the UI, and two child devices representing the sensor and the relay.

8

I just added the garage door and it sees 1 generic IO device. Is there any tricks to setting this up or instructions?

9

Also the ON/OFF buttons don’t do anything. When I hit the set button the IOlinc, it opens and closes the garage door, so it appears to be an issue between the IOlinc and the Vera/Insteon USB modem

10

You mau need to press the “Reload” button a few times to create the child devices. It’s been quite a while, so I don’t recall all the details, but I do not remember it being terribly difficult.

Also, when I installed this, I had only one Insteon device and reliability was poor. As l added a few more Insteon devices and its mesh got stronger, reliability improved. You may be able to test that by temporarily moving the PLM closer (ideally on the same circuit) as the IOLinc.

11

Oh crud, Insteon is PLC? I had bad incredibly slow and unreliable connections with powerline ethernet adapters and ended up returning them. I was thinking that it was a competitor to Zwave just on a different frequency and that X10 was a related tech that used powerlines instead.

12

Most current Insteon devices are dual band, combining powerline and RF communication. This includes the PLM. There are ways to mitigate issues some experience with powerline communication, but this would not be worthwhile for a single device.

13

Yeah, right now I’m stuck with the single device and the error under it claiming it is unable to get any information on the node.

14

Moving the PLM to the same plug point as the IOLinc (may require disconnection from the garage) will help you assess the problem. Just like zwave, Insteon relies on replication of the signal across multiple devices to enhance the network strength. A single device with a PLM, especially as building size increases and/or wiring age increases, will lead to communication issues.

I do not recall if I had the node error when I had a single device, but I recall clearly that there was a dramatic improvement as more devices got added. At this point, with mostly Insteon in my house, reliability is very high. This is all a gamble if you are not certain you want to get involved with Insteon and there are zwave solutions to the garage door management.

15

… also, I am assuming that you have neither the PLM or IOLinc on a power bar or UPS. Is there a UPS on the same circuit as either? This causes loss of Insteon signal; other known culprits are compact fluorescent lights and electrical motors such as those in fridges. While the vacuum was running constantly for a while in the house yesterday, I saw the network crumble and then restore quickly once the vacuuming stopped.

EDIT: You should be aware, also, that your house may have two phases of power and your PLM and IOLinc may not be on the same phase. This can be assessed by turning on a 220V appliance like an oven, electric dryer, or baseboard heater; these should couple the two phases to achieve the higher voltage. If communication improves when the phases are coupled, then this is a potential issue.

Again, there are ways to mitigate all of this (see Insteon phase couplers and FilterLincs), but probably not worthwhile for a single device.

16

Thanks. May return and explore other options. Each are plugged directly into an outlet, although I may double check to see they are on the circuit, but I think that they were.