I tried Homeseer, I had some questions being it was totally different. I got one half assed response and my other questions went un answered. No way I was going to spend that much money for poor support.
Jim
[quote=ājbfosterā]I tried Homeseer, I had some questions being it was totally different. I got one half assed response and my other questions went un answered. No way I was going to spend that much money for poor support.
Jim[/quote]
My forum support experience has been great with both vera and homeseer. Both forums have been around long enough that in most cases, a simple search lets me find the answer without me asking for it. And when I do ask, I usually get informed responses.
I didnāt use official support channels much on either service (twice on the vera, it was OK).
Yes I feel that the people should upgrade to the latest hardware more. Doing that we can reduce the HW/firmware compinations MCV need to support . The price of the Vera controller is marginal here. It is only 5-15% of the total cost of the HA system.
Of course I donāt have any support tiket statistic, so this is only a strong feeling what might keep MCS busy.[/quote]
They canāt make the firmware rock solid on ANY of the existing platforms that are out right now. What makes you think that your method will improve things? Apple supports phones/tablets for up to about five years with all new software updates. The iPhone 5 was released with iOS 6 and will run iOS 10, supporting five different levels of the operating system. By the time you reach the last version a platform will support, itās very slow because stronger platforms (CPU and RAM) are needed for the extra features.
With Vera, or ANY home automation controller, you have absolutely no idea how many devices will be added or what sort of workload the owner will put on it. So, right out of the gate, itās basically a support nightmare.
Your are comparing apples to oranges 
Apple has a tight chokehold on both the hardware and software. be it OS or apps. That is why they can do what you describe. Vera and most other HA controllers do not have this luxury. As they are depending on 3rd party devices. Granted, those should adhere to the ZWave(+) standard set by Sigma Designs but I doubt this is always the case. Which is what causes the device support issues.
Zigbee is even worse as there are multiple standards and every device needs a specific profile to be supported. When I bought my Vera plus it was for the Zwave+ support and the faster CPU and more memory than my vera 3. The Zigbee and BT radios were nice but I wasnāt expecting a lot of Zigbee devices to magically work.
The new Zwave āadd deviceā wizard is nice as it guides you on how to set up a specific device for joining so you donāt have to find and read the manual. But Iām sure adding the same device as a āgeneric zwave deviceā amd reading the device manual on how to set it up for joining will work just as wellā¦
[quote=āBOFH, post:64, topic:195573ā]
snip
As they are depending on 3rd party devices. Granted, those should adhere to the ZWave(+) standard set by Sigma Designs but I doubt this is always the case. Which is what causes the device support issues.[/quote]
Then why is it that if I add a new device in Home Seer I have no difficulty, yet the same device in Vera has caused me grief over 2 months+.
Even other 3rd party systems donāt encounter the Vera ācanāt configure deviceā syndrome.
I guess I am lucky as Iāve yet to run into that error. I just added a monoPrice Zwave+ door/windows sensor to my Plus and it was painless. Can you give examples of devices that give the error so I know which ones to avoid?
They all work OK with the old FW. I guess you get what you pay for.
[quote=āBOFH, post:64, topic:195573ā]Your are comparing apples to oranges
Apple has a tight chokehold on both the hardware and software. be it OS or apps. That is why they can do what you describe. Vera and most other HA controllers do not have this luxury. As they are depending on 3rd party devices. Granted, those should adhere to the ZWave(+) standard set by Sigma Designs but I doubt this is always the case. Which is what causes the device support issues.
Zigbee is even worse as there are multiple standards and every device needs a specific profile to be supported. When I bought my Vera plus it was for the Zwave+ support and the faster CPU and more memory than my vera 3. The Zigbee and BT radios were nice but I wasnāt expecting a lot of Zigbee devices to magically work.
The new Zwave āadd deviceā wizard is nice as it guides you on how to set up a specific device for joining so you donāt have to find and read the manual. But Iām sure adding the same device as a āgeneric zwave deviceā amd reading the device manual on how to set it up for joining will work just as wellā¦[/quote]
Youāre basically proving my point.
The comment was that there should be ālifecyclesā of which hardware will support which firmware and the other way around. My comments were showing that you have to have extremely tight control on BOTH like Apple does. And, in the HA world, youāre completely out of luck because there are variables completely beyond the manufacturers control - third party devices (and how many of them there are) and the ability to configure it to work whatever way you choose.
So, thereās ZERO value in trying to place limits on what hardware will be supported to run what firmware because the extra variables can not be accounted for. Ever.
Exactly. Case in point the First Alert ZCOMBO detectors. They got somewhat basically supported and worked in early UI7. But it wasnāt until FA provided Getvera with all needed documentation that support for that device became far more elaborate. Such as splitting it into a Smoke and a CO device so you can determine which is going off and basing a scene (and your reaction) on that.
Getvera made some progress by listing ācertified partner productsā (http://getvera.com/compatibility/) that have been tested to work with Vera so customers have at least a resource to check potential devices against or base their device purchasing decision on.
Based on my experience, most of the zwave devices monoprice.com sells as no label are made by Vision and recognized as such and supported by Vera.
[quote=āember1205, post:68, topic:195573ā][quote=āBOFH, post:64, topic:195573ā]Your are comparing apples to oranges
Apple has a tight chokehold on both the hardware and software. be it OS or apps. That is why they can do what you describe. Vera and most other HA controllers do not have this luxury. As they are depending on 3rd party devices. Granted, those should adhere to the ZWave(+) standard set by Sigma Designs but I doubt this is always the case. Which is what causes the device support issues.
Zigbee is even worse as there are multiple standards and every device needs a specific profile to be supported. When I bought my Vera plus it was for the Zwave+ support and the faster CPU and more memory than my vera 3. The Zigbee and BT radios were nice but I wasnāt expecting a lot of Zigbee devices to magically work.
The new Zwave āadd deviceā wizard is nice as it guides you on how to set up a specific device for joining so you donāt have to find and read the manual. But Iām sure adding the same device as a āgeneric zwave deviceā amd reading the device manual on how to set it up for joining will work just as wellā¦[/quote]
Youāre basically proving my point.
The comment was that there should be ālifecyclesā of which hardware will support which firmware and the other way around. My comments were showing that you have to have extremely tight control on BOTH like Apple does. And, in the HA world, youāre completely out of luck because there are variables completely beyond the manufacturers control - third party devices (and how many of them there are) and the ability to configure it to work whatever way you choose.
So, thereās ZERO value in trying to place limits on what hardware will be supported to run what firmware because the extra variables can not be accounted for. Ever.[/quote]
But Apple, and other manufacturers, do support standards even when not their own - the best example is USB.
I can plug a USB microphone, or headphones, or many other devices into an iDevice and they work, because Apple support the standards. And if it didnāt work because of the device itself, you can be sure they would say that.
ZWave has a set of standards, which devices are supposed to follow, so the same should apply.
Of course maybe some donāt - but the documentation and feedback from Vera is so bad we have no way of knowing, everything is done via an adhoc support requests and hearsay.
If they actually published the support list and details of any devices not playing nice, we could put pressure on the device manufacturer or ZWave organisation - but they donāt, so we canāt, and actually my suspicion is that they simply donāt know and do everything adhoc and disorganised.
At least some devices are configuring themselves even if they are not listed in the wizzard.
In fact most of the wizzardās functionality is that it guide you through steps you have to make on the device (like: āpress 1 time to pairā, or āpress three Times rapidlyā, etc.)
The problem (at least for me) is not that some device is absent in wizzard, but that after pairing you donāt have it properly working.
There only few devices which I have with such issues, but it is a bit annoying, especially if you know that some device is quite long on the market and still there is no proper implementation of it in Vera.
I bought Vera partially because I was told that it is more āwide range of devices friendlyā than for example Fibaro, but I quickly learned that anyway I should look for comments about compatibility before buying specific item.
To be fair, it is not only problem of Vera, but also those manufacturers.
I couldnāt agree more, which is why my reasons for leaving was I out grew vera.
Once you start needing real logic like PLEG, running a few plugins and needing more then just a few basic things going on VERA just starts doing weird and unexplained things and requires alot more attention to keep it stable. I decided at that point to upgrade to the newest VERA for more power, then did the same again a year later. It just wasnāt enough and is probley what VERA wanted. Having their customers upgrade every year would seem to be perfect for their pockets and provide a steady income flow.
Vera severed its purpose for me, and If I would have never wanted more it might have been able to keep up. But even to this day new devices are being added new plugins and 3rd party connections being integrated (alexa, Harmony remotes) and my automation and smart home is still growing altho that not true for everyone or maybe not at my pace.
I said I wouldnt but VeraPlus until I needed ZWave gen5ā¦ and I held off as long as I couldā¦ I bought a open box VP and held it until end of Dec 2016 when they fixed the device cannot connect bug.
In the short few weeks after, Iāve run into (and documented/found a few new ones as they admitted) a good 10 large bugs. These are keeping my system from being reliableā¦ and I removed any/all unneeded plugins and associated code.
I have thought for a long time that there was fundamental design flaws in Vera (MIOS)ā¦ Iām now 100% confident Iām correct.
- Compile at Run time causes all sort of problems
- Long Boot times due to compile at every restart, not just at reboot.
- Even the smallest of config/device/scene changes require a LUA restart ā¦ e.g. recompile
- LUA errors are nearly impossible to figure out where they come from because they have no real error trapping
- a single LUA problem to interfere with other code/functions (due to lack of threading and/or services model)
- no ability to ensure execution ordering (no transaction model or execution ordering/stacking)
- no ability to stop scenes/actions based on other occurrences after a given activity started (no transaction model or execution ordering/stacking)
ā¦ Iām sure there are more that the real coders, like Richard / Akaboor / etc, know about
ā¦ this i just the OS itself, not any bugs that Vera LLC has created in the āappā called UI7.
[quote=ājbfoster, post:61, topic:195573ā]I tried Homeseer, I had some questions being it was totally different. I got one half assed response and my other questions went un answered. No way I was going to spend that much money for poor support.
Jim[/quote]
I find their forums to be much quieter. I leave this thread for a day and 1-2 new pages have appeared (things come back to life quickly here not so much there). I think that maybe due to a few reasons that are only my guesses (I havenāt done enough research on it).
-
There is alot less users and forum members there.
-
More advanced users with maybe less questions or less basic (most members like myself have left vera or wink or smart-things or some other entry level 99.00 controller before jumping into Homeseer)
No matter the reason the forum doesnāt explode with crazy amount of replies for all questions. This form is the heart of Vera and helped me out so many times. Even my post count is super high here where in the same amount of time on that forum my count is much lower due to questions being over my head (see #2 above) or getting a great response already. Could also be considered a bit less argumentative so threads stay a bit more on topic and to the point, not needing 4 pages of replays to the OPās question.
Support directly hasnāt been required for me, but for price adjustments and license question my phone call was answered quickly and the person spoke the same language as me. Iām in the US and this is a full US based small business. No out of the area call centers no waiting for product to hit the local US distribution center before they know anything about it.
My phone calls with VERA were generally answered so I didnāt have a huge problem with that either. Emails were a problem with vera, more then phone call. Phone calls I assumed were handled by someone out of the USA as they generally handled my problem but was tuff to understand.
I want to say the most problems with HomeSeer people had in the beginning was getting signed up for the forums. I know they were blocking gmail accounts or spam filters were set way to high and people were having a problem just registering for forum access. Some times this required a phone call or email directly to Homeseer which made people mad before they even tried HS.
What mobile app do you use for Homeseer?
I have a Vera 3 thatās going ok enough, but bogged down, as well as a Homeseer license and a VeraPlus. Iāve been delaying a migration away from the Vera 3 for awhile, and I really want to stay with Vera due to familiarity, but the complaints about firmware bugs scare me.
The biggest reason Iām not looking forward to Homeseer is because AutHomationHD has been perfect for the familyās workflow, and it doesnāt seem like there are any decent Android apps out there, unless I wanted to design something myself (Iām assuming thatās what the designer I spent $99 on is for?).[/quote]
I use imperihome. It took me a bit to convince myself it was worth the $40 for the plugin for the $5 app, but in the end it has really worked out and the developer is really responsive. Note that we donāt normally use apps for control in our house. Itās automated or there are switches (mainly automated). However imperihome is used from time to time ( for instance adjusting the living room ceiling fans when watching TV).
About hstouch. I would like to say it was worth what you paid for it, but Iāve only opened it once. They are also currently making a new mobile app in house for homeseer.
I do kinda miss AutHomationHD, but I was using I.perihome as well on the Vera.
Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk[/quote]
Thanks for the responses everyone. Is there a link where I can read about the new mobile app HS is making in house? The timeline and quality of their final product may push me over from Vera to HS.
Iāve tried Imperihome but everyone in the family has different preferences, as do guests, and AutHomationHD was a nice no-nonsense app that didnāt require dashboards to be created or tons of scrolling to find devices. Has anything major changed with Imperihome over the past 2 years that merit another chance?
[quote=ābattars, post:75, topic:195573ā]Thanks for the responses everyone. Is there a link where I can read about the new mobile app HS is making in house? The timeline and quality of their final product may push me over from Vera to HS.
Iāve tried Imperihome but everyone in the family has different preferences, as do guests, and AutHomationHD was a nice no-nonsense app that didnāt require dashboards to be created or tons of scrolling to find devices. Has anything major changed with Imperihome over the past 2 years that merit another chance?[/quote]
Iām not yet aware of the new mobile app HS is making and I would also like info on it.
As far as imperihome I use dashboards everyone can use the same or have their own layout what ever you choose. With the HS plugin you can run multiple instances and limit devices on different users. The overall feel and use of imperihome hasnāt changed (just features) so if you didnāt like it before you probley will feel the same now, unless you never gave it a proper chance.
HS touch is lame unless you use designer which then makes it a advanced user option and take days to build out what you want. Any new user to HS shoudl not play with designer right off the bat or they will become frustrated real fast. It has limitless options to design anything you want but itās equivalent to using Photoshop to edit photoās. Unless you know how to use it there is just way to many button and options to even know where to start for the beginner.
Putting my 2c in regarding the HA devices fragmentation / situation.
Some manufacturers change the spec without changing the label so a Z-Wave device might have 4 hardware versions (and posible 8 software versions) with the same label / id. It happened to me a couple of times and I refuse to buy any type of device from that vendor anymore. And donāt get me started with zigbee: almost each device has itās quirk - at least in zwave you can expect to behave generally the same by command class but with zigbeeā¦ Iām actually considering going back to wired HA and leave only door/window sensors on zwave / battery since they generally have long battery life.
I agree with you and I strongly believe in wired everything when you can. Internet or Home Automation. You see alot of posts in the Alarm section from me. Door and window sensors and motions are all wired in my house. I think there is something like 30 door and windows in my house including some interior doors for light control. Not only cost (wired cost me around 2.00 per door/window vs. z-wave 30.00) but monitoring that many batteries would be crazy.
[quote=āinteglikewhoa, post:76, topic:195573ā][quote=ābattars, post:75, topic:195573ā]Thanks for the responses everyone. Is there a link where I can read about the new mobile app HS is making in house? The timeline and quality of their final product may push me over from Vera to HS.
Iāve tried Imperihome but everyone in the family has different preferences, as do guests, and AutHomationHD was a nice no-nonsense app that didnāt require dashboards to be created or tons of scrolling to find devices. Has anything major changed with Imperihome over the past 2 years that merit another chance?[/quote]
Iām not yet aware of the new mobile app HS is making and I would also like info on it.
As far as imperihome I use dashboards everyone can use the same or have their own layout what ever you choose. With the HS plugin you can run multiple instances and limit devices on different users. The overall feel and use of imperihome hasnāt changed (just features) so if you didnāt like it before you probley will feel the same now, unless you never gave it a proper chance.
HS touch is lame unless you use designer which then makes it a advanced user option and take days to build out what you want. Any new user to HS shoudl not play with designer right off the bat or they will become frustrated real fast. It has limitless options to design anything you want but itās equivalent to using Photoshop to edit photoās. Unless you know how to use it there is just way to many button and options to even know where to start for the beginner.[/quote]
I liked Imperihome on Vera and still like it for HS. I wish there were an equivalent to Authomation for HS, but I guess thats not quite true of Vera either.
But Imperihome is really limited by your imagination. Iāve only spent time with the tip of hte iceberg, but you can make an attractive and function UI with it.
Iād like to mess with HS Touch but I donāt have time and I tried to know my limits for once! 
I agree with you and I strongly believe in wired everything when you can. Internet or Home Automation. You see alot of posts in the Alarm section from me. Door and window sensors and motions are all wired in my house. I think there is something like 30 door and windows in my house including some interior doors for light control. Not only cost (wired cost me around 2.00 per door/window vs. z-wave 30.00) but monitoring that many batteries would be crazy.[/quote]
So tell me integlikewhoaā¦ with hs3ā¦ can I do complex scenes like (*** and **** and *** <90) does it have the same or better functionality as pleg? In moving over from vera ui7 to Hs3 can I expect all my zwave devices to work? what about audio feed back responses in scenes? (right now I have some audio feed back from sonos through lupp code in scenes)
I have been looking on hs3 forum, and website, and after the last false trip at 2am on a door sensor with a siren waking me upā¦I am almost ready to jump shipā¦