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Hey all, I'm pretty new to this space and looking to get started. What I want to understand is which is the best platform to get started with? Costco has an Insteon starter kit for $30 which seems like a steal but I don't know if Insteon is the right technology to commit to. What is the common goon-sensus on this and where to get started? I'd like to do/have the following in my future smart home: - Have a high amount of compatible devices (switches/etc) that I am not locked into expensive niche devices that also could be limiting looking forward (thinking of a dedicated smart light bulb, rather than the outlet that can control any light bulb) - Able to work with the current technology I have and preferably set up in such a way that future compatibility will not be an issue. Something that is nimble enough to move as technology progresses for 10-20 years. I have iOS devices, Apple watch, Nest, and will have an Echo soon. - Cheap switches/outlets/etc if possible. I understand that this is where they make their money but would prefer to stay away from the B&O equivalent of Smart Home technology. I need practical and affordable - Mostly simple for installation. I'm okay with running wires on occasion to fulfill a specific need I'm trying to fill but should be able to install these with basic installation like swapping out an outlet. Complex programming is not something I really want to tackle, but willing to explore that if it opens up flexibility and future compatibility. I'm not looking to do anything crazy from a Smart Home perspective at this point but who knows how deep the rabbit hole will go once I get started. My neighbor has an Insteon and really loves it. He's trying to get it to control a simple motor to automatically open/close blinds with the sunrise/sunset and not sure how much success he's having. If that's a limitation to the system or something else. I mention that to say that it likely the extent I'd probably take it and mostly stick to lighting/thermostat solutions. Appreciate any insight! I'll pick up that $30 starter kit today if that's a solid platform to use and that the hardware included isn't already working toward obsolescence.
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Nov 11, 2016 20:18
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hotsauce posted:Samsung Smart Things hub is $49 at Amazon/Newegg. Pricematch to your local Best Buy if you want it today (hopefully it doesn't go out of stock at Amazon/Newegg first). I thought the costco one would use the RF that the insteon switches use. What does it take to make it work with RF if not?
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Nov 13, 2016 18:17
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I just grabbed the Costco one and see it's the 2012 version so it makes sense it's $30. Not sure the big differences. Can zwave switches work indepdent of the hub like Insteon or will they cease to work like normal switches if there's a drop in connection for whatever reason? Trying to decide which route I want to go before investing in hardware.
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Nov 13, 2016 20:26
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hotsauce posted:My Nest is shaping up to the the worst purchase I've made in a long time. Nothing supports the drat thing. I know I can set up some IFTTT stuff to glue it all together, but it would be real great if it "just worked." Should stick with the Insteon. I just checked and despite the box it includes the most recent hub. Everything worked immediately for me. But perhaps the first outlet I chose to use was on the same 110v line as the hub and then the mesh network from that outlet reached the other. I'm in on Insteon now. Especially since I found different options to use as "hubs" that control every protocol, ties them together.
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Nov 14, 2016 23:47
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Insteon just released a siren. I'm sure the others will follow suit shortly.
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Dec 14, 2016 13:14
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Scrapez posted:I've read that elsewhere. Is this the one you mean? I have the regular harmony hub with that remote. My kids keep beating the poo poo out of mine and it's acting up. Can I replace it with this? Says ultimate hub only but wasn't sure if it's the branding and it's keeping people away who don't own any hub. E: bonus question, if so can I have two of these connected to one hub at a time?
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Dec 20, 2016 04:45
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Three Olives posted:Pretty sure it is any any Hub, however you can only pair one simple remote which makes no sense to me but that is how it is apparently. So basically you can have a screen remote and a simple remote both connected but that's it total, no two screens, no two simple, one of each. Gotcha. Is $30 for the simple pretty standard or is this a sale? I don't have a strong use case for the screen unless someone can tell me why it's badass and why my wife and kids would prefer it. They rock out the activity buttons as it is now so...
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Dec 20, 2016 05:18
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I am a fan of Insteon personally. Just opened my Echo and it worked perfectly. Recognized all my names and scenes immediately. Very impressed with the integration.
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Dec 24, 2016 18:40
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So with this home bridge software can I use my iPhone/Siri to control my Insteon devices? I don't have any home kit devices currently.
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Dec 30, 2016 03:08
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emocrat posted:Can anyone here point me to a comprehensive breakdown of major smart home ecosystems? I would like to get some basic stuff set up, but I am having a hard time figuring out what system to buy into. The cost of these things isn't trivial when you look at the number of outlets, switches and single purpose devices in a decent sized home and I am worried about sinking too much money into it and finding out its a dead end standard or whatnot. I went through this exercise a few months back as I was in the same position as you. I ended up going with Insteon for the reason that my neighbo already used it and so it was easy to implement from his experience. All of my research led me to the point that no matter what you decide to do, there's ALWAYS an option to tie them all together with a different hub/software configuration. There are solutions that will control Zwave, Insteon, Hue, Homekit all from one central solution. So go with one of them and do not be overly concerned about investing too much into one protocol only to switch a few years down the road and lose that investment. There's always a way to use the old stuff. By that time you'll likely WANT to have the more comprehensive and more advanced hubs as well...
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Jan 6, 2017 15:31
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emocrat posted:Agreed. I have nothing to contribute to it unfortunately, but a comprehensive OP would be fantastic. Well maintained and informative OP's are one of the best things about SA in my experience. That aspect of this community has been invaluable to me in the past. There's software (I can't recall the name off the top of my head) that you load on a dedicated PC that would be the brains as well as another hub made by Insteon that also is compatible with Zwave. I have heard comments that it isn't 100% compatible but I want to think that with exception for some edge cases it's a perfect match. Sorry I don't have more information for you to act on, but wanted to share my conclusion as I spent a few weeks himming and hawing over the purchase on this very issue and once I knew there were solutions down the road it opened me up to just buy whatever worked for me.
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Jan 6, 2017 17:13
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sellouts posted:I use this to make my Insteon stuff work without an Insteon hub. https://www.indigodomo.com/ It's what TraderStav is talking about. I use Insteon plugs and switches where it makes sense. An ecobee for thermostat. Harmony for electronics control. Philips Hue for the smart / color bulbs. Sonos plugin as well. All tied together with this software. It's solid. Overall, how satisfied are you with indigodomo? Worth the price? What about if I don't need to use multiple protocols? Any hassles or other things to mention about having to have a dedicated computer to run for it? TraderStav fucked around with this message at 05:36 on Jan 7, 2017 |
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Jan 7, 2017 05:34
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emocrat posted:Ok, I am looking at getting some Insteon stuff and I am hoping someone who knows more about it than me can give me some insight on a few questions. That package is selling at Costco for $29.97 and yes, it's cheaper than the smarthome.com website. It's a steal for getting started with Insteon. The 'newer' hub supports homekit but apparently is a disaster in other respects. That one in the package with the dimmers is the one you want. Down the road you a can swap out the hub for newer/different solutions and use your existing switches/equipment. You can do what you are saying, essentially you would be having the smart switch be the controller and you'd have to set up the dimmer switches to be responders. It's not super straight forward as a process but it's very doable. There are instructions in the manual. You'll go back and forth between the switch and dimmer with key presses to get it right. I have this set up in my rooms with two switches for one ceiling light.
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Jan 10, 2017 16:29
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emocrat posted:Awesome, thanks. I have a Costco membership too so thats fantastic. Yup, you're basically two months behind me so keep tossing out questions. Pick up an Amazon Echo while you're at it. It makes it SOO much better. I've heard complaints around Insteon (here and elsewhere) but overall I've been very happy with it for my purposes.
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Jan 10, 2017 17:16
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emocrat posted:Cool, Will do. The reason I'm gravitating towards Insteon, is that as far as I can tell, its got the best setup for keeping control off the smartphone. I really really want to avoid getting to a place where I have to pull out my phone to perform any operation that isn't very complex. I also want complete functionality for a guest and all. Both Zwave and Insteon (someone please correct me if I'm wrong on Zwave) act as Switches first and should never/rarely require an app to operate. Some criticsms about Smartthings/Zwave are security concerns and challenges getting to remote areas of your home as Zwave does not use powerline AND mesh like Insteon does. Insteon has complaints about cost (not open market for their products like Zwave) and less flexibility in the app since Smartthings has an open market (which also leads to security issues). Hope that helps.
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Jan 10, 2017 17:50
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emocrat posted:Can anyone tell me what happens to Insteon products of my internet goes out? Will everything come crashing down, or will my wall switches still work? What if I have a wall switch configured to toggle a scene? Everything will work just fine. Scenes will probably work as it doesn't need to communicate to the cloud for those.
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Jan 12, 2017 17:32
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Rick posted:Yeah I still don't get this. At the very least it seems like it would've been an advertiserable bullet point feature in an OS upgrade this year, and probably should've been in a year before that. When they only had them on Apple TVs I could at least understand that maybe they were using hubs to sell them but now that it's on ipads it really doesn't make sense. My kingdom for being able to use HomeKit to manage my Insteon devices by having a bridge app on my iMac.
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Oct 9, 2017 17:33
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Thermopyle posted:I think I really want dimmers with the leds indicating level. Insteon do that.
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Nov 4, 2017 16:57
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This thread has recommended the ecobee3 over the nest in the past. I see now there's an ecobee4, does the recommendation still stand for the new version?
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Jan 5, 2018 03:46
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BeAuMaN posted:Btw, just a heads up guys These any good? Can they interface with Insteon Hub?
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Nov 22, 2018 02:09
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Also what features do you lose (if any) if you don't use their subscription service.
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Nov 22, 2018 02:13
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I assume if I'm a cheap rear end nerd there are other products out there that accomplish similar functions and I roll my own server to do the video storage and such?
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Nov 22, 2018 02:21
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Now that's hilarious and terrifying. I threw an order for pickup for two black ones. Will research later and if I change my mind return or resell them. Pure impulse buy as I'm not in the market but could see a use for them. Curious to see how they interact with my Insteon/Alexa/Harmony set up. If at all.
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Nov 22, 2018 02:28
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Make sure the bedroom camera doesn’t have the geofencing logic...
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Mar 21, 2019 22:03
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Any input on the UniFi systems? I'm looking to put 2-3 outdoor cameras and would prefer to not pay a subscription fee but keep the storage in my house via some device (open to suggestion, although UniFi sells a solution too). Looks like they have a pretty good (on the surface) turn-key product that still has accessibility from your smartphones and developers in other countries won't be spying in on your cameras. Don't have too many key requirements other than the standards: nightvision, outdoor (I'm in Michigan, so cold performance needs to be there), prefer battery powered but I can run wires to outlets that are outside. Would want the battery to kick in if those were disconnected. Good enough quality where they're useful. Just jumping into this so not even sure if I know all of my requirements. Appreciate any input! Thanks!
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Apr 5, 2019 17:17
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ROJO posted:Just as a heads up all the unifi cameras with the exception of the G3-micro do not have any Wifi capabilities and must be powered by POE. So they not only need cat5 run to them, but they need a POE injector and an outlet if you don't have a POE switch feeding them. And the G3-micro (which I don't believe is rated for outdoor use), while having Wifi, doesn't have a battery option (that I am aware of). So if battery or battery backup are a hard requirement for you, Unifi isn't going to work unless you run a POE switch with a UPS to back it up. Thanks for the input, I hadn't realized all of that! I'm starting from a blank slate (other than having an Insteon smart home so hooks into that would be neat, but not necessary). Will need to take a closer look at what's out there. Not sure I can easily get to the eave on the back of my house without cutting through an upstairs bedroom wall.
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Apr 6, 2019 02:37
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Thanks again for the feedback. Making me consider making the run for the Ethernet, which I may be able to make happen. Looks like it'll offer me the best balance of cost and flexibility of options. Just regular CAT5e? If I'm running it outside I'll need to get something with weather resistance or plenum?
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Apr 6, 2019 15:02
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Motronic posted:I run regular cat5e if it's inside. The outside cameras when mounted on a soffit or something I consider to be an inside run. If you're actually running outside, like you need to go basement to attic on the exterior of the building (a rain gutter downspout is a great way to hide to runs and is something that looks "normal" on a house) or you're doing a buried run to mount something on a post/tree, etc I'd use something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MA3OIML/?coliid=I35Z4XMSNGDLVU&colid=2QZ0KGEGECZ9T&psc=0&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it The cameras would be under a soffit but real challenging to get to as there isn't access to the eave. If I started from my second story there's a pretty clear shot and run down the j channels, but getting the Cat5 upstairs is now the challenge. Are there good solutions where I set up an access point upstairs to connect to my router downstairs wirelessly and then do the PoE from there to the cameras?
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Apr 6, 2019 16:22
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Can the UniFi app do the timelapse in-app like the Nest cameras can? To be more clear on what I'm asking, in Nest you open a camera and below the feed is a timeline that you can drag your finger back and forth and show the feed at different times of day? It's pretty slick. For context, I'm still evaluating my solution that I want to put in place. I like the simplicity of picking up a few Nest cameras, paying the $50 a year, and being done. On the other hand, it bothers me (potentially irrationally) that if the Internet goes down the camera stops recording. Also, it's a Google product so who knows what the gently caress the future holds.
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May 14, 2019 19:17
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Tapedump posted:With what Google is doing to Nest, you might want to consider other hardware.... Can you be more specific? I know they down have a great past with owning products, but what did they do recently that really makes it more of an issue? Trying to find the right balance here between functionality that I need and the convenience that something like Nest offers. Is it likely that Google mess up the core features of the Nest Cam?
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May 15, 2019 18:11
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CheddarGoblin posted:Synology's Surveillance Station will do this if you have a Synology NAS (may even be worth getting one just for it). It's really nice. I actually just moved our NVR system at work over to it, 50+ cameras of all different types and it hasn't skipped a beat. Used it at home for years and it's only gotten better. Oh wow, this looks like a great solution too. Will need to look into it. One feature I loved about the Nest, and would love to see if it is recreated anywhere, is that the notifications can be suppressed when it detects you are at home. I liked that idea that when my kids are running around in the backyard or playing basketball I don't get spammed with a hundred notifications.
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May 15, 2019 23:04
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CheddarGoblin posted:Surveillance Station definitely has this as well. Very awesome. Need to check it out for what to assemble together. Like the UniFi, predominately PoE or are there wired for power with WiFi cameras that are compatible?
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May 16, 2019 00:08
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CheddarGoblin posted:Synology's Surveillance Station will do this if you have a Synology NAS (may even be worth getting one just for it). It's really nice. I actually just moved our NVR system at work over to it, 50+ cameras of all different types and it hasn't skipped a beat. Used it at home for years and it's only gotten better. Any suggestions for which NAS to get if I plan to have 4-6 cameras max? I'd even consider moving my Plex media and usenet programs to it if it can power it well enough. Can still have my main PC keep the Plex server if it won't power the streams well enough. Also, is the surveillance station software free and just need a Synology or is it something I'd have to pay for on top of the hardware? TraderStav fucked around with this message at 01:36 on May 16, 2019 |
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May 16, 2019 01:34
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Thermopyle posted:After Google's comments today, I don't think it will mean much of anything other than that at some point in the future, we'll have to migrate over to using a Google app (which *should* have the same features) instead of a Nest app. So are folks walking back the concerns that were raised last week about google nest now?
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May 17, 2019 11:53
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So then the bottom line goes back to Nest not recording while not having WiFi and no local storage as being the largest (and highest likelihood impact) differentiator between choosing it and rolling your own system?
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May 17, 2019 20:55
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Thermopyle posted:For me, those are the two biggest downsides of Nest. Forgot to add the $50/device annual fee for 5 days lookback. Need to weigh that against the cost of the extra hardware for roll your own. Edit: $30 for additional cameras. TraderStav fucked around with this message at 22:57 on May 17, 2019 |
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May 17, 2019 22:45
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If I have a non-Homekit Insteon hub, is there anything that I can do to get Homekit to work with my Insteon system? Running a different home automation manager, etc?
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Jun 14, 2019 18:16
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Kalman posted:Depending on yourInsteon model, Home Assistant has both HomeKit and Insteon support. I use it to translate HomeKit to non-HomeKit devices, though no experience with Insteon (works fine with zwave and Nest tho.) Hrmm. I have a retropie collecting dust that I could play with this weekend and try flashing Hass.io. Thanks for the heads up!
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Jun 14, 2019 22:33
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So I got hass.io up and running on my RaspPi, but unclear on how to add new components. Insteon isn't listed, but according to the below link, I just need to add that component and configure it for my hub (which is basically just login/pass) but it's very unclear on how to add the component. Can someone nudge me in the right direction? https://www.home-assistant.io/components/insteon/
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Jun 15, 2019 04:12
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Throwing hass.io to the side for a bit I am trying out Homebridge to get my Insteon devices into Homekit. Anyone here use Homebridge before and gotten their equipment to work? I've gotten as far as getting the switch to show up in Home on iOS but it doesn't do anything. Feels like there's something missing. Using homebridge-platform-insteonlocal https://github.com/kuestess/homebridge-platform-insteonlocal e: HOLY poo poo forget that message. Stupid password on the Hub was a capital I and not a lower case L. I am in business! TraderStav fucked around with this message at 04:09 on Jun 18, 2019 |
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Jun 18, 2019 04:03
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