Ademco VISTA-128BP, Caddx NetworX NX-8E or ELK M1 for Residential Alarm and Home Automation

If you're doing the job for yourself and you don't care about an insurance discount, don't worry about it. Make your choice based on the prices and features among the three panels.

Not in the least. The M1Gold is one of the best engineered panels on the market. Programming is fairly easy with ELK's software (included free if you buy it from an authorized online dealer). It's also an extremely flexible HA controller.

No.

No.

Not in your case unless it is a business installation

Since the M1 is brand new the reliability hasn't been proven whereas the Ademco and Caddx panels have been out for over 5 years now

No idea, might call Honeywell or GE on that

I haven't worked with the M1 yet but I know the Ademco and Caddx panels and both are excellent

Earl,

Send me a direct E-mail with your address, and I'll send you (UPS C.O.D. for freight charges) an M1 Gold, Three keypads, and one sixteen zone expander... You'll need to order the metal panel enclosure (I used it for another project, best part of the system) to mount the control board........ Regards, Russ

Subject: Ademco VISTA-128BP, Caddx NetworX NX-8E or ELK M1 for Residential Alarm and Home Automation Newsgroup: alt.security.alarms => Earl Wallace I have boiled down my choices for an Alarm system that would work with my

Rather than the Vista-128 I'd go for an Apex Destiny for home automation. It uses Ademco accessories, and is geared more towards HA. The V-128 is more of a commercial panel.

The Elk M1-G looks like the most flexible option for you, but I've no personal experience with it.

The NX-8E isn't too bad either, it offers lots of expandability and reasonable pricing............ Russ

I was considering the ELK M1 as the panel to get, but it doesn't have a proven track record of reliability (yet), hasn't been UL approved (yet), and is so new that it is still on the development track. If I buy the M1 now and later ELK comes out with a new board to make it UL compliant, or address some serious issues, I'll have to buy a new board because they don't do hardware upgrades - only software (firmware) upgrades. As much as I would like to use this board, I think I would feel uncomfortable going with it now. Perhaps in a year or two.

I thought I read somewhere that the Apex might be discontinued in the future. Otherwise it looks pretty good too.

So it is between the VISTA-128BP and the Caddx NX-8E.

Subject: Re: Ademco VISTA-128BP, Caddx NetworX NX-8E or ELK M1 for Residential Alarm and Home Automation Newsgroup: alt.security.alarms => Earl Wallace I was considering the ELK M1 as the panel to get, but it doesn't have a

Elk is a good company. They will not leave you hanging.

That rumor has been going on for two years.

I've no experience with Networx, except for takeovers. The V-128 is as solid as they get. It's a damn good panel, and can be bought with UL listed commercial fire. There are no z-wave options AFAIK. It can run a small automation system though. It's bulletproof too.

Does the vista 128 have a bi-directional serial port? I didnt think it did, I do know the NX8 does. This feature is useful if you intend to integrate with other home controlls.

James

Subject: Re: Ademco VISTA-128BP, Caddx NetworX NX-8E or ELK M1 for Residential Alarm and Home Automation Newsgroup: alt.security.alarms => James Does the vista 128 have a bi-directional serial port? I didnt think it did,

No

Looks like Ademco addresses the RS232 bi-directional serial port issue with the Ademco VA8201 Alpha Pager Module:

The VA8201 Alpha Pager Module (APM) provides the VISTA-128BP/128FB and VISTA- 250BP/250FBP control panels with alpha paging, parallel printer output, serial printer output and or home/facility automation control functions using a RS232 bi-directional communications protocol. The APM transmits alphanumeric security control panel dependent messages to the paging service using Telocator Alphanumeric Protocol.

Ademco describes how to use this module with the VISTA-128BP in this PDF Document:

Subject: Re: Ademco VISTA-128BP, Caddx NetworX NX-8E or ELK M1 for Residential Alarm and Home Automation Newsgroup: alt.security.alarms => Earl Wallace

Okay, I may be mistaken... I'll research it tomato! I'll let you know. I;I'll let you know my findings. Is your email valid?

You? Research?

It's valid in that mail to snipped-for-privacy@walltech.com will reach my Autoresponder. The Autoresponder will then give you the real email address to use. This is a bit of a hassle I know, but it does an amazing job of killing SPAM to this address. If SPAMers discover the real email address, I just change it and update the Autoresponder. Believe it or not, this works very well. I get about one SPAM a week on average using this technique. I don't use any Anti-SPAM software on my system, and have been doing this style of email management for years with about a dozen different ISPs. It works because SPAMers won't read the email from my Autoresponder, so they never find out the real email address.

In cases where I can't use the Autoresponder, I use private email addresses which are always "real". These private email addresses are rarely misused, and when they are misused, I know exactly who did it and will kill that address and assign a new one.

-earlw

In the Ademco Document

describes the Serial Port Protocol and Message Format used in connecting a Home Automation Control to a VISTA-128BP/250BP using the Ademco 4100SM or VA8201 modules.

For example, to read the Zone Status on the serial port, the Ademco document says (only part of the doc is displayed here):

Zone Status Messages -------------------- The table below describes the typical commands used to query the control panel for a Zone Status and the zone?s partition.

NOTE: The system can provide the status for zones 1 to 96 only.

Action String Definition ----------- ------------------- ------------------------------------- Zone Status 08zs004B (CR-LF) The panel responds with a Zone Request Status Report. Note: This message should be sent only when an initial connection is made with the panel. It is not intended for use as a ?polling? command. The panel can be programmed to send System Notification Messages concerning zone status.

Zone Status 68ZSD...00CC (CR-LF) The panel sends this message in Report response to a Zone Status Request. The data portion of this message is 96 characters (one character for each zone in order). Each character is the sum of all applicable status values, expressed in hexadecimal using ASCII characters 0-9 and A-F.

Status Values: 0 Closed 1 Open 2 Trouble 4 Alarm 8 Bypassed

Example: a Zone Status Report for a system in which Zone 1 is Open, Zone 2 is Open, in Trouble, and Bypassed, and the rest Closed, would begin 68ZS1B00...

Is there a document on the Caddx NX-8E that likewise explains the serial port data stream?

Thanks, -earlw