Hard-wired HA lighting; was Re: XTB, reliablity, etc.

Depends in part on what you mean by "hardwired systems".

It is useful to distinguish off-the-bat between hard-wired ON-OFF and hard-wired dimming of lights.

Hard-wired ON-OFF is something that can be controlled easily from (eg) a PC port,ADICON Ocelot or Elk M1G, or even a hybrid control (such as X-10, INSTEON, RF _and_ hard-wired) and can be accomplished with simple mechanical relays or contactors. Updates to the US and Canadian electrical codes in the past decade have made it somewhat easier to pass muster with the Authority Having Jurisdiction (AHJ) of the National Electrical Code (NEC in US).

Hard-wired light _dimming_ is a different matter. Compared to ON-OFF, dimming with any control signal method (PLC, RF, IR, hard-wired) is more challenging than ON_OFF owing to:

1) the incremental difficulty of meeting code and regulatory requirements 2) the greater complexity of the hardware required 3) larger bandwidth needed for control signals 4) increase in propagated noise both through air and on the powerline.

In addition, hard-wired dimming (compared to, eg X-10) ) has the added challenges/requirements of:

5) the prevalence of proprietary hard-wired systems (DMX512 is a notable exception) 6) Generally greater physical/space requirements

But there are several hard-wired dimming lighting systems that are available to DIY folks.

... Marc Marc_F_Hult

"[] have to start pulling wire to every switch and outlet in the house" ?!.

HippoSpeak Alert ;-} Does one 'have to start installing X-10 to every switch and outlet in the house' in order to use X-10 anywhere at all?

Rest assured that there nuthin about hard-wired lighting that requires this. One can have hard-wired control of a single light or outlet. The choice of which to run hardwired and which to control via PLC, RF or IR can be based on actual need and circumstances and not dogma.

But hard-wired, however reliable is not a panacea. For example, the common need for dimming lamps with cords through wall-mounted receptacles does present a special case for hard-wired dimming that is (OIME) commonly improperly installed by home-improvement enthusiasts even when the dimmer is a conventional, non-automated manual, wall-mounted dimmer and not automated (eg X-10, INSTEON, Z-wave, Centralite).

Wall outlets (receptacles) compliant with US and Canadian electrical codes are listed for either nominal 120 or 240 volts. The National Electrical Code (NEC) effectively prohibits the dimming of standard (typically "duplex") receptacles with standard dimmers through (at least):

110-3(B). Installation and Use. Listed or labeled equipment shall be installed and used in accordance with any instructions included in the listing or labeling. 404.14(E) Dimmer Switches. General-use dimmer switches shall be used only to control permanently installed incandescent luminaires (lighting fixtures) unless listed for the control of other loads and installed accordingly.

One apparently approved way to power a dimmed outlet is to use a Lutron Duplex for Dimming Use (DFDU) or Half For Dimming Use (HFDU) receptacle and For Dimming Use (FDU) mating plug.

Unfortunately, these are only UL-listed for use with 14 specific Lutron dimmer families and three control systems. Ironically, of these, the dimmers most frequently supported by the HA control systems frequently discussed in this newsgroup is RadioRA -- an RF-based system.

And a Lutron plug and receptacle cost ~$30 (! -- if you can find 'em) so dimming of portable (plug-in) lamps is one use where X-10/INSTEON/Z-wave/etc _modules_ have significant advantages over hard-wired owing to practical (don't want to burn out the vacuum cleaner) regulatory and cost considerations.

... Marc Marc_F_Hult

They've had twenty plus years to study the problem. I would HOPE that they made some improvements! :-)

Nor have I accused you of it, AFAIK. (-: It just seems to be a commonly expressed sentiment here and elsewhere.

I'm quite well aware that there are newer systems that offer far better out-of-the-box reliability than X-10 but I am faced with the issue of sunk costs. When I can't push X-10 any farther, I'll doubtless look into them much more carefully, but I feel Jeff's XTB has bought another five, if not ten years of useful life out of my X-10 system.

I also have another issue to deal with. My wife hates upgrades. She hates it when the IT staff where she works forces her to learn a new OS and new apps. She hated it when I tried to foist a One-For-All remote on her as a replacement for the X-10 remotes she had grudgingly learned to operate. Her enthusiasm for HA is roughly equivalent to my affinity for cleaning up her diarrhea covered rescue dogs when she is on travel. I deal with it, but I'd rather not! Unless an HA system comes along that makes the changeover transparent (not likely) we're probably going to continue with X-10. Monitoring her Rascal, her pregnant canine is really the first thing that's come along that's sharpened her interest in the capabilities of HA. Up until now at least, HA has, for her, mostly been a solution in search of a problem to solve.

That's a perfectly rational choice. HA component selection is obviously a multiple attribute decision making process. If I were still doing that sort of work, I'd gen up a table of qualities like tactile response, low price, high reliability and so on, and assign them a ranking to try to determine which system fit best. You've decided Insteon works well for you for a number of reasons which just happen to rank fairly low in my ordering of attributes.

I want lots of controllers spread throughout the house. I want the devices to be inexpensive. I can tolerate a modest level of mis-operation (a light failing to fire when activated by a motion sensor) and I don't much care about the feel of wall switches because there are really only three wall switches that we ever use. None of those wall switches are ever dimmed. Our requirements and preferences are clearly quite different, but that doesn't mean either of our choices are wrong.

As I've noted before I am *very* reluctant to torture the old wiring in my house for any reason. That especially includes swapping out X-10 switches that work well for us with Insteon switches that would work equally as well, but which would be completely uncontrollable by the types of control devices we rely on most. It just doesn't make sense for us and it has little to do with any boosterism for X-10 or dislike of Insteon. It's just not a practical solution for people like us who very rarely use a wallswitch for anything, especially dimming. If, when changing out the switches, I broke one of the already short and over-twisted wall wires, I'd have to do a lot of grunt work to repair it. No thanks!

We use a fairly simple setup that's affordable because X-10 modules are so inexpensive. In the rec room, for instance, the first press of B6 brings up a single incandescent fixture near the stairwell. The second press activates 1/2 of the fluorescent ceiling fixtures (every other unit). The third press turns on the remaining units. One house/unit code (and therefore one button) controls three levels of lighting.

Mostly, we only use the first level when passing by. When we're in the room, we'll light just half of it and if we're doing something that requires a lot of light, we press the button three times and all the modules come on. This is accomplished by piggybacking modules set to the same code. A very substantial benefit is that the ceiling fluorescents no longer come on after a power line interruption. The first module, connected to an incandescent lamp sometimes does, but that's a lot better than the whole room lighting up.

When piggybacked, the downstream modules don't react to the first powerline blip - only the first module does. Another benefit is that piggybacking defeats local sensing. The fixtures that used to turn themselves back on soon after being turned off no longer do so when piggybacked. Who needs local control for ceiling fixtures without switches anyway. And best of all, there's no module diode castration involved!

I came up with the idea when I used to use my X-10 RF belt controller in the color darkroom. I wanted to make sure the lights would never come on accidentally and that it would take at least two or three button presses to activate them.

It's a very practical way to vary light levels with COTS fluorescents using appliance modules and it only consumes a single unit code. I have no idea whether I could do that with Insteon or another protocol, and I would be loathe to abandon it. It's also very intuitive. Want more light? Hold the button down. The only downside is that if you want to go from all lights back to the single stairwell light, you have to turn them all off first. That hasn't been very often.

It does consume a lot of appliance modules but they can be had new for less than five bucks apiece. That's 1/4 the price of the cheapest Insteon switch, BTW. So for the price of some powerstrips and modules, I can have tri-level lighting for what a single Insteon switch would cost. I don't see any benefits, I'm afraid, only negatives if I were to switch.

-- Bobby G.

No, of course not. You may have misread the comment you cited. What I meant was that MY installation could not be replicated by standard hardwired lighting-oriented control systems unless I automated plenty of outlets as well as light switches. Since most hardwire systems are very heavily lighting oriented and very poorly outlet oriented, there's really nothing in hardwire I know of that can duplicate the functionality I have now with X-10 within a reasonable budget. I would indeed have to turn the entire house inside-out to come close with hardwiring to what I have with X-10. I hope that clarifies my comment.

To duplicate what I control with my X-10 equipment with any number of high end, hardwired system would cost thousands of dollars, take significant installation time and effort and would, to the best of my knowledge, still be unable to integrate the types of devices I can control with a single

8-in-1 X-10 RF remote.

I know my wife's reaction to more than one remote on the coffee table or the nightstand and it's not good. Nothing I've seen (at least nothing near a price point I like!) comes closes the power and flexibility of a $20 X-10 remote. One reason I've stuck so hard with X-10 is that nothing else offers the breadth of controllers and manufacturers. I can choose (and have chosen) Smarthome, X-10, Leviton, WGL, Monterey, Elk and any number of other X-10 product vendors. I have keyfob controllers, automatic timers, handheld multifunction remotes, RF wall switches, hardwired wall switches, Palmpads, panic buttons, etc. all without mortgaging the home. And they all speak the same, standard, NON-proprietary protocol. I like the idea of open systems, and that's another reason X-10 appeals to me and some of the newer protocols do not.

And one can build a replica of the Eiffel Tower from toothpicks but people don't, in my experience, automate a single light or outlet. At least not for long. The ones that do have usually just bought an X-10 starter kit and are at the very threshold of their addiction to HA. How many people do you know that have installed something like HAI/ALS or Centralite just to control a single device? I doubt it's many.

I consider myself pretty thorough at performing requirements analyses. At least I got paid well to do it in a former life. I know my needs and my environment. The only "dog ma" that's driving my HA design is my wife's newest acquisition - a terribly pregnant rat terrier - you know, like the RCA dog, Nipper, Victrolas, "His Master's Voice" etc. which I'll bet half the young whippersnappers here have never heard of!

We're trying to work out a way to monitor her crate in the basement with CCTV, temperature and sound so we know when she's about to whelp. Say, you're a sensor guru. What my wife and I *both* would like is an odor detector that can tell us if the dog has just defecated in her crate long before the smell gets into the central air handler. One teensy little rat terrier can emit a stink fog that could easily be considered chemical warfare under the Geneva Convention! :-)

Even worse is that if we don't catch an unscheduled dump in time, the dog will roll around in her own dung and that's just plain yucky. I created a false floor out of an old window fan grate so that liquid waste falls into the tray below, but solid waste only gets pushed through slowly as the dog moves around in the crate. Isn't that more than you ever wanted to know about dog dung? You'd be a hero to my wife, like Jeff and Davet are, if you could come up with a reliable poop scent detector.

So far, the only idea I've had is to mount some sort of position sensor on the dog's collar since the dog does a little dance before she poops and

*usually* turns two complete circles in the crate before opening the bomb bay doors. I know that from the CCTV monitor tapes. I suppose I could use image processing like the gent with the pet door but I don't think it would be as reliable as a poop stink detector. There's nothing funnier than both of us watching a DVD or eating dinner and watching both our noses crinkle at the same time as the sh!t literally hits the fan and we rush downstairs to minimize the dung rolling and begin the dog and crate cleanup.

On this we concur. My wife's fondness for refurbishing old table and floor lamps means that almost all our lighting comes not from ceiling fixtures, but from free-standing lamps. Ironically, neither one of us is much of a dimmer user, which is probably just as well considering we're slowly switching over to CFL's. For this sort of environment, a simple X-10 appliance module works very nicely. On the few lights we ever dim, and for those that are part of the "ALL LIGHTS ON" set, we use lamp modules and incandescent bulbs because appliance modules will not respond to that command.

X-10/INSTEON/Z-wave/etc

On this we also agree. It's easy to see why X-10 is so useful to us with our particular environment and use pattern and why I am reluctant to move to any of the current hard-wired platforms. I find it very convenient to be able to not only control all the AV devices from a single remote, but to control all of the electrical fixtures as well. Controlling all the basic AV and house functions via a single remote is something that's got very high SAF. My greatest frustration is that the UR24A remote can't operate all housecodes without a number of keypresses to reset the base housecode.

If I ever develop better soldering skills, I could even fix that by implementing Dan Lanciani's modified PIC. But it's not really that big an issue since every room now has a Control Linc Maxi all house code controller feeding into an XTB. It's a very nice setup. The only tweak I foresee is adding a switch to the Control Linc so that I can use the macro keys with the lid removed. That involves finding the internal contacts for the lid switch and leading them off to a mini pushbutton mounted somewhere on the case.

Is there any other HA protocol out there that has a 256 device programmable table top controller for under $50?

-- Bobby G.