I've just been handed a box of Insteon stuff -- a few years old, but still new in the box -- and I'm not sure whether I have a box of stuff I should try to sell, or a really cool project in the making.

I love technology, though I'm often slow to adopt it. Take Alexa for example. I think there's a TON of coolness in that, but I"m not about to introduce it to my own home. Home automation is something I've wanted to get into for a good long while, but I'm hesitant to put things that control my house on the internet -- too much opportunity for hacking, mischief, or other bad ju-ju.

For a bunch of years I've had some X-10 stuff around, mostly for the convenience of programmable timers on lights, and especially for the Christmas lights. That's neat stuff, and I've wanted to expand on it, though budgets get in the way from time to time as well.

I know Insteon is somewhat more expensive than X-10, but it seems like it's got a good bit more capability. Maybe I'm wrong.

This box-o-goodies came with a hub (2242-222), a pair of 2450 I/O Linc units, and a handful of water leak sensors. The leak sensor use is sort of obvious. What cool things can I do with the rest of what I've got, or without spending a fortune on other devices? Or should I just find someone who wants to add them to an existing system?

I have a mix of X-10 and Insteon plug in adapters. I've used home automation since the mid-80's (started with X-10 and a simple timer controller) for lighting and a radio. Moved to a more automatic system a few years later, and moved to a Universal Devices controller a few years ago. That is when I stared also using Insteon. I'm also looking to try out some Z-Wave devices.

While my system is quite small now, I hope to expand it when I move at some point. I've not used the Insteon hub. The Universal Devices unit, while it has a learning curve, has the ability to move times to follow expected sunrise and sunset times throughout the year.

I'm looking now at the Insteon thermostat (2441TH). It looks like a good thing.

It allows the program mode I have on my existing Honeywell (wake, leave, return, sleep), plus the option to change it from outside. Example: traveling on a cold weekend, and wanting to warm the house up a little before I get back home.

Looks like I've got a LOT of learning to do on this.

Do Insteon and X-10 get along? Could I have my Insteon hub control the existing X-10 plug-in gadgets? Or am I misunderstanding the hub?

I have a Honeywell thermostat that is Wi-Fi enabled. I can change things via an app on my phone. If I want to spend some time on it, I could integrate it into my current system. I've left is separate as I don't have the ability to change the automation system from elsewhere right now.

Went to Insteon to control my outside lights after my X-10 devices became unreliable. Initially X-10 light switches worked fine but over time as more devices that introduce noise into the house electrical circuits were added they could not be depended on. I replaced them with Insteon and even with noise filters, signal booster, phase bridges, and anything else that could clean up/reduce the noise, I could not get reliable function.

This was complicated by the terrible failure rate of the Insteon switches. With my last purchase 2 of the 5 were DOA and one of the ones that worked failed within a month. Neither of the 2 replacements worked. Currently out of the 5 Insteon lights only one operates remotely. They will all be replaced with Z-Wave units.

*** Update April 2022 *****

Insteon appears to be gone

more here

I suppose that's the risk of buying Hardware that is dependent one someone else's servers.

easy come, easy go.

You are a typical engineer. I am not obviously. I prefer to be hands on with stuff around the house. I do go so far as to have a doorbell and the house came with an intercom. I know I have limited repair skills if something goes wrong.

Over time the last ones standing are going to be Amazon, Google, and Apple.

Alexa has a 70% market share in the US.

Amazon keeps coming out with its own products to compete with third parties.

I think they are going to eat most other companies lunch in the home automation market.

I'd been using X-10 stuff for years. Problem was: As the power lines became increasingly noisy from all the electronic gadgetry plugged into them, the X-10 devices became increasingly less reliable.

I fixed it, for a while, with a really good X-10 repeater, but then my new espresso machine, of all things, hobbled even that.

Enough was enough.

I'd been looking at alternatives for years. Long story short: Unless I wanted to invest a lot into a lot of roll-your-own integration, it would be Insteon or Lutron's Caséta.

Insteon was more whole-smart-home-y than Caséta in that Insteon controlled more, whereas Caséta is more limited--mainly light dimmers. But light dimmers was mostly what I needed and, for some reason, I just never much liked Insteon.

I went with Lutron Caséta.

Turned out to have been a wise move.

I doubt Caséta is going away. Lutron is a major electronics/electrical products company. Caséta is essentially the homeowner's/entry-level version of Lutron's more extensive, more capable RadioRA 2 and RadioRA 3 pro-grade home automation systems.

One nice aspect of Caséta is it's so brain-dead easy to add new devices. You simply install the switch, dimmer, or plug-in module; bring the Caséta app up on your phone or tablet; tell it you want to add a device; it steps you through some questions; then tells you to push a certain control on the switch, dimmer, or module for ten seconds; tells you when it's seen it, and you're done.

Same with adding Pico remotes.

Another nice thing about Caséta is it doesn't require cloud services for day-to-day operations: Does Lutron Caseta Work Without The Internet?

ETA: I got curious about the time thing (mentioned in the article above), so I put a special rule in my router to log traffic coming from our Lutron Caséta Smart Bridge, destined for the Internet.

The good news is they're using Internet-standard NTP (Network Time Protocol) for time. The maybe less-than-ideal news is they're using some-or-another cloud services provider's NTP servers, rather than ntp.org.

ETA2: Then it occurred to me: If the Lutron Caséta Smart Bridge is using the typical vanilla NTP client configuration, it probably is using the ntp.org "pool" of servers.

This "pool" of servers is a round-robin kind of thing. The servers to which each ntp.org pool host points changes from time-to-time, to spread the load across all the volunteer servers.

Sure enough: One of the hosts in ntp.org's current pool points to a host address owned by that cloud services company.

What this all means is that, even in the remote likelihood (IMO) Lutron discontinues the Caséta line: Our Smart Bridge should continue to fill its role.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: ensigmatic,

We remodeled our family room and living room about 15 years ago and installed Insteon controls for the lighting. Every couple of years a component would fail, I finally got fed up and ripped out all the Insteon crap and went back to normal wall switches.

quote:

Originally posted by radioman:
*** Update April 2022 *****

Well! How about that?! That pretty well stinks. It also, however, makes me glad I hadn't invested more (time nor money) in this Insteon stuff. Thank you for the heads-up.

I've had mixed results with X-10 gear (great for the Christmas lights... sometimes) -- heck, I use a few X-10 pieces at work reliably. Thank you, ensigmatic, for the Caséta review and for the article link. Caséta looks like the way to go if I get back into the idea of automating my little hut. For as long as is practical, I want to avoid Alexa and the like.

I still have a few items on that and I guess I’m going to accelerating replacement planning.

Several years ago I did have the hub die, got it replaced under warranty. The process to add all of the devices was a real pain.

Just switched the kitchen and dining to Lutron Caseta and seems to be a better setup.

quote:

Originally posted by vthoky:
Thank you, ensigmatic, for the Caséta review and for the article link. Caséta looks like the way to go if I get back into the idea of automating my little hut.

You're welcome.

I've been pleasantly surprised by how well it works.

There was one light, a Lowe's-branded LED ceiling light, that suffered the dreaded Caséta "blinking light syndrome." (You turn the light on and, instead of coming on, it blinks on-and-off repeatedly.) I replaced that ceiling fixture with one from Costco and problem solved.

The wall and lamp modules have worked flawlessly with every other LED bulb and fixture in the home--including the LED Christmas tree lights. (You can set any dimmer to operate in only on/off mode.) I had one very small, separate string that glowed dimly when off, but it did that with an X-10 appliance module, too.

quote:

Originally posted by vthoky:
For as long as is practical, I want to avoid Alexa and the like.

Caséta can integrate with Apple HomeKit and Siri, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant, but you don't need them.

I had ours integrated with HomeKit and Siri for a while. It worked pretty well. I subsequently became annoyed with, and a bit less trusting of, Apple. So I did-away with HomeKit and completely disabled Siri on everything.

Haven't really noticed any real decrease in convenience.