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<DIV><FONT face=Arial>I fail to see what a discussion about X-10 has to do with
ALC problems.</FONT></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
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<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=mdhimes57@msn.com href="mailto:mdhimes57@msn.com">MARK HIMES</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=HAI-users@tssi.com
href="mailto:HAI-users@tssi.com">HAI-users@tssi.com</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Wednesday, March 19, 2008 2:27
AM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Re: [Hai-users] Problem with ALC
lighting on OmniPro II</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV><!--[gte IE 5]><?xml:namespace prefix="v" /><?xml:namespace prefix="o" /><![endif]-->
<DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>That’s really interesting. I have an Omni-Pro I, connected to a
Stargate</DIV>
<DIV>system via serial port, for many years. The Stargate and the Omni
both</DIV>
<DIV>have all (or most) of the X-10 addresses configured. In the case of
my</DIV>
<DIV>Omni (I), it only allows 1/2 of the whole X10 addressing range (128
addresses</DIV>
<DIV>instead of the full 256). I have about 220 X10 addresses configured in
Stargate,</DIV>
<DIV>So the Stargate has 99% of all these exclusively programmed for use in
the Stargate.</DIV>
<DIV>My Omni-P has about 8 X10 addresses that it will respond to but NONE of
the</DIV>
<DIV>X10 addresses are programmed to be transmitted by Omni. I programmed
the</DIV>
<DIV>Omni to allow commands to be SENT TO STARGATE that (eventually)
</DIV>
<DIV>trigger an X10 transmission FROM the Stargate. This is so that I could
</DIV>
<DIV>be sure I never had any X10 "collisions" from both of these devices and
kept </DIV>
<DIV>my programming sanity at a "sane" level.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I have NEVER had random X10 devices go on/off as randomly as your</DIV>
<DIV>experiencing. However, I have had on rare occasions 1 SINGLE
receiver/device</DIV>
<DIV>act up and using my Monterey X10 troubleshooter, found the bad
receiver</DIV>
<DIV>and/or device (1 address, 1 house code 1 number). On a couple of rare
conditions</DIV>
<DIV>I found a bunch of device addresses on the SAME house code
causing a lot of grief.</DIV>
<DIV>Again, some troubleshooting with the tool, turning off stuff, etc and
found that </DIV>
<DIV>one of my many 16-button consoles was transmitted random garbage
and</DIV>
<DIV>replaced it to get back to NORMAL. And a couple of times, many
years ago when</DIV>
<DIV>I was first programming the Stargate I discovered a several "bugs"
(all mine) in the </DIV>
<DIV>software. Some were easy and some were hard to find. but my
Stargate</DIV>
<DIV>X10 transmissions AND programming have been solid for many years.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>SOOOOOOoooooo. You didn't say how many devices or house code</DIV>
<DIV>addresses you had, but make a list of all of them and make sure that
</DIV>
<DIV>some or ALL of them are truly random.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> If all or most all are on the same house code,
you might have another</DIV>
<DIV> transmitter somewhere acting up on that SAME house
code. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> If some of the single device addresses are
"ALWAYS" part of your </DIV>
<DIV> random problem and others are NEVER a problem, you
might have some</DIV>
<DIV> devices/receivers that are bad (receiver, device,
loose connections).</DIV>
<DIV> And you might also have an address transmitter other
than Omni (console)</DIV>
<DIV> or a single device, screwing all the other
devices on the same house</DIV>
<DIV> code) I.e. mixture of single device failures along
with 1 or more </DIV>
<DIV> transmitting device failures (Other than Omni).
Always keep in mind </DIV>
<DIV> how many devices that you use ARE ALSO an
X10 transmitter !!</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> Are all the addresses (house codes and device
codes) that are part</DIV>
<DIV> of the random actions on the SAME PHASE of your power
lines ?</DIV>
<DIV> What do you use for a Phase coupler ? That could
be part of your</DIV>
<DIV> randomness problem.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I noticed you said" <EM>I have definitely seen this kind of behavior from
</EM></DIV>
<DIV><EM>X-10 switches, <U>and kind of expect it there</U></EM>. I
EXPECT A NEAR <BR>PERFECT SYSTEM ! That begs the question "HOW LONG" have you
</DIV>
<DIV>been allowing this randomness to occur ....WITH OUT CHECKING </DIV>
<DIV>THEM OUT ????? THOROUGHLY ?????</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Now the biggie. I have an Omni (I) but I NEVER have programmed</DIV>
<DIV>any X10 transmission activity into my Omni. MY reason is more </DIV>
<DIV>simpler that just sanity. My Omni programming "capabilities" are </DIV>
<DIV>hugely inferior to Stargate. I don't see that an OMNI 11 could
have </DIV>
<DIV>THAT much difference than Omni I. Actually I upgraded mine to</DIV>
<DIV>an Aegis many years ago.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>So I suggest you FIRST make a LIST of all the addresses you are
using</DIV>
<DIV>and track down the ones that DO and the ones that DON'T act up. </DIV>
<DIV>This may take a while (that's the nature of "random"), From
personal</DIV>
<DIV>experience over the many years, that is the best first step I EVER</DIV>
<DIV>take. It allowed you me see the scope of a whole problem and help</DIV>
<DIV>better isolate the next steps to take. That's part of analyzing</DIV>
<DIV>the scope and nature of a "System" and its problems.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>So AFTER you determine ALL THE ADDRESS that DO randomly operate</DIV>
<DIV>and all the ADDRESS THAT NEVER randomly operate, THEN you have a</DIV>
<DIV>better chance if isolating ..... What do all the randomly acting
devices</DIV>
<DIV>have in common, (or if its easier, maybe ask what is common about
the</DIV>
<DIV>ones that NEVER act up) ?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>Now if you've truly proven there is no single X10 device bad, or
something</DIV>
<DIV>messing up a whole X10 house code of addresses and that EVERY
device</DIV>
<DIV>code you are using is acting up and both both phases are
experiencing</DIV>
<DIV>problems .... AND your program is truly bug free then I'd say</DIV>
<DIV>something goofy is going on with your Omni. If THAT happens,</DIV>
<DIV>try another KNOWN GOOD power adapter (tat supplies power to your</DIV>
<DIV>Omni). Noisy or flakey power supplies are notorious for causing </DIV>
<DIV>intermittent problems. But if that's the case, then ALL your addresses
should be affected.</DIV>
<DIV>Also consider that your X10 Power Line Interface (converts the Omni 10
</DIV>
<DIV>commands to/from the power line, (or loose connection, bad wire, etc
etc).</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>The only thing I can truly testify is that I have had several years</DIV>
<DIV>now with ABSOLUTELY NO X10 Ghosts. It took a few years of</DIV>
<DIV>troubleshooting to get the "marginal" or even solid failing devices
</DIV>
<DIV>off my complete system and cleaning up all software bugs and </DIV>
<DIV>an occasional wall-wart. That's 190+ single X10 device/address
units, </DIV>
<DIV>over 14 X-10 transmitting devices/consoles, most with 16 buttons</DIV>
<DIV>and 25 "virtual/indirect (mostly software)" X10 addresses .</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> No
random here.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Hope all this ranting gives you a some ideas ?!</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Mark</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>From:</B> <A
title=mailto:dan@butterfields.net href="mailto:dan@butterfields.net">Dan
Butterfield</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=mailto:hai-users@tssi.com
href="mailto:hai-users@tssi.com">HAI Users Group</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Tuesday, March 18, 2008 12:38
PM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> [Hai-users] Problem with ALC
lighting on OmniPro II</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>I recently added some ALC lights (wired via cat-5 to an
OmniPro II), and am <BR>experiencing some odd lighting behavior. The
lights will periodically <BR>spontaneously turn on or off (primarily
off). This happens when no other <BR>activity is occurring in the
OmniPro II (e.g. no one is turning lights on or <BR>off, and no timed events
are triggering), and is random and unpredictable. <BR>It typically is the
case of a light turning off some minutes or hours after <BR>manually turning
it on. It occurs with different lights in the house, so <BR>doesn't
seem to be tied to one switch.<BR><BR>I am going to start trouble shooting
this by disconnecting different <BR>switches from the OmniPro II to see if
some switch is injecting commands <BR>into the system in some way, although
with the infrequent intermittent <BR>nature of the problem, it'll be a long
slow process of elimination. I have <BR>tried to eliminate all
programming that references lights, to try to take <BR>some kind of
programming error out of the equation. However, has anyone <BR>ever
encountered this kind of behavior before? Could bad connections to the
<BR>switches cause this? Is cat-5 sufficient for ALC signalling, or is
it <BR>possibile I am picking up some interference?<BR><BR>I have definately
seen this kind of behavior from X-10 switches, and kind of <BR>expect it
there, but was surprised to see it in an ALC system. I had hoped
<BR>it would be more reliable! I have a bunch more switches to
install, but am <BR>holding up because of this problem.
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