Re: RF light switch

[nobody@xxxxxxxxxxxx (Dave Houston)]

"P T" <nospam@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>Please help me decide which RF light switch to choose:
>Zwave
>Insteon
>or Zeebee ( not yet available)
>Thank Ya'll

My response would be "none of the above".

For limitations common to all RF devices see...


www.echelon.com/support/documentation/analysis/005-0171A_RF_White_Paper.pdf

If, after reading the white paper, you are still interested in RF light
switches...

Insteon only uses RF as a phase bridge and (planned, but not yet available)
in remotes that communicate with the phase bridges. The actual control is
done by powerline. They have a white paper on their web site that gives the
details.

     www.insteon.net

There are ZigBee (not ZeeBee) switches available from Control 4 and
Crestron. Crestron has long had their own proprietary 418MHz and 433.92MHz
RF devices as well. An advantage of the latter is that RF capable
programmable touchscreen remotes (e.g. Pronto) can be used for control.
Crestron has a good reputation for reliability but this comes at high
prices. I haven't seen their pricing on the new ZigBee based devices.

Lutron's RadioRA also uses proprietary 418 & 433.92MHz devices but their
protocol is too complex for most programmable remotes. Like Crestron,
RadioRA has a good reputation for reliability but is costly and needs
closely spaced units.

RF control makes more sense outside North America. The FCC and Industry
Canada set very low limits on radiated power so range is very limited. Most
of systems compensate by using various repeater schemes but these require
lots of devices with relatively close spacing. (See the Echelon white
paper.) Outside of North America, limits on radiated power are much, much
higher and there are several suppliers of RF controlled switches with a wide
price range.

While ZigBee devices use a common, open source mesh networking protocol,
most companies that supply hardware will likely have proprietary
communications protocols meaning that interoperability will be unlikely
between devices from different manufacturers.