Re: XTB - the Future of X10 has arrived!

["Robert Green" <ROBERT_GREEN1963@xxxxxxxxx>]

"Marc F Hult" <MFHult@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message

<stuff snipped>

> It is also helpful to the all technologies to candidly assess
> SWOT's (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats).
> IMO, this is one of the recurring issues with some conversations
> in c.h.a .  -- namely the need for partisan  identification and
> endorsement  'winners' at the expense of accuracy and
> completeness and refraining from hyperbole.

Each and every newsgroup I've visited suffers from those "recurring issues."
Having "favorites" is human nature and it's likely not to disappear from the
behavioral characteristics of Usenetters any time soon.  I probably wouldn't
have to look very hard to make the very same claims about you that you're
making about others.  People elide information from their posts that tend
not to support their contentions.  People repeat inaccurate information as
if it gained the power of truth by simple repetition.  Such has been the
nature of human discourse since long before Plato.  We do it subconsciously,
I am sure.

> >As I've said in earlier posts, the $1000+ I've spent converting to
> >Insteon has yet to yield any real benefit over X10,
>
> What did you convert from? Folks migrating from a couple of dozen x10
WS467
> wall switches to a like number of $19.99 INSTEON wall switches will both
> find it hard to spend anything like $2000 and will enjoy immediate payback

Your concern about comments made "at the expense of accuracy" U-turns very
well to rest on your own shoulders.  I assume your "hard to spend anything
like $2000" comment is at least partially predicated on mine that to switch
to another protocol and system would cost me $2000.  (It could be you chose
the $2000 number completely by chance and his has nothing to do with my
comments.  If so, accept my apologies.)

If your comment was to challenge to my assumption that it would cost *me*
$2K to changeover, the truth is I could spend that in a heartbeat on some of
the wired automation systems I've been looking at. You're subconsciously
"playing your favorite" - which seems to be Insteon - without thinking about
whether I was even talking about that protocol or something else entirely.

I don't think I will be using PLC in the next system I install.  Why?
Because there's no guarantee that 10 years from now Insteon won't face
issues similar to X-10 as the environment and powerline next noisier and
more complex.  The only way to beat that is to go hard wired.

That brings to the surface another apparently erroneous assumption: that all
the average large X-10 user possesses is a couple of dozen WS467's and
that's all we'll need to convert.  Highly inaccurate.  It's pretty easy to
not get things right because of incorrect foundational assumptions?  We all
do it, even we perfekt people.  :-)

I know pretty much to the dollar what my X-10 installation is worth and what
it would cost to replace it.  Unless you know electricians that work for
free, I suggest that $2000K is a *very* conservative estimate of switchover
cost.  It assumes no pigtails break off in the boxes (it's happened twice so
it's probably going to happen again and it's the bitch of the century!!!).
It assumes all goes well and it's a simple switch in and out.  In fact,  it
assumes all sorts of things not entered into evidence that are contrary to
my experience, as well as the posted experience of others.

Bruce said he spent $1000+ doing the conversion and that was at a "good
buddy/great deal" price.  He's retained a Stargate from his previous setup
that I recall him saying would cost another $1000 to replace.  So your
assumption anyone would be "hard pressed" to spend $2000 ripping out an X-10
system is in reality "hard pressed" to survive in the face of challenges
from both my inventory valuation and projected electrician costs and Bruce's
actual experience switching away from X-10.

Allow me to break out your remaining comments one by one about what my
spending from ?$ to $5K will allow me "to enjoy" [with my replies in
straight brackets like this]:

a) tactile response  [Not great but not worth $2000 to improve]

b) visual aesthetics [Not great but not worth $2000 to improve]

c) possibly better hash filtering [I'm not going to pull X10 for that!]

d) probably longevity of the hardware (my WS 467's fail with appalling
regularity)   [At the X-10 price, so what?  But I challenge your longevity
estimate with the fact that I still have old paddle style switches that work
just fine. I also counter with the many reports of defective Smarthome gear
that had to be returned, often more than once, for refurbishing or repair.
Maybe your electrical power isn't well-regulated or you hooked up the WS467
switches backwards.  They do have differently colored wires and since I
began paying attention to hooking them up as directed in the instruction
sheets, I've had no more failures.  I freely admit that I did experience
several failures with the original X-10 wall switches.  I changed to Stanley
switches, which I got for $3 each at closeout, and for whatever reason, none
have failed.  That means at least 5 years without a single switch failure.
I've had perhaps 4 controllers go flaky, as well as a few other items but
the replacement cost and bother is really just noise.]

e) freedom from interdevice interference  [Only time will tell!]

f) lack of start-up flash when dimming  [No issue for X-10 2-way lamp
modules and wall switches]

g) accurate dim levels  [Oh come on, who REALLY cares?  OK, maybe some HA
supergeeks do but we don't even dim our lights so why would we care?]

h) ability to logically gang switches [I can electronically "gang" them by
using the same unit codes.  ALL ON/OFF is all the ganging I really need.]

i) and so on.

Well, sorry, Marc, nothing so far has convinced me I need to leave X10.  In
the interests of accuracy, the flashing dimmer problem only affects the $5
lamp modules.  Spend a little more, get a little more - if you need it.

Now, let's look, as objectively as I can, at my side of the equation
(although I've listed these items a number of times before).

a) I save money - lots of money, by not converting.  I say it's $2000+ and
since it's my setup, you'll have to agree that it's highly likely I know
more about what I own than you do.  Could it be that you're failing to
assess a fair market value to the cost of an electrician (or my time) to
perform the switchover?  $5K is more like what the new system will really
cost, but since it will be in a new house, it's not as onerous as making the
change now would be.  Doing the upgrade at that time it becomes a case of "I
had to install a new system anyway."  It's really the only time when
installing a hardwired system is truly feasible, at least IMHO.

b) I save lots of time and effort not learning new software and hardware
interfaces.  I don't have to scour the web looking for shareware apps to
enroll all my modules.  I don't have to run all sorts of beta software for
all the new hardware I didn't buy, either.  This is one of the reasons that
there's not so much HA discussion in CHA these days.  Anyone who wanted to
automate did, and in their own ways.  So there's lots less to talk about
than there was in the beginning when the really smart people were still
finding their way.  Sadly, in CHA, we often end up chewing on the same old
bones.

c) I have testers and other tools for X-10 that don't even seem to EXIST yet
for other protocols.

d) I have an ever-growing amount of experience in dealing with X-10's
foibles that makes new problems much easier to solve than they used to be
when X-10 was new to me.

e) I can get new X-10 equipment dirt cheap as Ebay sellers panic and dump
their stock, probably assuming Insteon's going to kill the X-10 market.
That means I can go very, very deep in spares for very little money.

f) There's a plethora of equipment that exists for X-10 that's apparently
not going to be available for other platforms for a long time, if ever.
Phone controllers, universal modules, universal remotes, Robdogs,
Sundowners, etc.  If I convert, I lose mucho functionality and gain things
(like accurate dim levels) that I don't give a whit about.  Where's the
logic in that?

g) I get to postpone what protocol I would like to change to until the wars
are over and a winner emerges.  There's no guarantee that Smarthome will be
around for ever.  I remember when the well-capitalized Cybergenie phone
makers went bankrupt.  Here one day, gone the next and the only spares are
what's out in the market already.  Their intellectual property went into
deep freeze along with all remaining stock -  that got sold a few years
later when its value had all but vanished.

I'm sorry if that point-by-point breakdown still sounds like some partisan
boosterism.  I've tried to make it as logical a requirements and systems
analysis as I could, and it really pertains only to me.  I don't like X-10
for emotional reasons, as partisanship might imply.  I like it because it
gets the job done as cheaply as possible, leaving me money to spend on other
things.  That's important to both me and the exchequer, my wife.

I'm with Bob Bass on this one.  Smarthome violates the "eggs in one basket"
rule for me, at least for now.  Plus, I've never had an X-10 appliance or
lamp module codewheel reset to A1 but it seems to be a popular pastime for
at least some Smarthome products.  Admittedly, that's based solely on the
number of posts I've seen along the lines of "my X-linc loses its address"
and not direct experience.  But it came from people I know to be reliable in
at least same cases.

Yes, once again undermining my own points, I find the X-10's MD and keychain
controllers are notorious for resetting to A1, too, but there are
workarounds for that, too.  I am in no hurry to switch anymore, now that the
XTB has arrived.  For me, avoiding an upgrade that saves me lots of time,
effort and money is a "change in the way I live and work."  That's why I am
so effusive about the XTB and why I think some of the other 5 million X-10
users will be as well.

--
Bobby G.