Having x10 remote actually work for a while

General Troubleshooting and Support
21

I’m merely pointing out we have a fine interface that can be adapted to many professional serial based security panels on the market today. The code can be modified for this purpose.

Many users these days are choosing their panels on the basis of how secure they are encryption wise and how they integrate with their current HA system. The X10 range of security would certainly not be on that consideration list.

I don’t see any point promoting a panel whose technology to be honest is way past its sell by date. It’s forward we need to go not backwards.

Personally I do use a number of X10 devices as part of a larger HA setup and they perform well but I wouldn’t consider investing any coding time into developing their usage any further and I definitely wouldn’t have an X10 security panel at the heart of any setup I’d consider.

22

Many that have never used X10 security modules don’t realize each sensor has a different security code which can be changed and automatically changes if the battery goes dead or they’re removed for to long. They also must be paired to a console to work with it. This is the same for the remotes. Some stranger can’t just walk down the street and press a disarm button on a x10 security flob and disarm your system. True, they may get lucky just like you may get lucky trying your car keys in every car that is the same make as yours.
No security system is hacker proof! I’ve also not found a protocol that has stood the test of time that X10 has.
Adding any brand security system into HG will improve both HG and the security system.

23

I too use the SC1200 for security alarms, both at home and across town at a business. I won’t get into the arguments for and against, the fact is it is in use. I wanted to let you know that with Tuicemen and other’s help, my KR10, KR32 keyfobs are simulated in HG and transmit thru networked wifi Broadlink unit. So HG has schedule set to automatically ARM at a given time each evening and automatically DISARM each morning as apporpriate. With each DS10 etc module added to HG, I can program them to send email when they trip during armed times (I have not done that in HG yet). But key for me to use HG and begin to retire my programmed cm15 was having HG not only receive security signals but also transmit them (via broadlink unit).

24

Mike,
You have my attention. Tell me more. Start with what model Broadlink wifi . And maybe we can go private for more details.
Pete

25

Is there a need to go private? This may be of interest to other X10 folks like us?

There is a mountain of info on this on X10 forum by Tuiceman and others:

http://forums.x10.com/index.php?topic=30444.60

Anyway, Tuiceman showed how to use a Broadlink RM remote control transmitter resent ALL x10 RF signals, even security 24&32bit codes… With his help, I taught my RM to learn any X10 code and then be able to re-transmit it. Then he showed how to use the HA-bridge & interface in HG to link HG modules to RM memorized codes.

There are lots of HA bridge & Broadlink & HG threads on the x10 forum. I wrote a how-to link all three of these together once too but got ridiculed too much and dropped it. there is a link to it on this forum somewhere.

26

Yes I have found them and have been looking through them. What model Broadlink?
RM 33 plus? I see there is now a 2018 RM33 plus for android.

27

Mike,
Found your Doc and downloaded it. Don’t understand why anyone would ridicule anyone who is trying to simplify anything. Of course I have’nt read it yet.

Pete

28

@mike spent many hours expanding that documentation which was intended for X10 users. There are many x10 bashers out there, usually they are old users of X10 that never spent the time or effort to attempt to make X10 reliable. Instead they wasted money moving from one protocol to another until they found something that worked out of the box for them.
What mike uses is the Broadlink RM 2 I believe however from my reading the newer Broadlinks have a much wider RF learning MHz field so they may be better.
I created a HA-Bridge addon program for HG which is just a modified version of the Philips Hue program already included in HG so I could use a password with HA-Bridge. If it isn’t password protected the Philips Hue program in HG will work.

29

Thanks I ordered an rm3 pro. Looking forward to playing with this. I guess I am going to use it to move away from X10 if I have to. But I have used it for 20 years now and like all it can do. Not to mention I kind of understand it. I still am hoping that x10 will get there act together with AHP or at least let me get back the functionality I had before they blew up their servers. When I ordered the power supply they had a poll on which system you liked AHP was one of them, so maybe…

Pete

30

HomeGenie will do far more then AHP will even with all its plugins.
The Broadlink RM will not require you to move away from X10 but it will expand your HA setup to include control of other RF and IR devices. I have two Broadlink RM Pros and wouldn’t part with them (except maybe for one of the newer models)
These are one way RF/IR devices except for when in learning mode and the learning mode range is a very short distance. RF transmission is very good I get about 200 feet at my off grid place but it is very open concept. The apps for it will let you know it sent the code but there is now way to tell if the code was received other then the device switching state.

31

Pete,

I was not willing to let go of my AHP until very recently; You may be able to do as I did: run both at same time… Yes, the naysayers here here YOU CAN’T DO THAT! STOP! BACKUP!! YOU WILL CAUSE ALL KINDS OF IRREPARABLE DAMAGE! NEVER, EVER, RUN TWO CM15’S AT ONCE!!!

I also do the impossible according to some: I run 3-4 TM751 transceivers to get RF sigs into my powerline from various locations around the 1000x1000’ area here with 3 separate buldings; gotta have one in the metal pole barn 800’ from everything else, and in RF deadspots I put em when needed.

I even do another major bad thinig according to some: I have V572RF32 receiver, with antenna on mast 30’ up, feedin my powerline.

Don’t mention the high power XTBR repeater to boost sigs and retransmit them across both phases of 230v here…

Whew.

So for last almost year I have done so along with second HG cm15. My original AHP into its programmed CM15, and I added a second CM15 on HG. I did NOT remove my AHP programs from the running CM15. Yes, I get double and triple repeats. But HG is robust enough to not crash as it apparently used to.

So my point is you should be able to ease into adding this HG to your present functioning AHP system as I did - as long as you have a 2nd cm15. (you can still buy them on ebay etc fairlly cheap).

Then, as you get HG up and running, you can add each AHP macro one at a time. delete them in AHP as you go or just leave them duplicated as I have for a long time. If one does not do the macro, the other will! Eventually hopefully you will get to the point you can unplug the AHP cm15 as I have.

Without the broadlink Rm pro (or newer model), you cannot replace AHP if you use security. Now you can. My only negative is HG does not offer an equivalent to AHP F2 key (Activity Monitor). HG does have a downloadable file, and you can search thru all its minutiae and locate what was sent or received, but not real time. This is the only disadvantage I see. THAT said, I still have my AHP cm15 here; I may delete my programs out of it and let it turn on again, with no retransmits but just so I can go to it and check the activity monitor (F2)!

AHP had a cool feature built into timers, available if you click the view advanced layout: multiple sends of commands. In our case, this is an absolute necessity. X10 is not reliable without it. So I have learned to program my HG schedules (equiv to AHP timers) to send XC10 commands multiple times if really important. This would be a great feature for HG to add, but they have enough other more imoportant stuff to do so I would not even ask them - since I can get around it with crative programming.

Be prepared for the assaults on this thread, saying I did very bad things to get to a full HG system and retire AHP. :slight_smile:

32

There are a lot of nay Sayers out there. Much of it is from users that just repeat what they read on the net all off which is not truthful.
Running multi transceivers is just one example it can lead to problems but not if you set things up right.
Most of these people have never even attempted to make a x10 system reliable and state X10 things are insecure because of that.

33

Mike after reading you document and now this post you are a true scofflaw. I love it.
I have 2 cm15a running and the only thing I’ve noticed is that the living room lamp blinks when turned on by a sensor.I can live with that. By the way it blinked on and off then on again when I used a LED lamp with only one cm15a. I thought that was interesting. I will slowly move off of the cm15a’s eventually. Or not.

34

Well the new 2018 RM3 pro + unit bombs. It won’t read RF even tho it advertises it does It doesn’t recognize anything I own. It fails with HA bridge. It is not seen. It fails with the RM-Bridge site ( rm-bridge.fun2code.de/rm_manage/index.html ) It give a blue star thing indicating it sees the address and connects but does not show a device list. I am sending it back and going to pout for a while.

35

The Broadlink does take so time to learn the setup process. Can you learn IR?
Learning RF is a two step process unlike learning IR and you must have the RF transmitter very close to the Broadlink (like inches away)
You must have it learn the RF frequency then learn the code nothing is shown when it learns the RF frequency.

36

@pjanits Also what firmware is your Broadlink running?
There have been several versions that don’t learn X10 RF. I believe it was odd numbered versions But I thought they had that worked out.

I had to email Broadlink and request a newer Firmware which they said I didn’t need it until I stated I needed it explaining why.

37

It was the latest they offered. I think the unit was toast. It wouldn’t even get the IR volume control for my tv.

Pete
N9SWH General Class

38

Ya that’s what they told me too! What number is it? The apps will tell you version but not always allow you to update. I had to manually update with the firmware they emailed me.

39

It did allow me to update. V52 I think. It’s boxed up now. Maybe I will order another one later. Or find an RM2

40

I looked back on my notes and it was v26 it updated to. Half of 52. Reverse dyslexia.

Pete
N9SWH General Class