Insteon Physically Installing Devices

This page outlines a few best practices to consider when installing Insteon devices. While you can quickly wire in a new device, you might save yourself a lot of time and headaches if you stop to consider the placement of the device and properly log the details of the device.

Table of Contents Designing Your Insteon Network Physically Installing Insteon Devices Keep Track of Device Information Programming Insteon Devices Without MisterHouse

Designing Your Insteon Network

Obviously we want to install Insteon devices where they are actually needed. But sometimes there may be multiple options, some of which may be better than others.

More details about why these things matter can be found on the following pages: Insteon Signal Formats, Insteon RF Only Devices.

In short, when choosing the location for an Insteon device, you should take into consideration the following things factors:

• The proximity of the device to other devices
• The electricity circuit that they operate on
• The electrical phase that they operate on

You may need to install a dual band device, an access point, or a filterlinc if you are having problems. See Insteon Troubleshooting for a discussion of issues.

Physically Installing Insteon Devices

Devices such as Switchlincs, are wired in, meaning they require working directly with the wiring in your house. It should go without saying, that you should use extreme caution when installing such devices. Working with 120 volt electricity, which can be deadly if not respected, is beyond the scope of this document. But there are many resources online such as (suggestions for a good electricity how to online?). In addition, a licensed electrician should be more than capable of installing the devices for you. Other devices, such as Lamplincs and Appliancelincs can be plugged into any socket and do not require directly accessing your house's wiring.

If you have successfully installed the device, restore power to the device and confirm that if the device has an LED light, that it turns on. Now try changing the state of the device manually if you can. Generally, even devices that lack toggle switches, such as Appliancelinc's can be controlled by tapping the set button, generally this will cause the load to switch between on and off. If everything works move on to the next steps.

Note, if you purchased new devices, you may skip this paragraph if you like, but following it is still good practice. After the device is installed and confirmed working, you need to do a "factory reset." Generally, a factory reset is done by disabling power to the device, by unplugging it, removing the battery, or pulling the air gap for 10 seconds. Then simultaneously restore power to the device and depress the set button, holding the set button in for 10 seconds. Release the set button, and your device should power on. The intricacies of performing a factory reset on each type of device may vary, but the details are always spelled out in the instruction manual for the device. Insteon maintains a decent Repository of Insteon Product Manuals.

Keep Track of Device Information

Each Insteon device has a 3 byte hex code printed on it, such as __AB.B2.45__. This code is the device's address or ID. A device's address is very similar to a computer's IP address. An Insteon device will only respond if a message is sent to that address. It is difficult to discover these addresses if you forget to write them down. See Insteon Troubleshooting for help identifying Device ID numbers.

So when you install Insteon devices, write down their 6 digit device id, you will need that later to configure mh. The devices also generally have other information such as version number and sometimes manufacture date on them. You probably want to keep track of this information as well. You never know when you will need it (sometimes certain features are supported by certain versions) and running around the house removing cover plates is really annoying. You also want to keep track of what electrical circuit each device is installed on. This will help you in the future if you need to turn off the device. It will also help you diagnose communication issues as well. See Insteon Signal Formats for a discussion of why circuits and electrical phases matter.

Programming Insteon Devices Without MisterHouse

While it may sound odd, before you start with mh, you may want to try working with some Insteon devices using the normal "manual" method. This teaches two things:

1. How painful it can be to manage links manually
2. It will also help you better understand the Controller/Responder relationship

A more detailed discussion of what linking is and how it works is in Insteon Linking and Scenes. In short, Insteon devices have a list of devices to notify when their status changes. Devices generally only notify other devices of their status changes if they are expressly told to do so. This means that you really should keep track of the device address, a 3 byte hex code, for all of your devices.

Once you have a basic understanding of how Insteon devices work, it is time to move on to Installing MisterHouse.