Messages

1

Users / Re: Hard-wired IP light switches???

« on: February 08, 2008, 03:37:27 pm »

I'm looking for, and have been unable to find, IP light switches.  And more importantly, when I do find them, is LMCE going to be able to use them... that is if they exist...

Background: I'm currently building a house and starting the structured wiring in a couple of weeks, and have yet to install LMCE but I will when the house is finished and the core is built.  I think I do not want to use X10 or Zwave for my lighting because I think I want each light switch to have it's own rj45 port.  My google-fu is usually decent, but I am unable to find these devices...

If I am dense, tell me, but I would think this would be the ideal and best set up for my situation...

Skip

Why have you ruled out things like Z-wave and Insteon? I understand x10 has reliabilty issues, but i have z-wave at home and it works great. (although i havent set it up for MCE yet.)

2

Users / Re: Creating A Mirror

« on: January 31, 2008, 09:59:39 pm »

When I downloaded 7.10 in 64 and 32 bit version...  my speeds were generally in the 600-800K range....  that's fast...  I don't think I've ever gotten higher than that from a mirror...  in my experience torrents are just as fast if not faster...  IF enough people seed....  and with the built-in checking of the file, you can't beat it...

The problem is the difference in upload / download speeds. When you have an 10mb/768K it would take 10-15 active up loaders for every 1 downloader. When i downloaded linuxmce i was getting about 500-600K yet vs the 1-2MB/sec i get from newsgroups. This isn’t so much a complaint about torrents, but more of the way the ISPs sell bandwidth. Between the speed differential as well as the latest with blocking and forging packets to disallow p2p services in order for torrents to remain a viable distribution option something is going to have to force the isp's hand.

Which is not an issue at all when you have a few dedicated seeds (mirrors are usually also not hosted on home connections).  ISPs that interfere with your datastreams are not worth your money, get a real ISP instead. 

Unfortunatly unless you want dialup most parts of the US has one Cable provider and one DSL provider, you have no say in who that is. Each provider bids for the license for the particular markets. That is one of the issues about network neutrality, at least here in the US we dont often have the choice to "get a real ISP instead."

3

Users / Re: Creating A Mirror

« on: January 31, 2008, 09:04:39 pm »

When I downloaded 7.10 in 64 and 32 bit version...  my speeds were generally in the 600-800K range....  that's fast...  I don't think I've ever gotten higher than that from a mirror...  in my experience torrents are just as fast if not faster...  IF enough people seed....  and with the built-in checking of the file, you can't beat it...

The problem is the difference in upload / download speeds. When you have an 10mb/768K it would take 10-15 active up loaders for every 1 downloader. When i downloaded linuxmce i was getting about 500-600K yet vs the 1-2MB/sec i get from newsgroups. This isn’t so much a complaint about torrents, but more of the way the ISPs sell bandwidth. Between the speed differential as well as the latest with blocking and forging packets to disallow p2p services in order for torrents to remain a viable distribution option something is going to have to force the isp's hand.

4

Users / Re: Creating A Mirror

« on: January 30, 2008, 08:41:07 pm »

I have been thinking about looking into how to upload it to a newsgroup. I know i typically prefer to download large ISO files and updates from newsgroup postings due to the speed i get over any other download method with a good newsserver.

5

Users / Re: Intermatic Ha22 usb stick

« on: January 29, 2008, 05:30:36 pm »

I am kind of supprised that no one has commented on this yet? if these are infact working linux drivers this could be a nice boost in the zwave hardware support.

6

Users / Re: Minimum Processor?

« on: January 26, 2008, 03:06:14 am »

BTW, what issues are you having with live tv? I dont use zwave so im sorry to say i cant help with that.

i dont have it up and running yet, but i am just about to start purchasing zwave equipment as well as a few tuners to start doing live tv. what i have seen on the forums is that live tv quality can be quite hit or miss with many people having performance or lock up issues with using live tv.

I haven't time to upgrade to any of the new betas so I cant speak to if any issues were fixed though I did notice a thread about myth still locking up. Is there a reason in particular that you are choosing zwave? DDamron has done some awesome work with insteon and I think that might be something you look into before you buy the zwave. Not trying to sway you, just pointing out the different options.

As far as the live tv in 0704 - i can watch tv directly by bypassing lmce. myth locks up while watching unless I rewind a few seconds (found that in another thread). I would wait on the tuners until its more stable but then maybe the issues have been fixed since I last read about.

I'll try and find those links and direct you to them.

i am going zwave because i can get the switches cheap.

7

Users / Re: Minimum Processor?

« on: January 25, 2008, 11:09:51 pm »

BTW, what issues are you having with live tv? I dont use zwave so im sorry to say i cant help with that.

i dont have it up and running yet, but i am just about to start purchasing zwave equipment as well as a few tuners to start doing live tv. what i have seen on the forums is that live tv quality can be quite hit or miss with many people having performance or lock up issues with using live tv.

8

Users / Re: Minimum Processor?

« on: January 25, 2008, 05:49:32 pm »

ok, now that this bug is in my head.... i set about looking for this information and lo and behold it isnt easy to glean by any means that I could tell.

This is what I was referring to in my post. When I first came here, I did read everything I could find in the wiki and performed several searches in the forum, but there were still a few categories where the info did not seem complete or was contradictory in nature, so I posted a thread about it. And I have to say I did get a similar response along the lines of "don’t bother us and figure it out yourself, and if you cant figure it out yourself then it’s not our fault that other users haven’t properly documented their experiences". The questions I had, and even with the time I have been here still have, mostly regarded the playback of live TV and zwave integration. Both of those in the sample video as well as in the wiki were shown in such a way to seem seamlessly supported, yet in actuality seem to have quite a few issues and are not as supported as they are advertised.

I feel that many of these questions can be easily taken care of with a simple well maintained sticky of the most frequently asked questions right at the top of the user forum.

9

Users / Re: Minimum Processor?

« on: January 24, 2008, 06:38:56 pm »

So your one of those guys 

The Wiki does not have the info to answer my question.  Tom gave me the answer I was looking for.  There is no reference to the minimum processor needed to smoothly display High Def.  There is no reference to High Def at all for that matter that I can see.

Maybe you should do some searching yourself before playing tough guy.
It's people like you that turn others away.

I have to agree with this, If the forums get under your skin so much, maybe you should step back a bit and take a deep breath, you do not need to personally respond to every thread. Your negitive responses are not adding anything to the project and if anything are driving people away that may otherwise add some sort of valuable input or promotion to the project. I recall a thread reciently in regards to foldering that you participated in that i think hit the nail on the head. The quote i am refering to is from ChrisBirkinshaw in http://forum.linuxmce.org/index.php?topic=1842.30 about media organization.

I've worked in a consulting role on a number of UI projects within the multimedia and broadcast industry, and have found some of the responses in this thread alarming and to be honest a bit worrying. I'm really concerned that LMCE is going to remain stuck in the same place because a few people are being stubborn about certain issues.

Joe Bloggs says "I find it really tedious to wash all these dishes".
Everyone else says "Stop being lazy, it isn't that hard!"
Joe Bloggs is an edge case.

...

If someone says media is too hard to navigate, then perhaps they have a point. They might be wrong on the detail, they might be stupid, they might not have read the manual, it might piss us off that they ask before thinking it out properly, but you have still have to take their experience of the product into account. They are the general public, and the general public should be able to use LMCE - right? Or do we want it to remain a geek-tool hidden away from the mainstream? This isn't what the simple DVD install suggests.

You and i have already had this converation once in the past in the thread that i posted when i was looking for help when i first came here. And on some level you are right, more people need to document their experiances, but by broaching the subject in the way you are with these threads you are driving valuable members away from participating and providing their experiances in this forum and possably from linuxMCE all together.

10

Users / Re: Minimum Processor?

« on: January 24, 2008, 06:21:40 pm »

Thanx Tom, that's what I was looking for.

Golgoj4,  why post if you have nothing useful to contribute?   There seems to be quite a bit of people out here that do nothing but tell people to "search the forums".   The forums are to help people, not tell them to do what they already did.  The facts are the Wiki is not well organized or 100% accurate.  Searching the forums does not always return results, especially when people have a different sense of terminology or don't know exactly what they are asking for.  So instead of wasting yours and everyone else's time in the forums why don't you contribute to the Wiki so there are less repetitive questions that are so painful for you to help out with.

On that point, is there something wrong with the wiki that makes it non searchable, or was i just missing somehing when i tried?

You missed something...

Yeah, but something is off with the wiki search, the reason i was thinking it didnt work was i tried to search for n770 or 770 to find the directions for building the n770 orbiter. However the Wiki search doesnt get hits for either of those searches, which lead me to belive that the search was not functional because i knew both of those terms should have resulted in hits.

11

Users / Re: Minimum Processor?

« on: January 24, 2008, 04:37:54 pm »

Thanx Tom, that's what I was looking for.

Golgoj4,  why post if you have nothing useful to contribute?   There seems to be quite a bit of people out here that do nothing but tell people to "search the forums".   The forums are to help people, not tell them to do what they already did.  The facts are the Wiki is not well organized or 100% accurate.  Searching the forums does not always return results, especially when people have a different sense of terminology or don't know exactly what they are asking for.  So instead of wasting yours and everyone else's time in the forums why don't you contribute to the Wiki so there are less repetitive questions that are so painful for you to help out with.

On that point, is there something wrong with the wiki that makes it non searchable, or was i just missing somehing when i tried?

12

Users / Re: Economical Insteon+X10 HA?

« on: January 10, 2008, 10:28:14 pm »

First, let me say thanks to Dan for the hard work with the insteon driver.

So right now it looks like Z-wave has the most end device controllers but least support in LMCE and insteon has up to date support but lacking in end devices unless you are ok with the slower and less reliable X10 devices.

Looks to me like from a home automation stand point we are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

I am in the process of buying some zwave equipment right now because the total selection seems to be broader / more affordable with the hopes that some break through will come out for zwave support (even if i need to get my hands on an old controler).

That breakthrough could be when you update LMCE to use your Z-Wave equipment, and share it with everyone else. That's the kind of place the rest of LMCE's breathroughs have come from.

I would love to, but in all honesty i come from a windows world and am great with hardware but have next to zero experiance with code and linux. The last time i touched code was QBasic in highschool and PBasic for some parallax controlers i was playing around with. Dont take what i am adding as critisim, its not i think everyone who is contributing is doing a great job. I am merely adding my voice to an area that as a user i feel could use some development and trying to gather support on the zwave platform so that hopefully there will be a large enough of an user base that it is a worth while development project for someone with the experiance and skills nessicary to tackle it.

13

Users / Re: Economical Insteon+X10 HA?

« on: January 10, 2008, 08:58:35 pm »

First, let me say thanks to Dan for the hard work with the insteon driver.

So right now it looks like Z-wave has the most end device controllers but least support in LMCE and insteon has up to date support but lacking in end devices unless you are ok with the slower and less reliable X10 devices.

Looks to me like from a home automation stand point we are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

This is exactly what i have been noticing. I am in the process of buying some zwave equipment right now because the total selection seems to be broader / more affordable with the hopes that some break through will come out for zwave support (even if i need to get my hands on an old controler). If not i guess ill just stick to the windows control software for the system.

14

Users / Re: Insteon and ZWave compatable controlers

« on: January 03, 2008, 07:25:04 pm »

So how does the bidirectional stuff work?  I understand the concept as it relates to a thermostat:  if you change the temperature locally, the controller knows it (right?)  But what about a lamp?  If I hit the (local) switch on the lamp, the controller I guess knows it's off, but it can't turn it on again, right? 

Actually, it CAN if it wants to...
anything you do remotely, (meaning using a switch to turn off/on, or dim) gets reported back to lmce.  This allows lmce to MONITOR the system as a whole..
It's not just for lighting...
An X10 Hawkeye PIR sensor and a X10 RF Transceiver are quite cheap, and can easily be implemented as a security device..  when it senses motion, it sends out an X10 signal.  The Insteon PLM interface (also sees X10) sees that signal and reports it to lmce.

HTH

Dan

But if the power is cut to the lamp locally, how can the controller turn it back on?

This is assuming that you used a wall switch to shut off power to the outlet the switch is plugged into.

15

Users / Re: What HA Protocol do you (want) to use with LMCE?

« on: January 02, 2008, 05:00:20 pm »

I figure i would toss my response from the other thread in here incase you miss it over there

Also a co-worker and myself are really looking forward to zwave support, so we would be willing to send you some hardware to do the development if that is something you would be willing to take on. Let me know what you would need.
Thanks