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[john]

AHP is garbage.  My appologies, but this is
the impression I have after three years of
using it, right from the original ActiveHome
version 1. Now I have AH *PRO* with ALL the
plugins (MyHouse, Smart Macro, Eye Witness,
etc...) and nothing works right.
I have tried on Windows 2000 Workstation,
Windows 2000 Server, Windows XP Professional.
I have all kinds of problems with this thing:
- AHP just closes with no error message - the
AHP window will just close.  I come home from
work MOST of the time and see that AHP is
gone.  Windows is still running, but no AHP.
I have not been able to find any help or any
logs or anything.  Is it a macro, or a timer,
or what ?.....
- Smart Macros don't work - Whether day or
night, it ALWAYS turns my spotlights on as
well as the cameras, although I have designed
it so that the spotlights don't come on
during the day since they are not really
needed.  I have emailed ahpsupport 7 times
with no response.  I have tried the dusk/dawn
function, I have tried time ranges, I have
tried Daytime/Nighttime objects...NOTHING works.
- Timers don't work - I have set up some
lights to come on at dusk, and none of them
ever come on at dusk.
- MyHouse Online is crap - it is unreliable.
Sometimes it connects, and others it doesn't,
without me changing any network/firewall
settings.  It fails more often than it
connects. Completely un-reliable.
- The CM15A is crap - Its RF recieve range is
virtually zero.  I built a quarter-wavelength
ground plane antenna for it and modified the
antenna connection, and it is better now (YES
X-10, I KNOW I VOIDED MY WARRANTY FOR IT, BUT
WHAT DOES IT MATTER ?!  AHP DOESN'T REALLY
WORK ANYWAY !!!)

Again, I am sorry, but these are my comments
and impressions.  Before AHP I had found and
was using HouseBOT, in combination with
Windows Media Encoder 9 and some DOS scripts
to record video.  Now THAT program is
RELIABLE !!!  I used the MR26A as the RF
reciever, and the old CM11A serial module to
transmit signals onto the wire.  But no
pan-n-tilt unfortunately.
This is why I wanted AHP...EVERYTHING IN ONE.
So I spent the money and time and bought it,
and ALL its modules.  What a waste of time
and money.  And I see no fixes or solutions
on the forums.  And not from support either.

VERY VERY DISAPPOINTING ...
Going to continue searching and see if I can
find something else.  I wasted enough time
and money on this already.

[arf1410]

though I basically agree with your points -
AHP / CM15A isn't nearly as reliable as my
CM11A, your message looses much credibility
when you begin with stating "after three
years of  using it," - AHP was released in
Sep/Oct 2004, so you haven't been using it
for more than 15 months (unless a beta
tester, but still not 3 years)

[X10 Pro]

John says he started using ActiveHome and
then moved to AHP, and has used them both for
a total of 3 years.

Anyway, this a tough one. I can understand
the frustration you're feeling if nothing is
working for you. Despite bugs and various
other problems, I don't think the experience
you've had is typical. We'd be happy to work
with you to try to make ActiveHome Pro work
better for you.

[fred]

John i'm sympathetic.
My CM15A have some problems since six
months.
Loss memory, lost RF, lost communication
with USB...  what happen?  I try, I try, I
try... but nothing works.

[paul]

I just want to jump in and say that I am very
pleased with ActiveHome Pro.  I have had it
about a year now.  The hard thing was finding
the right location in the house to place it
so that the signal reaches all parts.

The one bug I have ran into is the
Conditional Macros.  If you have a condition
that includes 10 PM to 4 AM the macro does
not work properly.  Tho fix the problem I
changed it to 10:00-11:59 PM and 12:00-4:00 AM.

I am happy enough with ActiveHome Pro that I
going to jump on this $49 email offer for AH
Pro, iWitness, MyHouse Online and Smart
Macros.  I think this is probably the best
deal I can remember on X10.

The main reason for the purchase will be the
iWitness plug-in but I think I read something
about the AH Pro USB Module changing slightly
since I purchase my original unit.

[b wallace]

The worse part is the support, I just got
off the phone with them and was disapointed
again. I, like John have purchased every
add on availible i.e. all the software for
the old X10 and now for the new AHP except
for the my house, I called to see if i
could get the new software for free since I
had already spent 150 bucks on the other
software and they are offering it all for
49 dollars, they of course said no way!
Sorry X10 you have lost another loyal
customer.

[john]

Thanks X10 Pro for reading my post so
CAREFULLY unlike some people.  I KNOW when AH
*PRO* was released because I BOUGHT it !

My message credibility is intact.  Arf1410's
however is questionable.

Like B Wallace, I have tried support.  I
contacted them TWICE for the MyHouse
component.  The support person asked me to
create a user name for him so that he could
try connecting and testing it for himself.
Did he ever connect?  NOPE.

I called several times and must have sent a
DOZEN emails to AHP support, but NEVER got
anything back.

[X10 Pro]

John: If you want to try again, you can send
me connection information at ahpsupport@x10.com.

[john]

Thanks for the offer.  It works off and on
without me changing any network or firewall
settings. This is the problem.
Another REALLY CRIPPLING problem is that AHP
keeps on crashing !  Kinda defeats the
purpose of all the macros and video recording
if it's not running!  The program just
closes, with no error message or notice at
all.  I have not been able to determine what
is casuing the program to just close.  Seems
to be random.  Does AHP write to a log file
or something like that?  There doesn't seem
to be any Event Log entries either in
Windows.  It just plain shuts down.

[ryan b]

The biggest problem I have had is the active
home pro interface box seems to crash in the
middle of the night... my lights do not come
on in the morning and I am late to work! I
don't know if I have a defective interface
or what, but it has happened quite a few
times. Does anyone have any thoughts? Thanks

[andre]

Hi Ryan,
I came up with the mod last year that
adds 4 additional capacitors to the CM15A
circuit board.  Everyone that has applied
the mod has done so because of timers and
macros that have ceased to behave.  All
units that have been modified are rock
solid stable.
USB problems may be related because one
of the symptoms of the microcontroller
loosing its mind is that the USB interface
doesn't work when the macros go stupid.
The mod is simple and takes about 10
minutes to implement.  You require 4 0.1uf
ceramic capacitors. Axial or radial or even
surface mount types work.  Apply them to
the following locations on the board:
one across C11, one across C12, one across
pins 1 and 8 of U2 the 24C64, and one
across pins 6 and 11 of U1 the CY7C63723
microcontroller.  The problem is that
transients get into the power supply and
they don't mess up the microcontroller
enough to kick off the internal watchdog
reset, but enough sanity is lost so that
timers and macros don't behave correctly.
This mod won't fix problems with AHP
(maybe they're linked) but it will return
stability to your CM15A.
If you implement the mod, I'd like your
feedback.  Cheers.

[carmine]

Because I have been disturbed by the f@#$#%%
## email notification problems I will add
my 2 cents:
AHP is at the bottom of the scale for cost
and quality, if it meets your needs great,
if it does not, no amount of complaining
will improve the product as most peoples in
this forum will not pay an higher price for
a better product, its best to move on.
The major flaws with the CM15a is loss of
the clock, when that happens any macros
relying on time will stop working, if the
CM15a is connected to a PC it will have
it’s clock reset from the PC, that is why
people that have it connected 24/7 have
less problems. X10 signals (not X10 the
company) are being attenuated by modern
electronic appliances like Computers, TV
and even those nice LED’s night lights, if
anyone is serious about using this
technology he/she should have an X10 signal
strength meter, many calls to tech support
are related to weak signal and poor phase
coupling.

[Dan Lawrence]

Firstly, the e-mails have been turned off.
X10 Pro announced it.

Secondly, much of the problems have been
either bad programming (as noted in the 3.200
release) in the base AHP program and possible
problems with the add-ons, either bad
programming or PC hardware related problems.
Not every piece of programing is bad.

As of late X10 is trying to be more
pro-active in correcting software problems.

It as been noted in other PC magazines: The
more features that are added to software, the
more chances are that things will go wrong.

My X10 system has no cameras, as I don't need
them. I don't need fancy macros, nor do I
need to access my system through the web or
create new X10 programs, either.

My CM15a runs my timers, the single macro I
have and does it flawlessly.

Any communication problems I have had are
line noise problems. Solution: Plug-in
Fiters. Noise problem goes away.

As Levar Burton, as Geordi Laforge, said: "I
love technology. When it works."

[john]

Some of us bought AHP for the advertised
functions, such as cameras and apn-n-tilt
(which all my 6 cameras have).  So the
solution is not to lessen your use to the
point whre it becomes stable.

X10, you offered earlier to work with me to
solve my AHP issues.  HIGHEST on my priority
list is the AHP shutting down without any
error or message.  If I can just keep the
damn thing running, I may be able to do
something with it.

[KWG22]

Info of some use?-
I was having problems with programs just closing, no error messages, etc. as you describe.
My problem seemed to be in some bad computer memory.
I think it happened with more than one program though.