Subject: From: Date:

Re: [ECS] hv dimming Dan Carrington Sun, 04 Oct 1998 14:08:42 -0700

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Something to consider.  It could be the X10 dimming units themselves.  I
have some Newtone decora wall switches that are standard X10 dimming. 
If I send an on command from a remote and then hold down the dim button
on the remote, the light will come on then dim down to off.  If I
actually look closely at the lightbulb filliment and listen carefully, I
can see the filliment glow slightly and hum at 60hz.  The actual x10
dimmer unit will not go fully off.  I can hold down the dim button till
the cows come home and it will not go off further.  ECS will show that
light at 0% as it should.  If I then hit the off button for that light,
the light goes fully out and the humming stops.  This problem, mine at
least, has nothing to do with ECS, just the way my wall switch works. 
Try that yourself and see what is the problem.

Dan Carrington




Ingo Dean (At Home) wrote:
> 
> Mark,
> 
> > From: Mark Gilmore [mailto:markgilmore@cococo.net]
> > Sent: Tuesday, September 29, 1998 10:33 PM
> ...
> > Ingo, If you have used "SET ECS_PLC_IFC_2J_DIM=2", the fast
> > HV/dimming should work (with 4 extra dims for 0%).
> > If not, try the new one. If still not, is it dimming FAST ?
> 
> I just downloaded and installed the "10/03/98 03:58PM 1,281,274 ECS.ZIP"
> beta version.
> 
> I again "SET ECS_PLC_IFC_2J_DIM=2" to have ECS use smooth Homevision
> dimming.
> 
> It does do fast dimming, but setting my lights to 0% still leaves them
> glowing, just like before.
> 
> Using Homevision's built-in TV screens, I verified that it (HV) also
> believes the (still glowing) light to be at 0%, just like ECS.
> 
> If you are sending the four extra DIMs, perhaps Homevision is ignoring them:
> the regular "Dim ## Times" command (P{uc}07{fnc}) would be ignored by
> Homevision once it "believes" the light is fully dimmed.  You should be
> using the "Force Dim ## Times" command (P{uc}09{fnc}) so that HV's internal
> view doesn't override your commands.  (Actually, you should be using the
> Force versions wherever they exist to make sure Homevision never ignores
> you.)
> 
> Note also that I have this problem even without using the new fast-dim
> option (to a lesser extent, though).  Many times, I have to "reset" my
> lights because when I set them to 0% at night, they continue to glow.  But I
> believe this to be a seperate issue:
> 
> For more data, I had ECS dim a light and brighten it back one step at a
> time, comparing the ECS and HV (screen) values after each step.  You can see
> ECS and HV go out of sync both when dimming (at 6%) and brightening (at
> 96%):
> 
> Dimming                                 Brightening
> ECS     HV                              ECS     HV
> =========                       ===========
> ON      100                             0       0
> 96      93                              6       6
> 90      87                              12      12
> 84      81                              18      18
> 78      75                              24      25
> 72      68                              30      31
> 66      62                              36      37
> 60      56                              42      43
> 54      50                              48      50
> 48      43                              54      56
> 42      37                              60      62
> 36      31                              66      68
> 30      25                              72      75
> 24      18                              78      81
> 18      12                              78      81
> 12      6                               84      87
> 6       0<-LIGHT WENT OFF               90      93
> 0       0                               96      100
>                                         ON      100

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