Hi,
I’m planning to buy Envisalink to control my DSC Powerseries 1616.
is there anything I should specifically remember about when buying it (model, type) or all should work?
What is general impression after using it (stability, functionality, subjective value for money)?
Maybe there is someone in this forum who want to sell one?
Do you plan to purchase their monitoring (EyezOn) ? If not, I suggest you get a much cheaper and also popular AlarmDecoder, which also has an OH Binding available. I have both. I had AlarmDecoder, then purchased an EVL3 for the monitoring. I can actually get rid of my AlarmDecoder but I still use it to control extra keypads around the house (using ser2sock). Also, EyezOn monitoring is certified so you can be quite sure your insurer will accept them.
Lucky,
thanks for the response. I don’t want their monitoring, just remote control via OH (on/off/change state, whatever else around it) and actually was thinking about something else as Envisalink as pure DSC<->Eth converter is rather expensive for the purpose in my opinion. From what I see however Alarm Decoder is not cheap either and only as appliance can be setup remotely, in all other cases it’s serial/usb which requires PI to be close to it physically which is not the case for me. I need something to translate DSC to Eth ideally.
are you aware of any other options?
I have used an EVL 3 for the last 5 years and it has given me 0 trouble… well worth the slightly steep price tag IMO.
But, definitely search around on github… One quick search I found a library to turn an arduino into a keypad for example: https://github.com/sjlouw/dsc-alarm-arduino
+1 and most alarm panels in the last decade have rs232/serial port you can connect to. Even if it doesn’t, all you would need to know is the protocol for their keypad bus/terminal. That’s how I had my initial setup with a Vista 20p panel until I purchased an alarmdecoder for more peace of mind since it’s something proven and more mature than a diy
that’s exactly what I’m trying to do - find the balance between DIY (cheap but requires effort and maybe questionable stability) and market solution which should be more reliable but more expensive too.
probably will go with envisalink, although arduino option looks reasonable but still requires some hacking to make it available through OH and ethernet to my server ‘room’