Misleading product names aside, and without looking for any official statement, I’m curious as to whether the inductive load issue is due to the broken sine wave (and would be helped by the full sine wave option in 2.14) or if it’s something about the MOSFET that causes it to blow up when driving an inductive load.
C’mon man. Is there something in the disclaimer right below the product name that’s misleading?
No, the disclaimer is clear, but as others have pointed out, this switch works like every other smart dimmer out there (as far as the end pointing at the load goes) so calling it anything other than a dimmer is misleading. And to be fair, the disclaimer wasn’t there when many of us preordered the switches, and I would have ordered fewer of them if I had known that there were certain places I couldn’t have used them.
That being said, I’m still curious, from a technical standpoint, whether the issue with the switches self-destructing on inductive loads is a MOSFET issue or a sine wave issue.
It seems to me that the firmware changelog thread might not be the best place to have this argument about the product page text. Can we split this off to a different thread? I subscribe to this thread because I like to stay up to date on firmware changes.
4 Likes
Fair enough.
1 Like
I think where I’m hung up is the word misleading. To me that is a personal insult as it infers that it’s my intention to cover something up and trick you into purchasing something that you wouldn’t have purchased had you not known what you were purchasing. Which, to your point below, I understand – it was not there when we opened up pre-orders, but we’ve taken the steps to clarify our position and for you to continuously infer that we’re misleading people is not ok.
Fair enough, I’m happy to offer you and whomever is not happy with the switch a refund and grab it back from you. You’re right and that’s the problem with pre-orders, not everything can be accurate in the beginning, the important thing is to address it when we know more information, which is what we did.
I’m curious as well and just found out about it yesterday. Give me a second to look into it.
3 Likes
I think where I’m hung up is the word misleading. To me that is a personal insult as it infers that it’s my intention to cover something up and trick you into purchasing something that you wouldn’t have purchased had you not known what you were purchasing. Which, to your point below, I understand – it was not there when we opened up pre-orders, but we’ve taken the steps to clarify our position and for you to continuously infer that we’re misleading people is not ok.
I apologize for making it sound like you’re intentionally trying to misrepresent the product, which isn’t what I was trying to do. So let me see if I can better phrase what I’m getting at…
Going back to the idea that the switch operates the same way as other smart dimmers (not counting the smart part, which is clearly way ahead of all of its competitors), with none of the others being designated “2-in-1”, what differentiation from other products are you calling out with that designation?
Fair enough, I’m happy to offer you and whomever is not happy with the switch a refund and grab it back from you. You’re right and that’s the problem with pre-orders, not everything can be accurate in the beginning, the important thing is to address it when we know more information, which is what we did.
The refund offer is very much appreciated but, unsurprisingly, I can find other places to stick the extra dimmers where I wasn’t originally planning to automate. 
And I’ll probably be preordering some Blue fan switches shortly to go where the dimmers won’t work.
I’m curious as well and just found out about it yesterday. Give me a second to look into it.
Thanks!
My 2c and thoughts, keeping in mind that my position is slightly skewed due to paying attention as a pre order (vs a new customer without that history.)
- the “2 in 1” branding seems odd as all smart dimmers can also act as 0-100% switches, so what’s the add on feature here? What is the X in 1 specialty of this model vs from other manufacturers? What is different in the hardware that makes it X in 1?
- I want there to be an internal relay as my wish list would include it (as noted I was one of the preorder people who had use cases for mag ballasts) so my brain wants to make “2 in 1” solve for that.
- Other manufacturers have both switch and dimmer as sep products yet the switch must not contain a mechanical relay. For instance, Zooz has “switch” products in their 7x series but the switch models must use a solid state relay, as they specifically call out that no Zooz products are to be used with fluorescent ballast loads.
Now that I know the “2 in 1” designation doesn’t mean what I ‘want’ it to mean I just look past it as not really adding any value and just marketing-speak. But it took me a bit to get there.
Just my thoughts!
2 Likes
I see where you are coming from. I also take every comment people make into my product designs very personal and sometimes… it hurts because we are overthinking it
As mentioned by the op the term “misleading” was not meant literally, we all know how transparent you have been to the community.
Semantics aside… There is a valid point in there somewhere and maybe you want sleep on it and talk to your marketing people about it. When you hit the masses (Home Depot, Lowes and so on) you may want to call it just a dimmer to save you some unnecessary support and cost of dealing with returns.
Most people will go with the big title/name in the box and never bother to read the instructions and/or disclaimers.
Not that I personally care what it is called but just offering my 2 cents because I do care about Inovelli and want you guys to succeed because otherwise… who else am I going to buy such awesome switches from?
3 Likes
My .02c - if I saw this as a ‘dimmer’ switch, I’d be also looking separately for an ‘on/off’ switch. And in most cases (except the magnetic ballast) it’s unnecessary. So the 2-1 branding let me know that I didn’t need a separate dimmer and on/off switch. One switch would handle both.
To me, if you market it as a dimmer, it’s ALWAYS a dimmer (ie. not instant 100% / 0%). And a switch is ALWAYS a switch (no gradient or ramp up/down). So the 2-1 let me know I could choose which mode it operates in.
4 Likes
Would it make a difference to drop the On/Off and just say, “Switch”? I’m guessing not, but I remembered HomeSeer came out with a 2-1 as well, they just call it something different.
Huh. That’s interesting. I had no idea that switch existed, so I guess that calls for an “almost” in front of the “every other smart dimmer” argument.
(For what it’s worth, the switches I’ve replaced/am replacing with the Blues are Insteon “dimmers” and “switches”, which is how they were marketed to make the distinction between something that modifies the sine wave, and something that uses a relay).
I guess I’m still wondering, with some/most/all of the smart dimmers out there having the option to have a 0 ramp time, what the “2” of the “2 in 1” really means. What would be the disadvantage of just calling it a dimmer?
Would it make a difference to drop the On/Off and just say, “Switch”?
And I just realized I didn’t address this part. In my opinion, I think it would make a big difference.
2 Likes
That’s a valid point. I guess there is no easy answer here 
I was also attracted by the 2-1 marketing and I end up replacing all my red on/offs with blues. It works fine for me since all my light bulbs are LED.
Maybe we are all overthink this.
From a product box perspective maybe the solution is what is already in the website (I think):
Keep the name as is and add almost as a sub title: not for use with…
This right here all day every day!
One thing that’s not being taken into consideration here is that marketing and branding are done for the masses not for the few. While people like @euggersh are clearly aware of the technical differences between a dimmer and a switch and why a true on/off switch would be required for certain applications, 99% of the consumers of this product are just looking for a switch that can turn their light on/off or dim their light. Having that right in the name will make 99% of the users of this product happy.
For the other 1%, there is the disclaimer but as it’s already been pointed out, it was not there at the time of the pre-order. For @Eric_Inovelli to offer those who purchased a full refund for this reason is above and beyond what pretty much any other company out there would do.
8 Likes
Where I see a difference between other dimmers is that this switch has a clicking on/off when in that mode, so I’m thinking that there is a physical cutting of power when it turns off - is that the case?
I am also wondering… assuming that the switch is instantly turned on when it clicks back in the on/off mode, with the full Sin wave functionality, how does it differ from a non-dimming switch? Is it just that there is a risk that it may not be using full Sin wave and therefore have a negative effect on down stream devices?
@SViel, this came up a while ago, and it turned out that the relay is in series with the MOSFET rather than in parallel, so it doesn’t bypass it as you would expect a non-dimming switch to do.
It makes sense to me that they would be in series… So they always go through the the MOSFET, right? Is that still an issue now that full sin wave is an option?
I believe @Eric_Inovelli is looking into that question.
The relay being in parallel would have made it a true 2-in-1, though, since the relay would drive the load all by itself in a non-dimmer situation.
1 Like
The relay is there for 3-way operation with a dumb switch. It wasn’t put in the package for the 2 in 1 use.
The part I don’t like though is that the relay coil is being powered any time the dimmer is off.
I’m also a little curious why the mosfets can’t power a small fan like a bathroom vent fan, even when they aren’t quite fully on. It would depend on the fan, the Panasonics I installed draw something like 0.2A at full flow. But, some other models likely draw significantly more.
Yes, the relay disconnects power unless you have a dumb switch 3-way. You can set a Red series dimmer to do the same thing by setting it to dumb 3-way.
1 Like