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Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

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Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#151

Post by FLT8 »

gstar wrote: post #70

OMFG; I am in Perth, I have the same system, the very same problem and solved it almost the same way and was in the process of writing it up. The system uses RS422, with a base64 encoded AES key in the aaservice binary, and I was contemplating building an esp32 based open source implementation of the controller. That's a crazy weird coincidence.

I've got one of these systems too. Mine hasn't died yet, touch wood, but I was concerned enough about the possibility that I went as far as documenting the comms protocol and starting to design a pi hat to talk to the main control board.

I should really write that up at some point too.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#152

Post by renewiltord »

This is brilliant. Great write-up. I'm glad it's already on archive.org since this is nice and detailed. Much appreciated, man. I learned so much here:

1. PoE to USB

2. Smali debugging

Funnily, I thought it was serial over CAT5 because we have a couple of old network switches that are configured like that.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#153

Post by dvratil »

We installed Daikin AC in our house two years ago. Luckily, those units can be controlled locally (no cloud) via Daikin app (which says is unsupported and I should update to another app, but that one requires creating an account so screw that) and, more importantly, via HomeAssistant. What makes me really sad is that of all the "smart home" appliances we have, the AC is the only one doesn't go through cloud.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#154

Post by renewiltord »

hunter2_ wrote: post #78
SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me how, in USA, it’s the only civilized nation I’ve been to where you must have a prescription to purchase contacts and glasses. Everywhere else I’ve been will just sell you whatever magnification you need at the pharmacy. Obviously there is some acceptable line here, but I think the States handles this decently well enough. In Austin where I live you can get what is called a “homeowners permit” in a lot of c…

There's an easy hack for the contact lens (and maybe glasses?) situation. There is a consumer protection law meant to ensure eye doctors can't stop you from using any retailer you want (otherwise they'd essentially make themselves your retailer), and it works like this: You place an order with the retailer (online retailers typically allow you to simply type in your prescription values when adding lenses to your onli…

There's an even bigger hack: use photoshop to modify the prescription. My wife has been doing it for years. This is helpful since sometimes the prescription is over-specific and points to contacts you don't like.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#155

Post by ctippett »

Great write up. Australia has pretty good consumer protection laws.. I feel like the warranty period offered by the manufacturer could/should be superseded by the Consumers Guarantee Act – it seems reasonable to expect an AC unit to operate and work for more than a few years.

  There is no specific time when the consumer guarantees no longer apply to products. They may apply even after the manufacturer's warranty period has past.
https://business.gov.au/legal/fair-trading/australian-consum...

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#156

Post by OccamsMirror »

Gabrys1 wrote: post #144
devsda wrote: post #22

Unfortunately, if/when someone from the manufacturer knows about it their first thought will not be "How do we make it easier for our customers". It will most likely be "How do we restrict this hack" and will eventually get into more restricted/quirky hardware & software.

I don't think they'll care about this. Probably only 1% of their customers are capable of "hacking" this. As long as the tablet replace is cheaper than getting a new AC unit from another company it's fine for them.

Not even 1%.

It would be interesting if someone already in AC repair made it part of their business though. That's when you'd see the teeth come out.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#158

Post by eesmith »

Nursie wrote: post #64
SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me how, in USA, it’s the only civilized nation I’ve been to where you must have a prescription to purchase contacts and glasses. Everywhere else I’ve been will just sell you whatever magnification you need at the pharmacy. Obviously there is some acceptable line here, but I think the States handles this decently well enough. In Austin where I live you can get what is called a “homeowners permit” in a lot of c…

Yeah in the UK where I spent most of my life, it seems like you do whatever you want, pretty much. Golden rule - you don't touch gas plumbing. And you don't mess with your circuit breaker board/RCDs etc. I think installing new ring circuits may be off limits. Anything else? Go for it. I fitted a bunch of taps and a toilet, changed single sockets to double+USB sockets, changed light fittings, fixed poorly wired lighti…

Watching "Scrapheap Challenge" has taught me the UK has a lot of regulations about steam engines.

One of the behind-the-scene videos was something like "that old steam-powered whatever they just happened to find in the scrapheap? Yeah, we've got the inspection certificate right here."

Boiler explosions will do that to a country.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#159

Post by klausa »

athrun wrote: post #148
paranoidrobot wrote: post #108

I installed AC in my home in the last year. I specifically went for units that were IR controlled rather than any proprietary smart B.S. For the smarts, I used cheap IR blasters from AliExpress and hooked them up to HomeAssistant. I just mounted cheap Lenovo tablets to the wall to do the room-dashboard thing to allow controlling lights/AC without a phone. These kind of horror stories only serve to reinforce my decisi…

I was thinking of doing the same but IR control only allows for unidirectional communication with the unit. Since there's no feedback mechanism, how do you solve for when the state of the unit(s) gets out of sync with HomeAssistant's?

(not OP)

It just doesn't matter that much in my experience. If an issued command didn't work, it's easy to tell anyway (it's hot/cold), and you can just repeat it. HomeAssistant also has bits of special handling for items that don't communicate their state back, called "assumed state".

For the rare times I want to control my AC when being away from home, I have an air monitor nearby. I can just check if the temperature/humidity has changed, and repeat the command if it didn't work. If you _really_ cared you probably could script it to do it automagically, but I didn't feel the need to bother.

Re: Air Con: $1697 for an on/off switch

#160

Post by hunter2_ »

refurb wrote: post #137
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US based online contact vendors reject orders without a signed prescription. The doctors intentionally don't sign them. The workaround is to order them from Canada

1-800 contacts will write a prescription for you with a $20 online eye exam. Optomitrist asks if your current prescription is ok, asks you to stand 20ft back and read a few letters and you’ve got a script you can use wherever.

As will several other retailers, but only in some states. As someone in an excluded state, I considered whether enabling Mock Location on my phone would get me past that check (I think they require you to use a native mobile app, so I assume they use location from that?) but then thought of the method I mentioned earlier instead.
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