Dashbox or Not To Dashobox - Looking for info an opinions
Posted: Sun Jan 15, 2017 5:00 am
I had concerns with my “All-Electric” house when I purchased it in June 2016.... All summer I was paying $350-$400 electric bills, while those electric bills were annoying, but I had issues to address at the time. The other day my January electric bill came in, $470... $470 is more than annoying, it is enough to make me mad, and it is enough to make me do more than replacing failed incandescent light bulbs with LED’s. If the bill is going to be that high during all of the winter months, then it’s time to invest in circuit level monitoring, time to find the energy hogs, time trim the excess usage, and time to start thinking about major energy saving upgrades.
Even after replacing both 5400W heating elements, and removing roughly 10 lbs. of calcium deposits from my Electric Water Heater, I’d be willing to bet the water heater is consuming more electricity than everything else in the house… With one exception, the heat pump & electric furnace. I’m assuming that heating the house was the biggest expenditure on my recent electric bill, but since this neighborhood doesn’t have natural gas service electric heat is pretty much my only option.
While searching for residential circuit level monitoring solutions I noticed that many of the other solutions require internet connectivity so that my energy consumption data that can be uploaded to and stored on servers owned by the company that developed the product. I consider myself “privacy conscious” not a “privacy nut”, privacy reason's aside I would rather collect and store my data locally in my house, on my network, where I can control it. I’m also concerned with a company’s ability to collect, store and present my data long without imposing some sort of re-occurring fee to cover the cost of the associated computing infrastructure. The nail in the cloud based coffin is driven home when I consider that my ISP meters the amount of data that I upload/download each month, assessing additional charges for every GB I go over my monthly allowance.
For those reasons (there are more) the cloud based solutions are not a good fit for me. Thank you BrulTech, for providing a solution that will allow me to keep all my data on site. I’ll assume responsibility for the cost associated with the hardware. I’ll ensure the system stays up to collect data. I’ll prevent any data from being accessed by a hacker or sold to the highest bidder. Basically I appreciate the option to store data locally, even if something goes wrong, I won’t blaming anyone, except myself… and I can handle that!
My initial plans included a GEM with enough solid core CT's to monitor all 24 active circuit in my house as well as the main lines coming into the house. Assuming I understood the manual earlier, I planned on connecting the GEM VIA a serial cable so a desktop (Win7 or 10) serving as a Data Host. Then, whenever I wanted to review and analyze the data that the GEM collected, I would log into the Data Host locally or VIA remote desktop….
I just noticed the option to have the GEM send data to the DashBox , which sounds cool, but resulted in a few questions.
1. The DASHBOX comes with a 16GB Micro SD card for data storage:
a. Assuming the GEM is fully populated and monitoring 32 circuits, how long can the DashBox collect data before the SD card is filled? Rough estimate is fine.
b. Is the SD card something that I could upgrade in the future, if I decided that a larger 32GB or 128GB SD card would better meet my needs?
c. If the SD card runs out of room, what happens? Is the oldest data deleted to make room for the newer data? Is the new data lost until the issue is resolved?
2. Is there a difference in capabilities between the DashBox Dashboard and the equivalent GUI that I would be using to access the data stored on my local Data Host?
3. If I decide to dedicate an desktop to serve as my Data Host, can that data be accessed from another device on my home network VIA a browser?
4. Is there any way I could connect to a test/demo Dash Box?
a. If there are differences between the DashBox and Data Host GUI’s can I connect to a test/demo console that is not running on a DashBox?
Basically, I’ve got a PC that I can dedicate to use as a Data Host. Other than the DashBox’s low power consumption, small form factor, warranty, and BrulTech support… Are there any benefits to this additional 1-time cost?
In addition to response from BrulTech employees. I’m really interested in hearing from end users who have used both a locally hosted Data Host as well as a DashBox. Did you like one over the other? Feel free to send me a message if you don't want to respond publicly.
BrulTech employees - its not that I don’t trust your opinions or your judgement. I just don't want to avoid asking the car salesman “should I buy a new car or should I keep driving this fully functional 10 year old car with 250,000 miles on it”. I expect the answer will always resemble “oh you don’t want that old clunker, look at this car. It’s the latest model, it’s loaded with every option package you don’t need, the annual maintenance cost are astronomical, and its way out of your price range! You should definitely buy this car.”
Thanks for the help... and sorry for writing a book!
K2skaterii
Even after replacing both 5400W heating elements, and removing roughly 10 lbs. of calcium deposits from my Electric Water Heater, I’d be willing to bet the water heater is consuming more electricity than everything else in the house… With one exception, the heat pump & electric furnace. I’m assuming that heating the house was the biggest expenditure on my recent electric bill, but since this neighborhood doesn’t have natural gas service electric heat is pretty much my only option.
While searching for residential circuit level monitoring solutions I noticed that many of the other solutions require internet connectivity so that my energy consumption data that can be uploaded to and stored on servers owned by the company that developed the product. I consider myself “privacy conscious” not a “privacy nut”, privacy reason's aside I would rather collect and store my data locally in my house, on my network, where I can control it. I’m also concerned with a company’s ability to collect, store and present my data long without imposing some sort of re-occurring fee to cover the cost of the associated computing infrastructure. The nail in the cloud based coffin is driven home when I consider that my ISP meters the amount of data that I upload/download each month, assessing additional charges for every GB I go over my monthly allowance.
For those reasons (there are more) the cloud based solutions are not a good fit for me. Thank you BrulTech, for providing a solution that will allow me to keep all my data on site. I’ll assume responsibility for the cost associated with the hardware. I’ll ensure the system stays up to collect data. I’ll prevent any data from being accessed by a hacker or sold to the highest bidder. Basically I appreciate the option to store data locally, even if something goes wrong, I won’t blaming anyone, except myself… and I can handle that!
My initial plans included a GEM with enough solid core CT's to monitor all 24 active circuit in my house as well as the main lines coming into the house. Assuming I understood the manual earlier, I planned on connecting the GEM VIA a serial cable so a desktop (Win7 or 10) serving as a Data Host. Then, whenever I wanted to review and analyze the data that the GEM collected, I would log into the Data Host locally or VIA remote desktop….
I just noticed the option to have the GEM send data to the DashBox , which sounds cool, but resulted in a few questions.
1. The DASHBOX comes with a 16GB Micro SD card for data storage:
a. Assuming the GEM is fully populated and monitoring 32 circuits, how long can the DashBox collect data before the SD card is filled? Rough estimate is fine.
b. Is the SD card something that I could upgrade in the future, if I decided that a larger 32GB or 128GB SD card would better meet my needs?
c. If the SD card runs out of room, what happens? Is the oldest data deleted to make room for the newer data? Is the new data lost until the issue is resolved?
2. Is there a difference in capabilities between the DashBox Dashboard and the equivalent GUI that I would be using to access the data stored on my local Data Host?
3. If I decide to dedicate an desktop to serve as my Data Host, can that data be accessed from another device on my home network VIA a browser?
4. Is there any way I could connect to a test/demo Dash Box?
a. If there are differences between the DashBox and Data Host GUI’s can I connect to a test/demo console that is not running on a DashBox?
Basically, I’ve got a PC that I can dedicate to use as a Data Host. Other than the DashBox’s low power consumption, small form factor, warranty, and BrulTech support… Are there any benefits to this additional 1-time cost?
In addition to response from BrulTech employees. I’m really interested in hearing from end users who have used both a locally hosted Data Host as well as a DashBox. Did you like one over the other? Feel free to send me a message if you don't want to respond publicly.
BrulTech employees - its not that I don’t trust your opinions or your judgement. I just don't want to avoid asking the car salesman “should I buy a new car or should I keep driving this fully functional 10 year old car with 250,000 miles on it”. I expect the answer will always resemble “oh you don’t want that old clunker, look at this car. It’s the latest model, it’s loaded with every option package you don’t need, the annual maintenance cost are astronomical, and its way out of your price range! You should definitely buy this car.”
Thanks for the help... and sorry for writing a book!
K2skaterii