Unrealistic High readings on my dashboard and histories.

[JasLine]

Hi, first post. be nice to me. Sometimes my TED5000 records a number that is so high that I would have to have been struck by lightning. Dies anyone have an explanation or a fix for this anomaly.

here is a copy and paste of my Dashboard Maybe a little hard to read but you get the idea. Not a machine shop or U.S. Steel. a single family home. average KWh per month 300.

KWH USED SINCE MIDNIGHT 35645.4 kWh    171319 KWH USED THIS MONTH     35645.4 kWh PROJECTED KWH    USAGE 2147483.6 kWh     PRESENT VOLTAGE 123.1 volts  home: 123.1   Solar: 122.1    1Sola: 122.1    AVERAGE DAILY KWH USAGE 99862.6 kWh

Any help would be great.

[Support7]

Hey JasLine,

These spike's are hard to narrow down since we cannot account for certain environmental variables with your local installation. Typically they are associated with black/brown out's or lighting strikes/surges across the power line causing a hardware conflict with recognizing the correct energy reading. There have been some hardware changes and updates to account for this in the latest model TED Pro Home so it's less likely to happen but since our theory of why it happens is hardware related and the TED5000 has been out of production for quite some time, we don't really have a solid solution other then recommending an upgrade to the TED Pro Home to take advantage of the hardware updates that are designed to account for this. Although depending on severity of a surge or black/brown out the anomalies are still possible.

TED Pro Home: http://www.theenergydetective.com/prohomestore.html

You can clear the high number from the dashboard totals by going to Footprints > Advanced > Reset Totals to Zero. This won't delete your history but it does reset the totals on the dashboard essentially like starting the month on your meter read date.

[jlsoaz]

[...]
You can clear the high number from the dashboard totals by going to Footprints > Advanced > Reset Totals to Zero. This won't delete your history but it does reset the totals on the dashboard essentially like starting the month on your meter read date.

It's roughly the same question from me that Jasline had, so digging up this old thread.  In this last bit of the response above, there is something about resetting totals to zero.  I can do that, but suspect I'll get out of this what I get out of the TED5000 software every few years now, which is totally losing all my data.  What I'd like is the ability to go in and remove data points that are obviously wrong.  For me they happen about once or twice per year and totally ruin any ability I might have to view a long term chart that incorporates the offending dates.  I'm guessing there is no feature in the software that allows for manually changing an individual day or hour or month data point, but if there isn't, then I'm just noting what I'd like for future repairs of my data.

[pfletch101]

As Support7 said, last year, the Ted5000 is now very old technology, and you should not be looking for any significant change in its firmware or for new standalone software for it. I can testify that this problem is much rarer with the Pro device, but I have also written a 'saved data editor' for the Pro which I have made available to deal with any residual problems. Unfortunately, this application, which operates on saved backup data, only works on the files saved by the newer devices.

[jlsoaz]

As Support7 said, last year, the Ted5000 is now very old technology, and you should not be looking for any significant change in its firmware or for new standalone software for it. I can testify that this problem is much rarer with the Pro device, but I have also written a 'saved data editor' for the Pro which I have made available to deal with any residual problems. Unfortunately, this application, which operates on saved backup data, only works on the files saved by the newer devices.

Thanks.  I think at this point I do realize that the company is not going to address things, and that the Ted5000 equipment I have is very old tech.  The thing is, when something comes across as a software issue and not a hardware issue, it is tempting to think that the company could fix it, if it wanted, with just a bit of work from a programmer, even if the matter is dated.

Maybe they'd say it's not fully a software matter.  I don't know if that would be true, but even if it is, why not fix it in then in the latest hardware iteration?  The fact that, to this day, even with the latest software and hardware, a user is still having to write a workaround tells me:
a) Maybe I was right not to buy the latest tech - it would have been nice to have what are undoubtedly improvements, but it doesn't come with a really obvious matter fully addressed.
b) if the matter can be addressed by a user writing a workaround, then it sounds like it could have been addressed by a programmer, if the company really wants.
c) maybe the company just does not understand that the matter is both important to some users, and could have been addressed.

So, yes, I understand it's old tech, but it sounds like it's possible (maybe not probable, but possible) that the company, with a bit of prodding, might be able to take improved action on this, at least for the newer models, if not for the older ones.

[pfletch101]

As Support7 said, last year, the Ted5000 is now very old technology, and you should not be looking for any significant change in its firmware or for new standalone software for it. I can testify that this problem is much rarer with the Pro device, but I have also written a 'saved data editor' for the Pro which I have made available to deal with any residual problems. Unfortunately, this application, which operates on saved backup data, only works on the files saved by the newer devices.

Thanks.  I think at this point I do realize that the company is not going to address things, and that the Ted5000 equipment I have is very old tech.  The thing is, when something comes across as a software issue and not a hardware issue, it is tempting to think that the company could fix it, if it wanted, with just a bit of work from a programmer, even if the matter is dated.

The cause of the problem is, almost certainly, as Support7 said, power-line fluctuations and glitches, which are inevitable in anything connected to the mains. The 6000 series has been made more resistant to these, but, short of building in heroic spike protection and a UPS, at very substantial additional cost, it is not possible to prevent them entirely. To build anything like the correction facilities that my editing Application provides into the firmware would take up much more space than they have available, for what is now a rather unusual problem. I think that they made a reasonable call.

Maybe they'd say it's not fully a software matter.  I don't know if that would be true, but even if it is, why not fix it in then in the latest hardware iteration?  The fact that, to this day, even with the latest software and hardware, a user is still having to write a workaround tells me:
a) Maybe I was right not to buy the latest tech - it would have been nice to have what are undoubtedly improvements, but it doesn't come with a really obvious matter fully addressed.

If by "fully addressed" you mean that you want no problems, ever, good luck with all your software and hardware purchases!

b) if the matter can be addressed by a user writing a workaround, then it sounds like it could have been addressed by a programmer, if the company really wants.

This 'user' is a very experienced programmer, but I assume that you did not intend to be insulting. The company did not think that spending time and resources on this was cost-effective. Given the very small amount of interest that I have had from other users since I completed the Application, I would have to agree with their judgement. They did, however cooperate enthusiastically with me as I was developing it.

c) maybe the company just does not understand that the matter is both important to some users, and could have been addressed.

They and I believe that it has now been addressed!

So, yes, I understand it's old tech, but it sounds like it's possible (maybe not probable, but possible) that the company, with a bit of prodding, might be able to take improved action on this, at least for the newer models, if not for the older ones.

They (and I) think not, within the limits of what is cost-effective.

[jlsoaz]

The cause of the problem is, almost certainly, as Support7 said, power-line fluctuations and glitches, which are inevitable in anything connected to the mains. [...]

Is that the cause of the problem?  Perhaps we are looking at related-but-not-the-same problems? 

My hope would not be to stop the occasional spike but simply to be able to go into historical data that is the basis for some charts, get rid of or revise to some sort of middling estimate the occasional outlier kWh data point that clearly has nothing to do with reality, and thus once again be able to read the charts and make some of use of them.  In effect, if a major use for me of TED would occasionally be to review some long-term historical charts, then much of this goal cannot be attained due to just a few claimed-uneditable data points. 

Perhaps if you or someone else could mention a path to export the data to some generally accepted data format (.csv, or some-such) I could try again.   Perhaps it is more easily discovered than I realize as to how to do that export/workaround type of procedure, but it has been too many years since I set this aside, so I don't know.

[pfletch101]

The cause of the problem is, almost certainly, as Support7 said, power-line fluctuations and glitches, which are inevitable in anything connected to the mains. [...]

Is that the cause of the problem?  Perhaps we are looking at related-but-not-the-same problems? 

My hope would not be to stop the occasional spike but simply to be able to go into historical data that is the basis for some charts, get rid of or revise to some sort of middling estimate the occasional outlier kWh data point that clearly has nothing to do with reality, and thus once again be able to read the charts and make some of use of them.  In effect, if a major use for me of TED would occasionally be to review some long-term historical charts, then much of this goal cannot be attained due to just a few claimed-uneditable data points. 

Perhaps if you or someone else could mention a path to export the data to some generally accepted data format (.csv, or some-such) I could try again.   Perhaps it is more easily discovered than I realize as to how to do that export/workaround type of procedure, but it has been too many years since I set this aside, so I don't know.

There is no 'built-in' way of doing this - either for the TED5000 or for the TED Pro series. If the MTU data saved by the 'Backup History' option in the TED5000 is in a comparable format to the MTU data exported from the current hardware (basically a memory dump of the data storage area), as I imagine it will be, I am afraid that there is also no magic workaround that I can suggest for you.

[jlsoaz]

There is no 'built-in' way of doing this - either for the TED5000 or for the TED Pro series. If the MTU data saved by the 'Backup History' option in the TED5000 is in a comparable format to the MTU data exported from the current hardware (basically a memory dump of the data storage area), as I imagine it will be, I am afraid that there is also no magic workaround that I can suggest for you.

ok, thanks, good to know.