[geoffers]

If you're struggling with your IHD readings, or want to understand how to navigate your Smets2 smart meter's menu screens to get more detailed information, this may help...

It's only for the Landis+Gyr E470 Series 3 meter, but I guess there are plenty of folk with this model.

After much trawling of the interweb I found a (very) detailed 143 page manual for this particular meter - probably more relevant to installers than users so I haven't posted the link to it.

However there are 2 sections of relevance which I have uploaded in a separate PDF

Section 5 (pages 37-40) shows examples of the available Meter Display Screens

Section 14 (pages 87-90: Sections 14-1 to 14-5) shows the navigation into the initial screens, as far as cycling through the screens for multiple Time of Use (TOU) Tariff values

Section 14 (pages 97-98 section 14-10) shows the navigation into the Rolling Display menu list (much of which is available on your IHD)

[JoeSoap]

@geoffers

I have an Aclara SGM 1412-B electricity meter and couldn’t find my daily standing charge on the display. I quick internet search turned up a useful guide which told me how to find it…

https://web-content.scottishpower.co.uk/files/pdf/terms-and-conditions/SMETS2_Smart_PAYGO_Aclara_elec_guide_Oct20.pdf

Try as I might, I still couldn’t find the info 🙄. I’ll have another go when I get around to it. The good thing about electricity meters is you can mess around in the menus as much as you want, whereas with gas meters, the more you do that, the quicker the battery will die. With that in mind, I tend to leave well alone.

[geoffers]

@JoeSoap

I finally got round to negotiating (and photographing) all the menu/displays which I was aware of on my meter (gives me some ammunition for queries with cust-services)

I understand it all now, but it took lots of attempts as some display sequences are accessed from short presses of buttons <A> or <B>; some require long presses; and one sequence required button <A> to be pressed during a "display check" initialisation screen.

Luckily the manual I found had a flowchart showing the sequence of button presses - no wonder I'd struggled with it before.

[JoeSoap]

@geoffers

Nothing's easy, is it? I eventually worked out how to find my standing charge but it wasn't how it said to do it in that handy guide I found 🙄. Of course, I've forgotten how I did it now but if I managed once, I can manage again 🤞

[wizzo227]

@geoffers
Do you have a definition of "short press" and "long press"? I got a nasty cheap importese camera with instruction sheet using those terms. On testing, "short press" effects were obtained from a press of between 0.3 and 1.2 seconds, whilst "long press" effects were obtained from a press of longer than about 0.6 to 3 seconds. It was not from the sort of place who do refunds. "very short" press usually did nothing.

It annoys me greatly to find that in product because it does not cost many extra transistors on a control chip to keep the timer for buttonpress event duration separate from the busy end of the chip, and to have one byte of memory to enqueue the "short press" event or "long press" event for next time the controller decides to look. Even some $1 microcontrollers could spare that much unless programmed not to. The makers of a device designed properly should be able to tell you how many milliseconds is a "short press" and how many milliseconds is a "long press", for example 0.1 to 0.4 seconds for "short" and >0.8 seconds "long" would suit me, though I think it better to test. If contracted to, I could build for you a onebutton toy gadget for you to go collating opinions of a hundred people in a call centre of what should be regarded as "short" and what should be regarded as "long" press in the next IHD. They each press one button some number of times in a manner which they regard as ought to be "short" and as ought to be "long", and then we look at histograms to decide what to specify to the programmers of the next product. Such testing would be more valid if you provided the right switch in the IHD housing so that all the ergonomics are the same as will go into product. That would be more proper than the opinion of one programmer.

[geoffers]

@JoeSoap
Being a bit of a geek I tend to keep a word document open on my laptop and make notes of all the steps involved so I can come back to it later

This is invaluable for things I tinker with - just upgraded an old phone from Android v8 to v11 (following instructions online), so did just that which was invaluable when I entered something wrong and had to go back a few steps.

[geoffers]

@wizzo227 - the manual for the meter says short < 2 ≤ long, but I'm sure some of the long presses needed nearer 5secs

[JoeSoap]

Originally Posted by geoffers

@JoeSoap
Being a bit of a geek I tend to keep a word document open on my laptop and make notes of all the steps involved so I can come back to it later

This is invaluable for things I tinker with - just upgraded an old phone from Android v8 to v11 (following instructions online), so did just that which was invaluable when I entered something wrong and had to go back a few steps.

I use You Tube a lot when tinkering and fiddling. Before I attempt anything unfamiliar I search good old You Tube and there’s normally some kindly person who’s put s video on showing how it’s done.

The family think I know how to fix anything 😂

[wizzo227]

EoN Hannover, for the next IHD,
Das Gerät muss ein Knopfdruck zwischen 0,02 und 0,3 Sekunden als kurzes Drücken erkennen, und das Gerät muss ein Knopfdruck von mehr als 0,6 Sekunden als langes Drücken erkennen. Zuschreibung an zerotechnology.co.uk MMXXIII

[wizzo227]

@wizzo227
I've thought of a nice little addition which might cost one piezo speaker and one transistor in addition to what goes into the next IHD, and should make them nicer to use for everyone. When released at the end of a short press, it always does a 'blip' of high pitch such as 900 Hz of duration equal to the ideal middle-of-the-acceptable-range duration for a "short press", whilst release at the end of a "long press" always gets a "blaarp" such as 450 Hz of duration equal to a sensible acceptable-range duration of a "long press". Then users always have immediate feedback of accepted buttonpress and example durations, so can progress much more quickly than with the annoying silent "did it even notice yet that I'd pressed a button?". Without the toy test, I could for example program to accept 0.02 to 0.3 seconds as "short press" with the high "blip" of 0.1 seconds, and 0.6 to 2 seconds as the "long press" could get a 0.7 seconds "blaarp". With this audible feedback, it is going to be possible to rattle through instruction sequences as fast as it is programmed to accept them; the human limit is the speed of a 1940's morse code operator. .-- .... .. --.. --.. --- ..--- ..--- --...