For a long time, the Arduino community had a library (written by Tom Igoe) that would interface the Arduino to the PSC05/TW523 so that it could send X10 commands. (available here) Since I was already wirelessly sending commands via the CM17A, I never took much interest in it.
But then I thought if you could also receive commands with the PSC05/TW523, you could pretty much make your own X10 controller and replace the ActiveHome SW and the CM11A/CM15A hardware.
Again the web provided a lot of the great detail on the protocol that enabled me to write an Arduino driver to receive commands with the PSC05/TW523. I created an example sketch and wrote a lot of background and posted it on the Arduino Playground here. Since the receive driver can coexist with the send library, the Arduino now has a complete interface with the PSC05/TW523 that allows you to send and receive X10 commands.
[3/30/2010] Thanks to Creatrope, a beta of the combined X10 send / receive library is now available - you'll find it here. [1/5/11] Creatrope site down. You can use the separate X10 transmit & receice libs or check out ThomasM's library here.
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The Playground article should tell you all you need to know about how to use this software, so I won't go into it here. Just to say that the Arduino is always looking for any X10 signal on the powerline at every zero crossing of the AC. When it gets one, it sets a flag, and fills out globals for the House Code, Unit Code, and Command that are used by your program.
With this complete, I was able to make my own X10 controller called the "X10 Book" that I will write about in my next post.
Edit Nov. 2, 09: Based on a comment by Phil, here's a link to an Ap Note from Microchip that describes how to use a PIC to essentially replace the PSC05. It would be great to port it to ATmega chips. Thanks Phil!
Edit Feb. 23, 09: I've received some very good feedback from Johannes related to changing the send and receive software to have reliable communications using 50Hz line frequency. (He uses an "XM10" X10 module instead of the PSC05 / TW523 for 220V 50Hz.) It's simply a matter of changing 4 #defines - 2 in the X10.lib (for sending) and 2 in my code (for receiving).
In the source for your X10.lib, in X10constants.h change:
#define BIT_DELAY from 1778 to 2133
#define BIT_LENGTH from 800 to 900
In my example for the X10 Receive function, in PSC05.h change:
#define OFFSET_DELAY from 500 to 800
Edit Nov. 2, 09: Based on a comment by Phil, here's a link to an Ap Note from Microchip that describes how to use a PIC to essentially replace the PSC05. It would be great to port it to ATmega chips. Thanks Phil!
Edit Feb. 23, 09: I've received some very good feedback from Johannes related to changing the send and receive software to have reliable communications using 50Hz line frequency. (He uses an "XM10" X10 module instead of the PSC05 / TW523 for 220V 50Hz.) It's simply a matter of changing 4 #defines - 2 in the X10.lib (for sending) and 2 in my code (for receiving).
In the source for your X10.lib, in X10constants.h change:
#define BIT_DELAY from 1778 to 2133
#define BIT_LENGTH from 800 to 900
In my example for the X10 Receive function, in PSC05.h change:
#define OFFSET_DELAY from 500 to 800
#define HALF_CYCLE_DELAY from 8334 to 10000
Thanks Johannes! I'm sure others will find this helpful.
Thanks Johannes! I'm sure others will find this helpful.