wimsza Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 Hi My PV installation is near complete and now I am in the hunt for management software. It seems that ICC is a recommended option, but I need confirmation from other members. They suggest ICC Pi-V2 Complete kit (Licensed) Pi 4 (4 GB). My setup is: 1 x Axpert 5K PF1 off grid with firmware 74.40e 2 x LiFeP04 6kw batteries (parallel connected) with build-in BMS that does NOT talk to anything (ithiumbatteriessouthafrica.co.za) 12 x Canadian Solar 410 panels (2 panels per string in series) which all come together in a combiner box and then connects to the inverter My change over switch completely isolate the Inverter (and PV) from the utility Being an Axpert the lack of "real" battery management is of concern so hence the reason for this post. Quote
Gnome Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 (edited) Lots of people got burned on ICC where they pay for a license and can't get upgrades. Do your research and search on the forum. Not sure who, "they" are, but yeah, let's just say the ICC developer is out for money and if you buy from the wrong person or don't read the fine print, you get to pay full price more than once just to get software updates including emails accusing you have using pirated software. I don't know the full story but apparently a deal was made that went south and now the ICC developer has made it his customers problem. Edited July 31, 2020 by Gnome Quote
wimsza Posted July 31, 2020 Author Posted July 31, 2020 forgot to say I obviously need some BMS hw, such as Victron BMV712 Quote
Rclegg Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 34 minutes ago, Gnome said: Lots of people got burned on ICC where they pay for a license and can't get upgrades. Do your research and search on the forum. Not sure who, "they" are, but yeah, let's just say the ICC developer is out for money and if you buy from the wrong person or don't read the fine print, you get to pay full price more than once just to get software updates including emails accusing you have using pirated software. I don't know the full story but apparently a deal was made that went south and now the ICC developer has made it his customers problem. I believe there are two people. Partner / Dev split right? The "correct" place to get ICC from is http://iccsoftware.co.za ? Quote
Gnome Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 1 minute ago, Rclegg said: I believe there are two people. Partner / Dev split right? The "correct" place to get ICC from is http://iccsoftware.co.za ? Who knows. All I know is, customers are caught in the middle of a feud that they have no context on or care about. Seems pretty shoddy to me for customers to need to pay for the mistakes by whomever caused this whole debacle. Rclegg 1 Quote
Rclegg Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 5 minutes ago, Gnome said: Who knows. All I know is, customers are caught in the middle of a feud that they have no context on or care about. Seems pretty shoddy to me for customers to need to pay for the mistakes by whomever caused this whole debacle. Agreed. It's an unfortunate situation. Quote
wolfandy Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 20 minutes ago, Rclegg said: The "correct" place to get ICC from is http://iccsoftware.co.za ? I've bought my license from there (had my own Pi) and have had nothing but awesome support and a number of updates to the software with new features Rclegg 1 Quote
Rclegg Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 2 minutes ago, wolfandy said: I've bought my license from there (had my own Pi) and have had nothing but awesome support and a number of updates to the software with new features Thanks for that. I'll be doing the same. wolfandy 1 Quote
RikH Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 (edited) 1 hour ago, wimsza said: forgot to say I obviously need some BMS hw, such as Victron BMV712 Yes, should be a nice solution. You can connect the BMV to ICC and let it talk to your inverter. Edited July 31, 2020 by RikH Quote
wimsza Posted July 31, 2020 Author Posted July 31, 2020 @wolfandy they are the people that I am talking to as well. Also, they do sell a complete kit which includes the ICC and Pi for around 3K Quote
wolfandy Posted July 31, 2020 Posted July 31, 2020 One other thing that I would highly recommend (also mentioned in another post somewhere here): Do not use the USB cable that came with your inverter but rather buy a new USB 2.0 cable. Apparently the original USB cable that comes with the Axpert is a very old standard and can cause comms issues between ICC and the Axpert. I have also made the experience that with a replacement cable ICC stability has significantly improved Quote
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