question

Rants aren't generally a good motivator for help on a community forum, particularly on a product that is widely sold and generally seems to work. Most complaints tend to come down to how it is implemented/setup, more often than not, unhappiness is down to things the user has done with/to it.

What version is your cerbo currently?

What is the rest of your setup, how is it all connected?

Coming from a coding background I would say that developing new code around a dual core mobile phone processor 5 years old will be challenging to produce such a product. I am asking myself the same questions. It seems the GX Multiplus has a quad core cpu with only 512MB of RAM which for an upgrade from the cerbo seems to be a bit odd as the memoery requirements are for that CPU are more demanding. Maybe the new Quad core CPU they have used doesn't address more RAM, I don't know but to be honest I am sick of having to read deep into this Victron stuff when really the product should be retail ready which it is far from. Victron need to get some in house developers and some decent design engineers to improve their whole Ve.Can system. It's a shame as their invertor hardware is very robust and reliable, but the whole Ve.can range is riddled with bugs and problems when it comes to software and supporting hardware. Victron if you are listening times are moving forward and everything is about the software and user experience with GUI. This means get rid of the Atari style GUI's and make your programming interfaces modern, well documented and easily uinderstood for the end user. Developers and coders love blaming the "simple" end user for their incapacity to understand their software. When really the devlopers job is to make the user experience simple and still produce and product that performs, which is far more challengin than just writing code that does the job and leaves the end user in command line to try and figure stuff out. (sarcism)

Having said all this I will still buy Victron (until Huawei and such become more time tested) as it works and is built half decent, but Victron should be worried as fancy marketting won't beat the main stream global electronics giants with all the resources and unlimited budget for R and D to come in and steal the market, which juding by the increase in energy prices over the next few months will give them a reason to go into a previosuly risky market.

I refer to my post earlier today regarding the same subject with the Multiplus II GX which has no support for Ve.Can until they release the updated hardware which I am still waiting for.

I am reluctant to buy the cerbo GX with old Dual core CPU and 1GB of Ram when I can have the Multiplus II GX with a quad core, but I still don't understand the design decision to make a quad core package with 512MB RAM, this is 2022 not 2017.

In summary I feel your pain. Victron need to move with the software market as it moves FAST!

Upgrade the hardware every 2 years and consitantly have in house full time developers (big payroll but full controll and no excuses) with monthly roll outs for firmware updates. I myseld wouldn't mind buy a new Cerbo Gx every 2 years for $300 if I knew it was fast, did the job and has smooth code. Following Apple wouldn't be a bad idea. Writing good code in the first place saves you having to patch the crap out of everything like Microsoft evidently enjoy doing, but that's another story.

Hi @Ed Baak

VenusOS and GX family is a multi-track, multi-year and multi-team continuous-improvement development effort.

GX devices and the VenusOS that powers them is a project that Matthijs (managing director/CEO & son of the Victron founder Reinout) takes a personal and active role in developing. In part because of how central a good GX experience is to a good overall Victron experience for many customers.

While nothing to announce today, the road map ahead for GX range and Venus is exciting, progressing, and addresses a lot of what you're asking for and more.

Components (and most specifically microprocessors) are undergoing unprecedented supply constraints in 2021 and 2022, affecting all industries, and while I have no insight into those specifics, I can say with confidence that has not helped speed up the R&D timeline.

As an interesting anecdote, the current UI was contributed by a frustrated/inspired end user with design and software development skills who thought that he could do better, and then did. This is all possible as the necessary components were open source. He is now on the dev team.

I myself was also a frustrated/inspired end user who thought that the community discussion and product documentation could be improved at Victron, and thought I could even help make things better myself.

If anyone has a clear vision for improvement, I can speak from experience to say that Victron is a company that responds very positively to people who jump in to the ecosystem with good ideas, and capacity to help make things better for themselves and everyone else as well.

It is definitely part of the point of having this community site.

Also worthy to mention there are already users actively developing on the platform (within the existing frameworks, extending them, and also out into other systems entirely via the APIs endpoints).

There is infinite potential for individual customisation to show exactly the data the user wants to see, exactly how they want to see it.

Making those tools more accessible is a part of the roadmap and upcoming releases.

The 'official' Victron interfaces will always be an attempt at the best fit for the most users, and as easy as possible for even the non-technical.

Essentially a compromise to personal customisation - as there are just so many potential interactions and applications of Victron products that it is simply not possible to make it perfect for everyone. That is in part why there is a door left open for people to continue where we cannot and make it how they would like it.

For example - hat tip to @Mark who built this interface for his Victron system.

I personally started with a raspberry pi, then a CCGX, then a Venus GX, and now a Cerbo GX and use it every day to control the systems that power my house, I have been suggesting improvements since 2018 - and find it extremely useful as it is, and good value for money in the context of a Victron power system.

Hi,

In response to your explanation of the above, myself and my UK Distributer are still waiting on the answers from this unanswered question in your forum.

https://community.victronenergy.com/questions/125727/multiplus-ii-gx-updated-hardware-and-lynx-shunt-ve.html

I would be grateful if you could answer these questions regarding the GX as it would make a lot of frustrated customers happy and allow them to expand their system with forward compatibilty.