I'm finishing school up this year and I'm looking to move into a starter home next year (I keep saying that & then I keep going back to school, haha), so I've been working on planning out what kind of home automation features I'd like to integrate - thought I'd share the list. It's basically split into two divisions: off-the-shelf equipment, and equipment that requires a central hub.
I haven't decided on a central hub yet. The two choices are to go commercial or to go the DIY route. Out of all of the commercial systems I've seen, I like
Control4 the best. Very reliable, very snappy. I got some good hands-on time in their "Smart RV" at a trade show and really liked their setup. As far as DIY goes, I like Zwave (the
Veralite control hub, specifically) and
Indigo Domotics (runs on a Mac, but gives you a lot more flexibility). Indigo now has Zwave support as well, which is awesome since you can basically program the system to do whatever you want.
Going the Control4 route would be more expensive, but you'd get vendor-backed reliability and when you go to sell your home, it's included as part of the deal. The downside of the DIY route is that you have to rely on yourself to make everything work, and especially in the case of Indigo, where it runs on a computer, you'd have to include a computer package for the next homeowner, teach them how to use it, etc. Vera's system is a little better because it's a standalone router type of device, but it's still not as reliable as a commercial system like Control4, so it's kind of a toss-up. With Indigo, I'd get an amazing amount of control over not only what equipment goes into my system, but also how I choose to control it. With Vera, I'd get an easy "set & forget" type of hub. With Control4, it's a system & service that covers the A to Z for you, which is nice. I'm not sure if they still have a DIY starter system available or not:
http://www.engadget.com/2012/06/28/control4-starter-kit-hands-on/
A quick laundry list of hub-controlled devices I'd want covered:
1. Lights (on/off/dim)
2. Blinds (motorized blackout & sunscreen blinds)
3. Door & window sensors
4. Garage door
5. Motion sensors
6. Ceiling fans
7. Mitsubishi Mr. Slims (per-room HVAC)
The one concern I have right now is the Mr. Slims (mini-split ductless system), which are pretty behind the times control-wise for such an advanced HVAC product. It's basically an ultra-zoned system - instead of a whole-house HVAC (traditional) or a "zoned" HVAC system (ex. 1st story & 2nd story split), it's a per-room system, which gives each user individual control of their room temperature. Plus, you're (1) not paying to heat & cool dozens or hundreds of feet of ductwork, and (2) not paying to heat & cool the entire house, just individual rooms. I have several friends with this system installed & it's really awesome, especially with the new high-heat models if you live in a heavy winter area.
The downside is they have near-zero smarthome integration in the U.S. You can hack it with IR commands, but that's pretty crummy because you miss out on the advanced features like setting a specific temperature. They do have a Wifi adapter over in Europe, but there's not much in the way of integration or availability in the US yet:
http://www.innovations.mitsubishi-les.com/en/controls/wifi-adapter
I know that Nest recently opened up a third-party developer program, so I'm hoping that Mitsubishi will get on the ball & do some further integration with that:
http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/24/nest-developer-program-begins/
Nest also partnered up with Control4 last year for integration, so really the only thing that is missing is native support for the Mitsubishi units: (which is primarily on Mitsubishi's end, to bring that Wifi adapter to the US, and then for C4/Nest to integrate it with a driver)
http://www.engadget.com/2013/09/25/nest-unveils-web-app-developer-program/
Bottom line though, the controller hub is not something that I'd want to fiddle with after installation. I want to use my iPhone as a simple remote control - pull out my phone, open the app, turn off the lights or turn on the fan or whatever. Control4 is the fastest & most reliable way I've seen to do that. I'm not really interested in the more complex systems like Crestron or Savant. It needs to work 100% of the time and have a high WAF, and also be able to be included with the house sale if I were to move, so Control4 is the top contender right now, especially since I'm looking to do more "home automation" (basic control) than "smarthome" type of stuff & it could carry over to a new owner like an alarm system. The rest of the system would pretty much just be using off-the-shelf equipment: (doesn't necessarily need to integrate with the central controller hub since I just want to use my smartphone as a remote control, rather than do advanced smarthome programming)
1. Movies: The idea here is "whole house movies". I already have this setup. All of my screens have Roku 3 players on them, which are running apps like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Vudu (which includes UltraViolet digital movie support), Youtube, Vimeo, and Plex. Plex is the big seller here - I've ripped all of the movies I own, plus family movies from old VHS tapes and whatnot, so everything is accessible from the Roku players. I used to run a NAS, but since local store is large & cheap these days, we just run it off our kitchen computer (Hackintosh). As far as screens go, I have an LED projector for my home theater, a Mitsubishi DLP for my living room TV (daytime viewing), and a small LCD in front of my elliptical machine (watching Netflix makes cardio 100% more fun haha). I also use my LED projector for outdoor movie parties with my 12' inflatable screen from Walmart; that would be easy with an extension cord & the Roku on Wifi.
2. Music: The idea here is "whole house audio". I used to manage a large iTunes library, but not so much anymore. I don't really like iTunes, but since I'm in the Apple universe, I use it. However, I recently switched to Spotify (20 million songs for $10 a month, or $5 a month as a student, with offline downloading so you don't have to use your cellular connection to stream if you don't want to) and really like it. I looked into Sonos, but because they don't have native support for Apple's Airplay, it's kind of pointless since I can get the same functionality using
Airfoil Remote, again with my kitchen PC as the server. A nice
multi-zone amplifier runs about $500 for 6 areas with individual inputs per area, so it'd simply be a matter of sticking a $99
Airport Express on each input. That way each room could have different music, or you could sync up the same music to several rooms. Since there are several people in my house, that's nice because we can also listen to whatever we want, wherever we want, without overlapping (similar concept to the Mr. Slims - individual room control for HVAC AND music!). I do really like the
HTD Lync system, which would be nice for an in-house intercom as well as front door entry intercom for visitors & package delivery people, and could probably be integrated with Airplay for my desired setup without too much difficulty.
3. Security: Not a big fan of security systems (alarms), but I do want to add more cameras. I'm using a Foscam network webcam as a baby monitor, but it'd be nice to have some more cameras floating around for motion triggers and for say driveway alerts or to keep an eye on the smoker/grill/kids in the backyard. There are some nice low-end models like Zmodo & Swann, but I'd probably go with a
QNAP Surveillance NAS since it works off-the-shelf with a huge variety of cameras, such as
AXIS cameras. If the budget is available, I'd really like to use HD cameras (because they're cool) and
thermal cameras (because they're cool AND available, haha).
4. Smoke alarms: Nest Protect, of course. Built-in wifi & smartphone alerts for smoke & carbon monoxide, plus a variety of other nifty features. Simple OOTB setup with the ability to link multiple units to your account. I like that.
5. Fireplace: My in-laws put in a gas fireplace a few years ago that is really neat - runs off the gas line to the house. Hit a button on the wall, voila, instant fire, with optional heating. Super convenient! Escea has a nice lineup of gas fireplaces that work with a
smartphone app for control.
6. Kitchen tablet: One of the coolest products to come out recently is the
HP Slate 21 Pro ($379), which is a 21" Android tablet. It's basically just a repurposed 2-finger touchscreen monitor with an Android motherboard inside, but it works pretty well & it's super cheap for what you get. You can mount it to a VESA swing arm (like one from
Monitors in Motion). It can browse the net (recipe sites), store information (like keeping your favorite recipes in the Evernote app), run Pandora/Spotify/Netflix for background entertainment while you cook, keep a shopping list with a notes app, sync up the family calendar on Gmail, etc. Really slick. The Pro model includes HDMI pass-through, so if you want to hook up a cable box or computer or whatever, you can kill two birds with one stone. And it's a 1080p IPS monitor, so you get a pretty nice picture as well.
7. Network: I used to do PFsense, FreeNAS, Gigabit switch, etc. but I think it's easier just to run something like a nice high-end Asus 802.11n or 802.11ac router with Gigabit built-in. I do prefer wired Gigabit connections, so I'd run that to all of the relevant areas (kitchen PC, kitchen tablet, Roku players, etc.), but other than that, not much in the way of network needs. We keep our main computer in the kitchen as kind of a mini-office space, along with the tablet for basic kitchen duties, and I have a Chromebook as the couch surfer.
8. Sprinkler System: Either a
Cyber Rain or
Rachio Iro smart irrigation system. These are easier to program than traditional sprinkler system controllers and have some added features like monitoring the weather for rain to see if it needs to water the lawn or not. These can also be tied into water conservation systems like
Rain Hog or an
Island Sky outdoor dehumidifier if your area is prone to water shortages.
9. Energy Monitoring: Power monitor is one area that I feel hasn't really come very far. Ideally, I'd like each outlet to have a networked Kill-a-Watt meter in it to see exactly how much each appliance is costing me, what I can turn off, etc. Basically just realtime monitoring of power consumption, along with aggregated data for figuring out how much you're spending & on what. I know there are some sub-meters that do some basic networking if you have tenants; the
Power Meter Store has a bunch of nice options, including
The Energy Detective, which looks to be a pretty good system. Not that it's an overly huge deal because it's not like you're going to shut off your fridge or TV or anything, but it'd be cool to track it & have that information available, especially since my long-term plans includes a DIY backyard solar array
So to kind of summarize my goals:
1. Simple, reliable home automation (simple = high WAF)
2. FAST response (no delays in sending commands, which is something Control4 impressed me with)
3. Use a computer or smartphone as a remote control
4. Offsite access (away from home - cameras, HVAC, etc.)
5. Failover backup on all devices (i.e. lights still work via wall switch if home automation hub is broken)
6. Zero or low-maintenance systems (not something to tinker with because it breaks all the time)
I'm glad that Indigo added Zwave support, since X10 has a pretty bad reputation as far as reliability goes & INSTEON has a spotty one, although they've improved somewhat since adding the dual-band RF wireless mesh networking stuff on top of the powerline communication protocol. But that requires leaving a computer on & is something of a headache when you move, if you leave all of your smarthome equipment in the house.
I thought long & hard about going with a full smarthome system, but it doesn't really make sense for what I desire. Home automation is more of an "in addition to" type of setup for me - you can turn on the light switches via the wall switch, and in addition, you can use your iPhone to turn them all on or off. Simple. I have a buddy who puts in high-end installs (stuff that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars) and they get pretty crazy with the smarthome aspect & "fluff" features, but I want to keep it pretty basic & low-maintenance.