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July 26, 2008

smart home installer

We are looking for recomendations to a company specializing in smart homes...specifically we would like a IP enabled video survalence system and some sort of system to turn on or off lights and other electrical items. Specifically, we would like to be able to enter to our home and be able to turn on or off anything on some sort of LCD screen by the door...I know this all sounds crazy, but a friend of mine told me to look around and I will find someone! Here is a company that sells this stuff, but I would rather find someone who specializes in this in the NYC area:

http://www.insteon.net/

Posted by nybk01 at 8:58 AM | Comments (3)

Comments

I wired my place with Insteon. Most of my lights run on Insteon under control of the HouseLinc software running on a Windows box. I got my stuff on Smarthome.com and installed it myself.

Any electrician with half a brain can install this equipment for you. The "gotcha" with Insteon, and X10 as well, is that light switches (which normally [and should] interrupt the hot wire) need to be rewired like an electrical outlet, with a hot and a neutral. That's where you will need an electrician.

Otherwise, the installation is fairly foolproof. You do all your device programming on HouseLinc.

Oh, one more "gotcha". If you've got a powerline LAN it may interfere with Insteon. That one had me scratching for a week till I located the problem.

I've got a bunch of articles about Insteon and X10 on my reno site:

http://www.brooklynrowhouse.com/search/node/insteon

Posted by: Steve at July 26, 2008 11:50 AM

Steve, what kind of throughput are you getting with your powerline LAN? I want to put a WHS box in my basement, but running cable through my brownstone would be a real PITA and wireless won't really cut it.

Posted by: la di da di at July 27, 2008 11:39 PM

I had a SlingLink power LAN for my Slingbox. The bandwidth was sufficient to pass a TV picture to my computer. Powerline LANs currently have a practical bandwidth of ~50Mbps.

Posted by: Steve at July 28, 2008 3:04 PM

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