By Bob Gatton
As you enter your home after work, you stop at a small LCD touch panel next to the front door. From this panel you can disarm the security system; turn on the lights to whatever level of brightness you choose; open or close drapes and blinds; raise or lower the thermostat; even turn on a television.
At the end of the day, you arm the security system from a remote control, but you don’t remember if the garage door is open or closed. You can use the same remote control to close the door; the garage door opener will send back confirmation that it is indeed closed. Or if you forget about the garage door until you're already brushing your teeth, you can use the touch panel in your bathroom.
This level of automation is available today from a variety of companies, but the cost can be in the tens of thousands of dollars, sometimes more than $100,000 for larger homes. In the very near future, however, these conveniences will be available at much more affordable prices. Two organizations, Z-Wave and ZigBee (www.z-wavealliance.org and www.zigbee.org), have developed wireless, secure, low-cost and low-power-consumption technology that can be used for all kinds of controls, including the following:
- Lighting controls
- Door locks
- Wireless smoke and carbon monoxide detectors
- HVAC control
- Home security and fire alarms
- Window blind, drapery and shade controls
- Appliances
- Medical sensing and monitoring
- Universal remotes for media rooms
Meshing around
In either Z-Wave or ZigBee systems, each of the enabled components communicates with other components in the system by forming a mesh network in the home. Since they are low power, the range of their radio signal is not that great, but each of the components in the network can relay the information to the next component.
Remember that garage door? If you find yourself at the farthest point in the home from the garage and you need to make sure the door is closed, just select ‘close garage door’ on your remote, keypad or touchscreen. The signal might go from the remote to a networked HVAC control, then to a drapery control and finally to the door opener in the garage. Both Z-Wave and ZigBee are bi-directional technologies; that's how the garage- door opener will send back a confirmation to your remote control. An excellent animation of how this technology works is available at the Z-Wave site.
Since they are wireless, these systems can be easily installed in both new construction and existing homes.
Z-Wave and ZigBee each have more than 100 companies that already have or are in the process of developing products that will use this type of wireless networking capability. Quite a few are on the market now, and more are becoming available every month. And the cost will very affordable; usually it will be only a small premium over a similar product without wireless networking.
One thing to remember, though: Z-Wave- and ZigBee-enabled components do not talk with each other. They operate on different radio frequencies. The house needs to have all its networked components to be compatible with one of the standards.
Bob Gatton is an Atlanta-based home-theater and -electronics consultant and writer.
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