By Bob Gatton
Working with your electrician or custom installation company, you have designed this latest house to have integrated whole-house audio and video, lighting control, security system with cameras and networked HVAC controls. Great, but how will the customer make all of this stuff work? If it isn’t easy for the customer to operate, it will not be valued. I have seen far too many systems that had great components but control systems that were not properly designed and programmed. The result was that those great components were rarely used—if ever.
There are three primary ways for your customer to control these systems once they are in the home: keypads, touch panels and remote controls.
Keypads built into the wall are the most economical way to control a system and usually the easiest for the customer to understand. (For examples of keypads, go to Vantage Controls: Keypad Station). In most installations there should be a keypad in every room where there is not a touch panel or remote control. The limiting factor for these devices, however, is that there is a limited number of buttons, thus limiting the number of different commands that can be entered on a keypad.
Touch panels are much more versatile, since they can be programmed with a virtually unlimited number of buttons. (See Vantage Controls TouchPoint 550W (Wall mount). The cost will be higher and the learning curve will be a bit longer for the homeowner, but with a properly installed and programmed system, these can control everything in the system. Touch panels can be wall-mounted, installed on a pedestal or handheld. (I admit that the line between a handheld touch panel and a remote control is very blurry.)
Remote controls for systems like this are not like the standard remote control that came with your television or DVD player. While many of those remotes can control other equipment, usually from the same or different companies, they can't control non-audio/video equipment.
For the home-automation system, the homeowner will need one or more universal programmable remotes, which are available from several companies (see below). Usually the remote is programmed by the installer, linking the remote to a computer. These remotes can also do multiple commands at the touch of one button: turning on the system, lowering the window shades, lowering the lights and starting the DVD. This chain of commands is called a macro.
Spend extra time with your installer on the controls. This is the part of home automation that the homeowner will use every day. If you and the installer put the keypads and touch panels in the right places and program them so that they are easy to use, the new homeowners will wonder how they ever got along without their new home-automation system.
Bob Gatton is a Knoxville, Tenn.-based home-theater and -electronics consultant and writer.
Companies that manufacture home automation systems, programmable keypads, touch panels and remotes
Crestron
ELAN Home Systems
Harmony (Logitech)
Niles Audio
Pronto (Philips)
Nevo (Universal Electronics)
Universal Remote Control
Vantage Controls
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