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Hello All -
So I'm a complete noob to this, so please bear with me! I have spent the last few days doing some research around home automation, read a few buying guides and a few threads on here. I'm basically looking to start down the path of home automation, with a primary view of improving energy efficiency in our family. So - heat, light and power sockets are my priorities - and specifically I would like:
- to have one button to turn off all the lights in the house. Surely the kids can manage to press ONE BUTTON before going to school - they are the last to leave the house in the morning and I often come home to half a dozen lights left on :-)
- heating: we have a fairly antiquated combi-boiler for radiators with a single thermostat at the top of the stairs - I'd like to replace this with individual radiator thermostats
- hot water - again, the combi boiler heats the water in the tank and is just on a daily schedule so sometimes we haven't enough hot water, and sometimes we have a full tank and no one using it - I would like a solution to match supply and demand...
- sockets - kids like to leave everything on all the time and rather than nagging I'd like to be able to make sure everything is switched off when I know no one is home - remotely from an Android app would be perfect. Even better would be to be able to remotely put their computers in to standby so I know I'm not accidentally trashing the homework they forgot to save by turning their machine off.
I don't want a solution that is cloud-dependent - internet outages are common enough for that to be a non-starter for me.
I want something that is relatively easy to set up - I don't have lots of time to invest in hacking scripts - while I'm technically minded and am not frightened of complexity, I don't have much time! Also, wife and kids need to be able to use everything with ease.
Budget - I plan to start small with approx £200-£300 - maybe just a controller and some lighting initially to dip my toe in the water - but I want to buy a system which I can easily expand to the other areas as funds allow.
Solutions I've considered, and my thoughts:
Lightwave RF - I love the aesthetics and the simplicity, and they seem to have all the devices I need to do what I want to do, but will they be around for the long haul? Investing in a proprietary standard feels like I might end up with the BetaMax of home automation and end up unable to replace things which wear out over time without investing in a completely different system.
Z-Wave Options
Vera Plus - seems relatively good value and highly compatible with lots of component vendors and a good online community. Z Wave standard means even if the company goes out of business my system will continue to work with minimal replacement costs if things break over time.
HomeSeer Hometroller S2 - been around for a long time, expensive but lots of support and compatibility - perhaps too much fiddly-ness for my time limited lifestyle? Am I going to need to spend hours getting a new lightbulb to work?! Why oh why can I find it for no less than £249.99 in the UK when on US web sites it is listed at $200. I would feel like I'm being ripped off!
Samsung SmartThings - I like the aesthetics and the cost, I like that it is a big established company not likely to go anywhere, but still seems in its infancy as far as compatibility (e.g. so far I believe does not support control of radiator thermostats) so wouldn't be able to do all that I would like to achieve in the longer term.
My questions for you lovely people: is there a system that I'm missing that I really should look at? Does my approach seem sound and my criticisms valid? Looking at what I've written I'll probably end up ordering the Vera Plus as it appears to combine scalability, compatibility and reasonable cost ... am I going to regret it?!
Thank you in advance...
So I'm a complete noob to this, so please bear with me! I have spent the last few days doing some research around home automation, read a few buying guides and a few threads on here. I'm basically looking to start down the path of home automation, with a primary view of improving energy efficiency in our family. So - heat, light and power sockets are my priorities - and specifically I would like:
- to have one button to turn off all the lights in the house. Surely the kids can manage to press ONE BUTTON before going to school - they are the last to leave the house in the morning and I often come home to half a dozen lights left on :-)
- heating: we have a fairly antiquated combi-boiler for radiators with a single thermostat at the top of the stairs - I'd like to replace this with individual radiator thermostats
- hot water - again, the combi boiler heats the water in the tank and is just on a daily schedule so sometimes we haven't enough hot water, and sometimes we have a full tank and no one using it - I would like a solution to match supply and demand...
- sockets - kids like to leave everything on all the time and rather than nagging I'd like to be able to make sure everything is switched off when I know no one is home - remotely from an Android app would be perfect. Even better would be to be able to remotely put their computers in to standby so I know I'm not accidentally trashing the homework they forgot to save by turning their machine off.
I don't want a solution that is cloud-dependent - internet outages are common enough for that to be a non-starter for me.
I want something that is relatively easy to set up - I don't have lots of time to invest in hacking scripts - while I'm technically minded and am not frightened of complexity, I don't have much time! Also, wife and kids need to be able to use everything with ease.
Budget - I plan to start small with approx £200-£300 - maybe just a controller and some lighting initially to dip my toe in the water - but I want to buy a system which I can easily expand to the other areas as funds allow.
Solutions I've considered, and my thoughts:
Lightwave RF - I love the aesthetics and the simplicity, and they seem to have all the devices I need to do what I want to do, but will they be around for the long haul? Investing in a proprietary standard feels like I might end up with the BetaMax of home automation and end up unable to replace things which wear out over time without investing in a completely different system.
Z-Wave Options
Vera Plus - seems relatively good value and highly compatible with lots of component vendors and a good online community. Z Wave standard means even if the company goes out of business my system will continue to work with minimal replacement costs if things break over time.
HomeSeer Hometroller S2 - been around for a long time, expensive but lots of support and compatibility - perhaps too much fiddly-ness for my time limited lifestyle? Am I going to need to spend hours getting a new lightbulb to work?! Why oh why can I find it for no less than £249.99 in the UK when on US web sites it is listed at $200. I would feel like I'm being ripped off!
Samsung SmartThings - I like the aesthetics and the cost, I like that it is a big established company not likely to go anywhere, but still seems in its infancy as far as compatibility (e.g. so far I believe does not support control of radiator thermostats) so wouldn't be able to do all that I would like to achieve in the longer term.
My questions for you lovely people: is there a system that I'm missing that I really should look at? Does my approach seem sound and my criticisms valid? Looking at what I've written I'll probably end up ordering the Vera Plus as it appears to combine scalability, compatibility and reasonable cost ... am I going to regret it?!
Thank you in advance...