CEDIA 2009: Home Automation and more - bit-tech.net Forums

Sifter3000 · 27th Jun 2009, 10:15

http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/events/...ion-and-more/1

This week we headed along to the CEDIA Expo 2009 at the Excel centre in London to take a look at the latest innovations in home theatre, AV and home automation technology. Waiting for us were programmable bathtubs, £6,000 Blu-ray players and a 103in Plasma TV - read on to find out more!

BioSniper · 27th Jun 2009, 10:28

Cheers for the coverage. Home automation has always been a passion of mine but X10 is a little bit crappy these days. Nice to see some alternatives are cropping up all be it at quite a price by the sounds of things.

StephenK · 27th Jun 2009, 11:11

Nice read. Thanks lads!

Yemerich · 27th Jun 2009, 13:00

What??? No casemods???

Sir Digby · 27th Jun 2009, 14:47

Awww, bless Harry and that TV

TheEclypse · 27th Jun 2009, 18:15

Got two of those 103" panasonics in the reception at work..friggin HUGE.

Goty · 27th Jun 2009, 18:29

Those HDHomeRuns are nice, also. We use a few at work for different things.

ACIDEVIL · 27th Jun 2009, 20:52

People will get fat really quick. BTW The 103" tv is awesome

Furymouse · 27th Jun 2009, 23:28

Surely you can make a better Bluray player than that for well under half the price. Understandably it is mostly for backup/streaming purposes and of course the always important e-peen

To me it seems like almost every one of these things will soon be or has already been eclipsed by other products.

DiegoAAC · 28th Jun 2009, 07:44

What about a waterproof laptop? (for the bathtub)

r4tch3t · 28th Jun 2009, 09:36

This is what I will have in my house, although, I am planning on doing most of it myself. Should be easy enough although I think I will have to purchase the software as my coding skills are lacking.

Baz · 28th Jun 2009, 09:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by r4tch3t

This is what I will have in my house, although, I am planning on doing most of it myself. Should be easy enough although I think I will have to purchase the software as my coding skills are lacking.

If you know you're electronics or are an electrician in real life, then there's nothing to stop you - good on you!

Flibblebot · 28th Jun 2009, 12:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by r4tch3t

This is what I will have in my house, although, I am planning on doing most of it myself. Should be easy enough although I think I will have to purchase the software as my coding skills are lacking.

Which part are you planning on having in your house?
The reasons why home automation costs so much is that it has to be absolutely bullet proof. If everything in your home - lighting, heating, security, window treatments, aduio/video distribution, etc. - is controlled by a central system, just one glitch can make your whole house unusable.

Having run my own company speciailising in all this stuff (although I've had to close the business, and this year is the first year that I haven't been to CEDIA in a long time), the logic required to tie all the separate systems of a house together can be mindboggling.

If you're just talking about video or music servers, then yes, it may be cheaper, but it probably won't look as good or be as robust and as easy to use as a pre-built system from Kaliedescape, Mediamax or Imerge.

You've got to remember that bit-tech readers are vastly more technical than the average home owner - and for the rest of the population, all they're interested in is how it looks and how easy it is to use. In the right market, there's no price you can put on those two commodities

Cupboard · 28th Jun 2009, 15:35

Running a bath from abroad seems monumentally pointless. Everything else is pretty awesome though, but I do have to agree with the sentiment expressed by r4tch3t - if you know your stuff it should be fairly easy.

r4tch3t · 28th Jun 2009, 16:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cupboard

Running a bath from abroad seems monumentally pointless.

But being able to txt your home when you leave work to have a bath ready for you is great for the ladies, my partner showed great interest in this possibility of Home Automation. From abroad it is pointless. Another thing would be security if you went away, you can make the house look occupied, opening curtains switching lights and TV etc.

It wouldn't be that hard to patch something together to be controlled from a laptop or control panel, but it would not be that flexible. I would make the logic circuits myself and have some kind of software to monitor them all with access to the software is by wireless tablet or e-mail/txt. As for fail safes there would be a master switch which turned it all off if it got stuck in a loop or something. and if something went wrong the system would de-activate. Not the best option, but at least you can still use everything the normal way.

27th Jun 2009, 10:15	#1
Sifter3000 Editor @ CPC bit-tech Staff Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: The South Sea Bubble Posts: 759	CEDIA 2009: Home Automation and more http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/events/...ion-and-more/1 This week we headed along to the CEDIA Expo 2009 at the Excel centre in London to take a look at the latest innovations in home theatre, AV and home automation technology. Waiting for us were programmable bathtubs, £6,000 Blu-ray players and a 103in Plasma TV - read on to find out more! __________________ Alex Watson. CPC and bit-tech. My weblog is The Wired Jester. Photos on Flickr.

27th Jun 2009, 10:28	#2
BioSniper I Mod, Therefore I Own Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Somewhere in the south Posts: 3,454	Cheers for the coverage. Home automation has always been a passion of mine but X10 is a little bit crappy these days. Nice to see some alternatives are cropping up all be it at quite a price by the sounds of things. __________________ My Flickr :: Bit-tech Flickr Wii: 1792 1527 2926 7945 :: Xbox Live: BioSnipr :: PSN: Biosnipr

27th Jun 2009, 11:11	#3
StephenK Nanomodder Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 224	Nice read. Thanks lads! __________________ Intel e6600 @ 2.4ghz \| 4gb Corsair Twin2X 6400C4 DDR2 \| Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro + Silver 5 \| Gainward 7950GT 256MB \| iiyama ProLite E2200WS \| Black Coolermaster Mystique 631 \| Corsair HX620 PSU \| Asus P5B Deluxe \| 1tb SpinPoint F1 Desktop + 320gb Samsung T166 \| X-Fi Xtreme Gamer \| Creative Inspire T6100 \| Samsung DVD±RW SH-S183A \| LG DVD ROM \| Logitech Mx5000 \|

27th Jun 2009, 13:00	#4
Yemerich What's a rebimboca da parafuseta? Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Sao Paulo - Brazil Posts: 713	What??? No casemods??? __________________ Bit Tech is more than games and hardware - check out the mods too. Don't let modding die in Bit-Tech.net.

27th Jun 2009, 14:47	#5
Sir Digby The Supprising Adventures Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Ye Olde England Posts: 1,060	Awww, bless Harry and that TV __________________ Angry internet men, I give up on you. Visit Game Engine, and contribute if you like.

27th Jun 2009, 18:15	#6
TheEclypse Supermodder Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: England Posts: 407	Got two of those 103" panasonics in the reception at work..friggin HUGE. __________________ Current Rig: Shuttle ST20G5 \| AMD Athlon64 4000+ San Diego \| X1950Pro \| 200Gb Samsung SpinPoint P120S SATA \| 1GB OCZ Performance \| NEC ND3540A \| 7-in-1 Floppy

27th Jun 2009, 18:29	#7
Goty Supermodder Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Dacula, GA USA Posts: 302	Those HDHomeRuns are nice, also. We use a few at work for different things.

27th Jun 2009, 20:52	#8
ACIDEVIL What's a Dremel? Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 2	People will get fat really quick. BTW The 103" tv is awesome

27th Jun 2009, 23:28	#9
Furymouse Like connect 4 in dagger terms Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: SL,UT Posts: 363	Surely you can make a better Bluray player than that for well under half the price. Understandably it is mostly for backup/streaming purposes and of course the always important e-peen To me it seems like almost every one of these things will soon be or has already been eclipsed by other products. __________________ "Get these oreos out of my way, Im trying to stab him!" Lapit mga kaibigan at makinig kayo!

28th Jun 2009, 07:44	#10
DiegoAAC What's a Dremel? Join Date: Nov 2007 Posts: 11	What about a waterproof laptop? (for the bathtub)

28th Jun 2009, 09:36	#11
r4tch3t hmmmm.... Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: New Zealand Posts: 2,884	This is what I will have in my house, although, I am planning on doing most of it myself. Should be easy enough although I think I will have to purchase the software as my coding skills are lacking. __________________ Fight my Brute The quantum limit of reality might be scaled up because we're all holograms. Obviously. Once more we see that sufficiently advanced physics is indistinguishable from getting really stoned. From here

28th Jun 2009, 15:35	#14
Cupboard I'm not a modder. Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Bury St Edmunds/Durham Uni Posts: 1,844	Running a bath from abroad seems monumentally pointless. Everything else is pretty awesome though, but I do have to agree with the sentiment expressed by r4tch3t - if you know your stuff it should be fairly easy. __________________ i7 920, 8800GTS 512, 6GB Corsair all in an Intel DX58SO; 3*320GB RAID5; CM Stacker Samsung Q45.