Home Automation, who has done it?

Parent Cafe
1

<p>I am simple, I am content with wired alarm system installed in my house. I have security cameras all over my house which I can see on my smart phone. Yet, I am looking for a way to control my lighting and garage door. I want to remotely turn on and off some lights so it looks like the home is occupied while I am away. I also want to control the garage door opener if I forgot to close it while I am on the road. I want to do all these using the smart phone.</p>

<p>Has anyone tied in all these in one system? How did you do it? </p>

<p>I have investigated several on the market. system like X10 requires you dedicated a PC as a host which I don’t think it is very reliable. Others only do the electrical appliances but fail short of Garage Doors.</p>

2

<p>This seems a little paranoid? I presume that you are not a drug kingpin operating in Mexico? </p>

<p>Don’t forget to shut the garage doors, and put some decently bright table lamps on these [Intermatic</a> TN311 15 Amp Heavy Duty Grounded Timer - Amazon.com](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Intermatic-TN311-Heavy-Grounded-Timer/dp/B005MMSTNG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368534044&sr=8-1&keywords=electric+timers+for+appliances]Intermatic”>http://www.amazon.com/Intermatic-TN311-Heavy-Grounded-Timer/dp/B005MMSTNG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368534044&sr=8-1&keywords=electric+timers+for+appliances) plus leave a couple of main room lights on. I live in a fairly rough area, and my house is often left empty for a month at a time. By double locking our doors, setting the burglar alarm and putting timers on some lights, we’ve never been burgled.</p>

3

<p>It’s not necessarily paranoid; it’s the latest technology and kinda fun. </p>

<p>That said, I can barely operate my smart phone, so I’m no help at all.</p>

4

<p>not paranoid, but inspired by my friend who forgot to close the garage door often. so he was looking into an automatic garage door closer like one of these:</p>

<p>Garage Butler: [Garage</a> Butler LLC. - The Automatic Garage Door Closer!](<a href=“garagebutler.com”>http://www.garagebutler.com/)</p>

<p>Sky Link GT-100A: [Skylinkhome.com</a> - Garage Door Auto Closer Model GT-100A](<a href=“http://www.skylinkhome.com/can/products/ut/gt100a.html]Skylinkhome.com”>http://www.skylinkhome.com/can/products/ut/gt100a.html)</p>

<p>Magic Closer: <a href=“http://www.magiccloser.com/[/url]”>http://www.magiccloser.com/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>It got me thinking. hmm, I forgot to close the garage door once and I had the neighbor to close it for me. Maybe I should investigate for a device that I can close the door anywhere with the internet and smart phones. After that, my thoughts went wild and that is why the home automation idea came about, in which, I can control everything in the house remotely via internet and/or smart phone.</p>

5

<p>I know there are projects people have come up with using a Raspberry Pi. Things like automatically opening/unlocking a door when an RFID tag is near, to being able to control various things throughout the house via a web interface. It’s a bit DIY, but there’s a lot of fun to be had if you’re into it.</p>

<p>And, honestly, running a dedicated server at home isn’t that unreliable. Just get a really low power usage one, throw it into a closet with a little bit of ventilation, and hope your internet doesn’t go out. Honestly, a single bottleneck like a PC seems to actually be more reliable to me than a bunch of independently operating devices, any of which might mess up on its own.</p>

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<p>It’s not paranoid at all. It’s quite smart. H has done all this with our house, but I don’t know what he uses. He can make sure our garage doors are closed from our bedroom.</p>

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<p>Agree with MOWC. We also have done it and can check on anything (including the camera feeds) wherever we are, either on a smart phone or laptop/Ipad. Our security guy and electronics guy set it all up when we did our reno a couple of years ago.</p>

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<p>We have a system in place, but haven’t bought the program yet which enables remote control of the system. But I think we will end up doing it. We have a weekend place, so it would be nice to be able to do this.</p>

9

<p>Simplisafe [Home</a> Security Systems from Simplisafe](<a href=“http://simplisafe.com/]Home”>http://simplisafe.com/)
Has the home security system set up right. You can check the status of the system anywhere you go. It is wireless and it will connect to the monitoring center via cell phones(T-Mobile). But it is short of home automation, because it can only provide home alarms, it cannot control other devices.</p>

10

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<p>I confess that one night while DH was working upstairs in his office, I had a little fun using my I-phone to dim the office lights up and down. :o DH was not amused. As Alec Baldwin always says on 30 Rock, “Grow up, Lemon!”</p>

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<p>nrdsb4, the H of a friend of mine thought he was being funny doing that when he was out of town and she was home alone! Friend was definitely not amused.</p>

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<p>^^^^Can’t say I blame her!</p>