"For $200-$800, gosh, I hope so!
Hey! You're in the cheap-seats here! "
I guess I don't quite understand why someone would spend all the time it takes to configure a quality HA / media control system for a system that is no longer supported and is getting out of date with technology. True the commercial software costs some money, but what is time worth?
I lot of us made a concious descision to use the discontinued Premise software not because of cost but because of the incredibly powerfull architecture. Once you get into deep level Premise programming you realize you can implement just about any type of feature. Lacking IPhone interface ... you can write one. Lacking low level device driver ... you can write one. Requiring sohisticated event-handling programming logic ... you can do it with the maximum possible level of control.
Which commercial HA package would you say offers a programming/control architecture comparable to Premise in terms of OO programming sophistication and extensibility?
Patrik
Hi Patrik,
I'll start with that I am not up to speed on Premise. With that said, there isn't a whole lot you can't do with either Homeseer, CQC or MainLobby. From the immediate posts above, it implies that one has the ability with Premise, IF they understand how to program software. Nothing wrong with that but it very quickly restricts the user community that has the background. One does not need to know how to program to use the above current commercial packages. I for one am not a software developer at all, but haven't run into many things that I have not been able to accomplish with either Homeseer or MainLobby. More programming was needed for Homeseer, especially on UI before MainLobby and Maestro integration was available.
Is the HA comparison spreadsheet up to date for Premise? If it is, then it's more obvious on the voids that Premise has compared to the above three current commercial offerings.
The HA / Media control software also integrates with other software. Some of that other software will ultimately not work on older OS platforms. Premise at that point is then dated and can't keep up with the industries latest offerings.
Not perfect examples, but MainLobby integrates with Outlook. Not sure if you can do those kinds of things with Premise or not. But, if Outlook ultimately will only run on Vista (not today, but likely in the next couple of years) then Premise won't be able to do this. Media software is starting to leverage the more modern OS and hardware drivers. It's just a matter of time.
No disrespect to Premise software or user community, I am sure by the passionate user's replies that it's cool stuff.
You make some very good points. However, of the systems I have tried, or evaluated, premise out of the box is still fairly easy for a novice. Basic support covers the HA areas...Lights (lutron), HVAC (Aprilaire), Music (Mp3s WITH Metadata), IR Control (Globalcache), and Security. Surely the UI is outdated, however it is easy to use. The object model is solid; control is solid; It runs for a looong time w/o reboots or hanging. I run it on Windows Home Server (W2003) without a problem. (I also get my xdo's double backed up!). It uses standard VBscript, which is relatively easy for newbies to learn. Having looked at some of the others, with made up proprietary languages, lack of 'standard' hardware support, even worse UIs than Premise, I still havent found a compelling reason to move. Sure, there are a couple areas i'd like to see - Windows Media Center integration; iPhone support; and some of the newer things as they roll out.
I guess the real problem w/ HA as a whole, is even thought the other companies made seem solid, the few that make it are few and far...Crestron and AMX are still the heavyweights; Control4 could become the dominant player. However, when you look at the business model, they have largely been HW plays with good control SW. Premise was a good SW play with exceptional HW control. Some of the brands you have mentioned charge astronomical amounts for drivers or capabilities - $400 for a Lutron driver; Outlook integration for many $; and on and on. Some have limited or virtually zero support for IR control!
The value of Premise, considering old supported HW, the no-cost download, the ease of programming IF YOU SO DESIRE, and the extensibility continue to make it a standard by which some of the newcomers need to meet, even before they could be considered competitors.
I suppose I have a bit of passion for Premise, however, I have done these evaluations in writing for some of the AV periodicals out there. One article I wrote listed some number of packages; virtually none (except Homeseer, etc) are still in existence.
An as an aside, I was one of the early adopters of Premise. And when I mean early, I mean $700 for the original 1.5 (?) version. (I think I have the original box and USB token somewhere). Dan, Jim Hunter, Damon, David, and Springer did a great job with it. Its unfortunate the business aspects went the way it did with Lantronix and ultimately, Motorola.
Maybe some day we should create a Home Automation Hall of Fame.....
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