BIG Home Automation Project 2011

[NewZealandHome]

A nice little $2 1Ghz Samsung CPU android micro-controller can control it all for me, I think automation and security companies have lost the plot on what it costs to build a system these days, it will just take a Waikato Uni student to build a small and reliable security controller, a much nicer graphical scripting engine, some nice looking android and iphone apps, and interface to all the I/Os and bus systems, job done.

 

[NewZealandHome]

Is it true about c-bus, when the power goes off and comes back on an hour later, you can't switch some lights back on until all units take 5-20 minutes or more to synchronize back up?

 

[znelbok]

Is it true about c-bus, when the power goes off and comes back on an hour later, you can't switch some lights back on until all units take 5-20 minutes or more to synchronize back up?

Not true at all - the system will come back up virtually intantly. There is no synchronising required at all.

C-bus us a true distributed system, where all control settings are stored in each individual device. The bus sends out what is called MMI's and this keeps all the devices up to date with the status of every thing else. You will not see any issues like the one you have mentioend at all.

Interested to know where this BS came from?

Mick

 

[NewZealandHome]

ok so the rumor makes more sense to me now, its probably true that all the c-bus light switches will take 5-20 minutes to set their correct MMI status in a large system, at 9600bps I'm not surprised with such a busy and slow bus system, does that mean if the light switch has the wrong status, it can't be used?

 

[nzspark]

I talked to a sparky at the wholesalers the other week who has done a cbus install in a building with 190 units and there is no delay at all.

Why do you keep saying 9600bps is slow???? do you know how much data is sent on startup? If its anything like the systems i am used too, each switch has a address "MMI?" this address is only a 8 bit binary code, it sends that code once on startup. wow 8 bits per unit on a 9600bps bus yea that sounds busy.
Remember no processing is done on this bus, each switch simply sends a simple binary code to a relay/dimmer that understands that code and switches its load.

 

[znelbok]

Man you have got to learn to read from reputable sources and not go stupid hearsay. You have people here with first hand experience telling you what actually happens and where to go for better information and yet you still come back with bullshit statements given others a false impression.

C-Bus speed is "slow" for a reaosn, to make it work on two pieces of wet string. It is not slow that comms are a problem or delays are evident in the system - pull your head out of the clouds and go read from teh experts.

Mick

 

[NewZealandHome]

The bus sends out what is called MMI's and this keeps all the devices up to date with the status of every thing else.

How many MMI messages are sent out on the network when you first power on the cbus system with 190 units? and how long does it tie up the network for this to happen?

 

[DJK]

Startup issue? I have 90 C-bus units connected at the house with the Elk/Ness interface and it works great for the last two years. We've lost power twice in the last two years, and never even noticed any lighting issues. C-bus and the Elk/Ness interface is rock solid.

 

[NewZealandHome]

I think the Elk/Ness kit is looking a bit out dated, and so is the pricing on it. $1500 for a Elk + cbus kit. come on, I could buy a full massive high end Gaming PC for that. This ELK thing doesn't even have a screen, let alone a 22inch LCD screen Trust me, my gaming PC is rock solid too.. it runs 24/7 no problems. I've never restarted my gaming PC actually, only to move houses.

I think I'll go for something a lot more modern than that.

 

[BraveSirRobbin]

I think the Elk/Ness kit is looking a bit out dated, and so is the pricing on it. $1500 for a Elk + cbus kit. come on, I could buy a full massive high end Gaming PC for that. This ELK thing doesn't even have a screen, let alone a 22inch LCD screen Trust me, my gaming PC is rock solid too.. it runs 24/7 no problems. I've never restarted my gaming PC actually, only to move houses.

It's all about the softare running on that machine...

 

[nzspark]

wow my spec put the the m1 gold at $500NZD each 16 channel input at $100 and each 16 channel output for $300
Now thats the same price if I was to use din rail relays for each input/output.
I'm not going with the M1/cbus interface now. I'm just going to use CQC to talk to the CBUS and M1
Can control automation with any touch screen or phone i want as CQC will be my front end.

Have you decided what i/o controller your going to plug into your pc yet?

anyone know of any large industrial automation projects that use a PC? Could it be that serial I/O controllers are unreliable let alone the software to control it?

If you want to say PC is cheaper I have seen 32 channel PLC controllers for $300

 

[DJK]

I think the Elk/Ness kit is looking a bit out dated, and so is the pricing on it. $1500 for a Elk + cbus kit. come on, I could buy a full massive high end Gaming PC for that. This ELK thing doesn't even have a screen, let alone a 22inch LCD screen Trust me, my gaming PC is rock solid too.. it runs 24/7 no problems. I've never restarted my gaming PC actually, only to move houses.

I think I'll go for something a lot more modern than that.

Many ways to skin the cat. If you want to roll your own light control, great.

My post was simply to state that when the c-bus does a "reset" the communication time is not an issue. Controlling the house via the Elk and Jason's iPhone app has work very well for the last two years. There is always a trade off between time and money. Fortunately for me, money is not an issue.

 

[NewZealandHome]

You are confusing a PC from a decade ago, you must look at the technology placed in front of you, and yes a little bit of history helps, but don't let it blind you for the future...

The line between PC and PLC is now getting very blurry this day in age... ARM based PCs (aka Android and WindowsCE) is now 1.2GHz! and can run full linux/android/windows mobile operating systems... I think the home automation industry is about to get turned on its head.

I call it a PC, you call it a PLC.

PC now run large Flash memory instead of hard drives! is it time to rename this PC as a PLC? or rename PLCs as PCs?

PC now run full I/O systems! is it time to rename this PC as a PLC?

PC now costs $23USD with full 1080p HD and 20 I/O ports! is it time to rename this PC as a PLC?

perhaps we need a new name for these new bread of Super Microcontollers.

yes I'm young, I come to this thread with "zero" preconceptions, I didn't even know home automation existed before starting this thread. Does it stop me from building an awesome home automation system.. nope. it is of course just my new hobby I just started on

Will I continue to point out how old the technology you guys are using.. yep

will I help build a better and brighter future... yep.

 

[NewZealandHome]

Let me just revisit this Wired vs X10 vs 802.15.4

I have a few thoughts.

X10 - out. it plane sucks.. reports of X10 controllers missing events and commands. what sort of system is that.

Wired - people choose wired solution because of the pre-conception that 100mbit LAN runs on wires, so it must be fast, but its not, 9600bps system over RS485. Just like a webpage loading, latency is improved numerous ways... faster browser, faster internet connection, faster dns cache, proximity to the server. Lets look at a lighting system.... relay switching speed, wire communication speed, distance to the switch. Did Google become popular because it paid attention to every millisecond counts.. you bet it did. Where are these specs on home lighting systems... no where. who is reviewing these metrics? no-one. I can count a million website dedicated to speed of webpages loading. We can't even see measurement results of the latency of lighting systems. anyone know of any research into this area, other than mythbusters 0.36s for a light to turn on. what about relay latency. Can I tell the difference between 400ms and 700ms when turning on or off a light? you bet I can. (excluding the time it takes for the filament or leds to shut down, latency in my mind is the time it takes between an action and a reaction, the start of the filament dimming is enough of a reaction to count) Kids of the future might even press the switch twice in this time thinking they hadn't pressed it if the latency reaches 700-800ms, lol.

Why aren't people installing home automation in every new home build. If you don't have home automation you are building a straw hut in my opinion.

Why is it expensive? because there's no competition... or is there? along comes the wireless standard 802.15.4 (the great thing about standards, is that there are soo many to choose from) numerous comms protocols built on this standard (zigbee, zwave) they rely on short range wireless comms. similiar to how your wireless telephone works i.e 2.4Ghz, some on 433Mhz some on 900Mhz

How fast are these standards? any speed you like, zwave is 9600 bps
Cost? $2 per RF chip.
Reliability: Each RF packet includes a checksum for reliable transmissions.

I think that RF lighting is good for retrofit. i.e use 240v converted to 3volt. or use 2x 1.5AA batteries.

I think that RF lighting is good for new house builds. just push cat5e to each light switch. and run some power over it. sure you only need some cheap telephone wire for power, but future proof it with some twisted pairs.


Wired advantages: its here now and its reliable, but nearly all wired solutions are still expensive for home use because of lack of competition.

Wireless: it requires 6 more months for some more advanced opensource microcontroller(PLC? PC?) software (the silicon is ready and in production), in USA Lutron keeps sueing everybody on patent infringement every 5 minutes, they have a patent on wireless inside a switch wallbox.

The future: wireless, because wired solutions are not installed because they were too expensive for 99% of the straw huts built.

yes there are a handful of RF products, but are not under $10 yet. give it a few years.

 

[NewZealandHome]

here comes one of the first products with the new RF technology at a reasonable price. considering it only costs $8 to make. expect to see a lot more of wall units for 240V like this...

http://store.homeseer.com/store/Homemanageables-HM-LM001-Z-Wave-Lamp-Module-P1006C40.aspx