[CES] Eaton develops Home Heartbeat

[electron]

CLEVELAND…Diversified industrial manufacturer Eaton Corporation (NYSE:ETN) has developed Home Heartbeat™, a home awareness system that enables consumers to monitor and receive updates on a broad range of household devices and systems.

Home Heartbeatâ„¢ provides consumers with anytime knowledge of the inner workings of their homes while they go about their daily lives. The wireless, plug-and-use system enables consumers to add simple remote monitoring to ordinary household systems and devices. Home Heartbeatâ„¢, which installs in minutes, features a Home Keyâ„¢ that allows homeowners an all-in-one glimpse at the status and condition of their homes.

The system routinely monitors for problems such as water leaks and flooding. It also provides updates on home appliances, the status of doors and windows, routine maintenance schedules, and oversees comings and goings of family members.

Read the rest of this press release

 

[electron]

"This is an exciting opportunity that puts Eaton on the cutting edge of the emerging category of home awareness," said Matt Lorenz, marketing manager, Residential Division, Eaton's electrical business. "Homeowners are looking for a way to keep in touch with their homes so they can avert emergencies and problems before they get out of control. Home Heartbeatâ„¢ provides a high-tech solution in an easy-to-install, easy-to-use system. If you can plug in a lamp, use a remote control, and apply stickers, you can use this system."

The system sends emails or text message alerts to cell phones when a problem is detected. Because the system is wireless, it is also easy to upgrade by adding new sensors and components.

Out-of-the-box, Home Heartbeatâ„¢ can quite literally be up and monitoring the status of the home in minutes. It has three main components: a Base Station, a Home Keyâ„¢, and a network of detection sensors. Installation of the system breaks down into three easy steps: activate the Base Station, train the Home Keyâ„¢, and use the sensors to monitor the home.

The Base Station is the heart of the system. It communicates with the Home Keyâ„¢ and sensors wirelessly and maintains constant awareness of the state of the home. The Base Station interprets the alert and status messages from the sensors and relays the information to the Home Keyâ„¢. These two components continually interact, transmitting important information, and alerts to the homeowner.

The Home Heartbeatâ„¢ Home Keyâ„¢, with its LCD display, communicates wirelessly with the Base Station. Homeowners can use this Home Keyâ„¢ to monitor the home, to alert them of a problem (by vibration, beep or red flashing LCD display), and to add additional sensors to the system.

The Home Keyâ„¢ captures a snapshot of the current state of the home as soon as it is out of range of the Base Station. Homeowners can also set up a "Call Me Awareness" feature which allows them to receive an email or a text message when there is a problem in the home. So whether the homeowner is home or away, at work, or on vacation, they can be alerted to potential problems.

The sensors -- which include water sensors, open/closed sensors, power sensors, reminder and attention sensors -- are the backbone of the Home Heartbeatâ„¢ system. They can alert the homeowner to a wide range of problems, including pipe leaks and flooding, open doors and windows, and appliances that are left on or are without power. Water sensors have an added feature that can activate a water shut-off valve. Reminder and attention sensors can be set to trigger easy-to-forget tasks, like bringing home a gallon of milk or taking out the garbage.

Home Heartbeatâ„¢ is ZigBeeâ„¢ ready. ZigBeeâ„¢, a wireless networking standard (IEE 802.15.4), connects small embedded sensors and transmitters that don't need much bandwidth, but that do need long battery life, built-in network security, and scalability. And because Home Heartbeatâ„¢ is wireless, it is also easy to upgrade by adding new sensors/components.

"A home awareness system should provide painless peace-of-mind about the most valuable thing most people own – their home," said Lorenz. "With simplicity, a lack of expensive third-party monitoring, and its ability to embrace future technological advances, Home Heartbeat™ delivers on this goal."

The ZigBee Alliance is an association of companies working together to enable reliable, cost-effective, low-power, wirelessly networked, monitoring and control products based on an open global standard. The ZigBee Alliance is a rapidly growing, non-profit industry consortium of leading semiconductor manufacturers, technology providers, OEMs, integrators, application developers, and end-users worldwide. Membership is open to all. Additional information can be found at http://www.zigbee.org.

Eaton Corporation is a diversified industrial manufacturer with 2004 sales of $9.8 billion. Eaton is a global leader in electrical systems and components for power quality, distribution and control; fluid power systems and services for industrial, mobile and aircraft equipment; intelligent truck drivetrain systems for safety and fuel economy; and automotive engine air management systems, powertrain solutions and specialty controls for performance, fuel economy and safety. Eaton has 59,000 employees and sells products to customers in more than 125 countries. For more information, visit http://www.eaton.com.

 

[ChrisWalker]

That's a very cool system.

It will be interesting to see if Eaton chooses to make the system Zigbee-compliant (i.e. interoperable) in the future.

Chris

 

[elcano]

Home Heartbeat™ is ZigBee™ ready.

Interesting wording. I dont know what "Zigbee ready" is supposed to mean. But as Chirs cleverly points out, if it was Zigbee compliant they would be using those words instead.

 

[ChrisWalker]

Elcano:

"Zigbee ready" is the term that both Control4 and Eaton are using to describe their systems. "802.15.4 radio" doesn't communicate a lot of value to consumers, and is in fact a little bit misleading anyway--since consumers would likely assume that two "802.15.4" devices would work together out of the box.

"Zigbee ready" is a bit like the "802.11 pre-N" devices. They conform to their own standards, maybe even based on a working draft of the future standard, and they do similar things to what the actual standard will do. But while "pre-N" devices can generally fallback to 802.11b or 802.11g to interoperate with devices from other manufacturers, with "Zigbee ready" devices there's no fallback. So essentially, many or all of these devices will not work with devices from other manufacturers, and many or all of them will not work with Zigbee-compliant devices in the future.

Control4 has been throwing around "Zigbee," "Zigbee ready" and "802.15.4" in their marketing materials for a while. It looks like "Zigbee ready" is the big marketing term that's being used now, which at least makes things clear for the technically savvy. But it's going to confuse a lot of consumers, like "HD ready" TVs. They don't actually have an HD tuner in them, but if you hook them up to one . . .

Unless I'm mistaken, there are very few device profiles worked out in the Zigbee world. I understand that it's now possible to create at least one variety of "Zigbee compliant" light switch now, but I don't know if standards even exist for any of the device types--and I don't know if there is any logo certfication procedure for any device type at all.

Chris

 

[rocco]

The ZigBee Alliance defined the term "ZigBee Ready" to apply to devices that have been designed to be ZigBee compliant, but have not yet received certification by a testing laboratory. By using the term "ZigBee Ready", a manufacturer is supposed to be committing itself to make the product compliant.

 

[ChrisWalker]

Rocco:

I'm not on the inside of all the Zigbee circles, so I really appreciate your contributions and knowledge here.

A few quick questions, if that's alright:

1. Are there finished (or even draft) Zigbee profiles other than the lighting profile? I haven't heard of any, but that's also not information that's advertised prominently anywhere.

2. Specifically, are there profiles for things like power sensors, and the Eaton home key?

3. Employees from some companies with "Zigbee ready" devices have indicated that their devices are too feature-rich to be Zigbee compliant. Is it possible to get a "partially interoperable with other Zigbee devices" logo?

4. I have also heard that some manufacturers are making a mixture of "Zigbee" devices and non-"Zigbee" devices. Do you see a lot of room for devices which can control other Zigbee devices, but are proprietary in and of themselves?

5. Have you heard any estimates as to when certification testing is going to be available for Zigbee devices?

Thanks a bunch, Rocco.

Chris

 

[rocco]

Hi, Chris:
Not being an alliance member myself yet, I don't have access to many answers. I am on the alliance mailing list, so I get my documentation through that and their web site.

1. Are there finished (or even draft) ZigBee profiles other than the lighting profile? I haven't heard of any, but that's also not information that's advertised prominently anywhere.

There are three profile stacks that were identified when the ZigBee specification was ratified in December 2004. They are "Home Controls", "Building Automation" and "Plant Control". I don't have complete copies of the profiles, and I suspect that it is because they are not really finished.

2. Specifically, are there profiles for things like power sensors, and the Eaton home key?

Eaton announced "Home Heartbeat" over a year ago, and I think the delay in getting it out is due to the immaturity of the profiles. Eaton's product straddles the lines between all three of the above-mentioned profiles. I do know that the Plant-Control profile is strong in sensor support, and is also the profile many alliance members are concentrating their development. I suspect that Eaton is relying on that profile

3. Employees from some companies with "ZigBee ready" devices have indicated that their devices are too feature-rich to be ZigBee compliant. Is it possible to get a "partially inter-operable with other ZigBee devices" logo?

I contend that the marketing line that a device is "too feature-rich to be ZigBee compliant" comes from the back end of a bull. I believe the Control4 lighting devices are not compliant because they needed to get to market sooner than the profile would be ready, and had to improvise the profile in their devices. I believe AMX did the same, but provides a "bridge" to link their devices to "compliant" devices. Most alliance members feel that interoperability is key to success, and are unlikely to support an "Almost-ZigBee" classification. That would be contrary to the ZigBee motto: "ZigBee: Wireless Control That Simply Works" (maybe they could change it to "Wireless Control That Almost Works").

4. I have also heard that some manufacturers are making a mixture of "ZigBee" devices and non-"ZigBee" devices. Do you see a lot of room for devices which can control other ZigBee devices, but are proprietary in and of themselves?

Tough question. I don't know. A non-ZigBee device would not be able to participate in the mesh and would require an additional "bridge". But if the other technology is less expensive or more functional, then those other concerns are minor. I can see ZigBee as a compliment to UPB. I can also see Ultra-Wide-Band bridging to ZigBee or ZWave in a home-theater environment. But I don't see a point to AMX's "Somewhat-like-ZigBee" light switches bridging to true ZigBee light switches. It would be simpler to just go ZWave.

5. Have you heard any estimates as to when certification testing is going to be available for ZigBee devices?

I hear nothing lately. Last spring I heard that testing was available, but without ratified profiles, there is nothing to test against. I believe that this is the reason we hear about so many "ZigBee-Ready" devices, and no "ZigBee" devices. We seem to be waiting on the profiles.

Here is some speculation: Similar to "linking" devices in Insteon, ZigBee depends on "binding" individual devices together (like a ZigBee wall-switch to it's ZigBee light-fixture). Like Insteon, messages are not "broadcast", but are sent from peer to peer, and the binding tables are stored locally within each node. This has caused difficulties with keeping track of Insteon device status in home-automation software packages. Coupled with the fact that there is no "master" controller or database in ZigBee, it makes it even more difficult to track status with ZigBee. I suspect the conflicting requirements of distributed control and central tracking of device status has delayed the implementation of the profiles.

 

[ChrisWalker]

Rocco, that's a lot of good info. Thank you very much.

BTW, do you know if devices from the "Home Controls", "Building Automation" and "Plant Control" stacks are 100% interoperable? In other words, if I take a "building automation" or "plant control' sensor and put it in my home, can I seamlessly use it to turn on a "Home Controls" light switch?

We're watching all the protocols very carefully. With all the "marketing" going on, it's hard for us to tell what is reality and what is not sometimes. I can only imagine how much confusion this creates for non-techie consumers.

Chris

 

[George West]

Hi Chris,

1. Are there finished (or even draft) Zigbee profiles other than the lighting profile? I haven't heard of any, but that's also not information that's advertised prominently anywhere.

Just the lighting profile. According to the ZigBee Alliance they are taking their time to "really get it right" on the rest of the profiles. Interestingly enough the sweet spot for ZigBee today is to replace wired embedded micro-controllers. At least one alliance member company made the comment to us that they are frustrated that there isn't even a serial line/UART profile which could probably be banged out over a beer at lunch.

2. Specifically, are there profiles for things like power sensors, and the Eaton home key?

No. And I give kudos to Eaton for not claiming that Home Heartbeat is ZigBee [anything] when I spoke with them at CES. Although the cynic in me thinks it might have something to do with the fact that I identified myself as an industry analyst. Control4 wasn't nearly so reticent.

BTW, if anyone gets the chance to check out the Eaton HH kit, it has some of the nicest industrial design around. The way that they enroll devices in the network is the slickest thing I have ever seen. You basically slide the key fob into a slot on the sensor node and push a button. Job done.

Another tidbit of information I picked up at Eaton was that they get about 3-5 years of battery life from a device that is only used intermitantly such as a garage door tilt sensor.

3. Employees from some companies with "Zigbee ready" devices have indicated that their devices are too feature-rich to be Zigbee compliant. Is it possible to get a "partially interoperable with other Zigbee devices" logo?

Another way to state this is "We can give you ZigBee or we can give you something that works"

As far as we can tell through our research, which includes speaking on a regular basis with the ZigBee alliance members (Ember, Chipcon/TI, Integration Associates and so forth), there are zero products released using both ZigBee compliant hardware and a ZigBee certified network stack. Everything being sold today seems to be going into proprietary 802.15.4 applications of one kind or another.

A fun thing to do is to talk to the Control4 guys and when they claim they have ZigBee enabled switches say "I thought you were using the Ember Classic Stack?"

5. Have you heard any estimates as to when certification testing is going to be available for Zigbee devices?

Today. From NTS and an asian company that I can't remember right now. I think the NTS site is physically located at Ember in Boston. My understanding is that only hardware and network stack are being tested.


George

 

[hotwire]

I received an email yesterday that said the Home Heartbeat system was finally available for sale.