Got back from the EHX show this morning about 1 AM. Major flight delays out of Orlando.
The EHX show this year was a great show, at least for ELK. We stayed busy the entire show with a lot of interest. As our president said "It looks like the automation industry has finally reached the tipping point".
It was great to meet all the Cocoonteches at the show. I got dragged away on a business meeting and did not get to attend the dinner. Bummer!
Got to talk with the guys at the Automated Outlet booth and was accused of things that are totally untrue about the night before. LOL!!
Touchscreens are the rage now. It seems that the touchscreen draws the customers into the booth and then they are dazzled with what you can do with it. The EHX and CEDIA crowd are willing to spend money to do the job right, where as the traditional security installer crowd wants everything for less than $100. The ISC show in Las Vegas at the end of March will be the security crowd.
New items that were showing at the ELK booth were:
M1XRF 144 zone wireless receiver,
M1KPAS, decora plate arming station,
ELKRM Remote Management Software with Russound CAV or CAM 6.6 interface which includes the Russound Media server and IPOD Bridge.
Wholehouse, 12VDC, 1 inch coupling, water cutoff valve controlled from the M1 or any 12VDC trigger.
New M1 software upgrade.
Table top, wooden box touchscreen concept. We had windows CE loaded in it, but it will run XP mobile. It has built in WiFi.
We were showing a Samsung Q1 UMPC and Dell Axiom PDA running ELKRM software as capability demonstrations.
There were a great many Media Servers at this show as compared to years before. That looks like a future strong trend.
Another great show to attend for automation is the CEDIA show in September at Indianapolis.