HA with PC Card vs Automation Panel

[Shinyshoes]

Ok, I think I may be confused.

I am building a house that will never have a need for a security system. Having said that, I may still want to incorperate cameras and motion sensors into my HA requirements.

What would be the benefits or drawbacks of using a PC card with Digital and analog inputs vs using a pre-made panel? I am a Computer programmer durring the day, so I plan on writing my own automation software instead of purchasing something like Charmed Quark or Homeseer.

Anyone else ever gone down that route?

 

[sic0048]

You might want to check out Premise Home Control. It was a professional software package being developed by a big name company that eventually dropped development for it. Luckily they released the code into the open and now there are many users developing it. Best of all it is opensource. I think you could do all the programming you want and get everything you are looking for without having to recreate the wheel.

There is a Premise group on this site, so be sure to check them out. Relatedly, there was a recent discussion about starting support for an I/O device to do exactly what you are looking for. Be sure to look it over.

 

[ano]

Ok, I think I may be confused.

I am building a house that will never have a need for a security system. Having said that, I may still want to incorperate cameras and motion sensors into my HA requirements.

What would be the benefits or drawbacks of using a PC card with Digital and analog inputs vs using a pre-made panel? I am a Computer programmer durring the day, so I plan on writing my own automation software instead of purchasing something like Charmed Quark or Homeseer.

Anyone else ever gone down that route?

In the five years I've had my HAI alarm/automation panel its run through power outages, and it has never crashed and I've never had to reboot it. Not once. Can your PC say that?

 

[123]

Ok, I think I may be confused.
...What would be the benefits or drawbacks of using a PC card with Digital and analog inputs vs using a pre-made panel? I am a Computer programmer durring the day, so I plan on writing my own automation software ...

The advantage of a commercial security panel is that it is a purpose-built device ... low power, reliable, expandable, and cost-effective. I use Premise for Home Automation but rely on an ELK M1 for security.

However, it is possible to use a Premise as a security panel. The post sic0048 supplied describes the process of creating a driver for a Weeder Digital I/O board. This post describes a simple Alarm Panel module (Module: Premise-speak for source code) that uses the Weeder driver to create a rudimentary security panel.

As a programmer you'll appreciate the fact that Premise has a multi-layer architecture. Programming logic and drivers are separate layers. The Alarm Panel example shows you what can be done at the logic level but this functionality should be implemented in the driver layer. Anyway, that's all technical hoo-hah that can be discussed later if you decide to use Premise. Good luck with whatever path you take.

 

[IVB]

In the five years I've had my HAI alarm/automation panel its run through power outages, and it has never crashed and I've never had to reboot it. Not once. Can your PC say that?

I had my SageTV box up for 2+ years without me touching it at one point. The only reason i had to reboot was because I added a hard disk. Then another card. Then I bought CQC.

Now I don't go 3 months without a reboot, but the cause is certainly not because it's a PC - it's because i'm too tempted to add/subtract stuff from it.

Then again, it's easy for me to add new hardware that does randomly divergent & disparate things. Can your HAI say that?

(hell, my Elk can't even say that, i end up taking it down every 6 months because I add crap there. Damned DIY'er life)...

 

[mdonovan]

Ok, I think I may be confused.

I am building a house that will never have a need for a security system. Having said that, I may still want to incorperate cameras and motion sensors into my HA requirements.

What would be the benefits or drawbacks of using a PC card with Digital and analog inputs vs using a pre-made panel? I am a Computer programmer durring the day, so I plan on writing my own automation software instead of purchasing something like Charmed Quark or Homeseer.

Anyone else ever gone down that route?

I got an Elk, and I'm going to use that for security. I also have a PC that I'm going to use to augment the Elk and to provide an interface to other hardware. I do programming as well (not for my main job, just as a hobby and a little for work), and I'm using xAP to network my HA hardware. I have one xAP app that broadcasts data from the Weather Channel, and I'm finishing up one for my Brultech ECM-1240. After that's implemented I am starting to test the xAP interface for the Elk. I have that sort of written, but it's not tested in the slightest. For Digial I/O and analog I'm looking at the Netiom-xAP device.

To summarize, my plan is to use the Elk (or whatever you get) for security, then use a PC and software to enhance it.

Matt

 

[jharrell]

IMO I would never trust a PC to fire/security and I develop software for a living. There is a reason there are no UL listed fire/security systems based on PC's yet, reliability. Perhaps one day I will be persuaded, it will need to have no moving parts and run and OS that knows how to properly sandbox applications, but even still I would rather have a dedicated panel that acts as a "lower brain stem" should the "higher brain functions" go down.

If you are doing fire/security, get an Elk or HAI and treat it as an intelligent ethernet based I/O board for your HA PC server, they both have open SDK's to program them as you wish and you can add other less critical I/O to the PC.

 

[ano]

I had my SageTV box up for 2+ years without me touching it at one point. The only reason i had to reboot was because I added a hard disk. Then another card. Then I bought CQC.

I don't know about you, but my Windows machines reboot at least once a week for the latest "critical" updates.

Another reason for the panel is battery life. Its a common trick for a thief to just open your breaker panel in the morning and robbing the place in the afternoon. Of course your PC UPS can easily go 8 hours...NOT.

 

[IVB]

I had my SageTV box up for 2+ years without me touching it at one point. The only reason i had to reboot was because I added a hard disk. Then another card. Then I bought CQC.

I don't know about you, but my Windows machines reboot at least once a week for the latest "critical" updates.

Another reason for the panel is battery life. Its a common trick for a thief to just open your breaker panel in the morning and robbing the place in the afternoon. Of course your PC UPS can easily go 8 hours...NOT.

Why in gods name do you let Windows automatically download & install updates? Do you let your HAI do that? If not, then why let your automation controller do that? I didn't install an update once in those two years, which is probably why it worked.

Battery life is a good point, plus also if this is a life-protecting fire/safety device, then I agree that a hardware panel should be used. But not because a PC is unstable - it's as unstable as users make it. Unfortunately, a PC is so "approachable" that people do dumb stuff, like surf the web, check email, and other stuff on it. I say you should do it because of it's inability to let you do what you want to do on it (like the preceeding statement).

Same reason the iPhone is more stable than regular phones - you can't do a god damn thing on it unless the powers that be permit you to, in their wise & noble perspective from up on high.

 

[mustangcoupe]

I don't know about you, but my Windows machines reboot at least once a week for the latest "critical" updates.

Another reason for the panel is battery life. Its a common trick for a thief to just open your breaker panel in the morning and robbing the place in the afternoon. Of course your PC UPS can easily go 8 hours...NOT.

Well, for one, I do not let my automation machine do any automatic updates... it could be critical but I dont use my automation machine for typical web browsing either, so it doesn't see the usual abuse most PC's do.

Not all places have their main breaker accessable from outside, here in NH most if not all are located inside the home, basement, or garage.... the'd have to remove a live meter head to disconnect power to my home. But in either case you disconnect power it should notify someone, ether it be my elk or ha machine, should know when power was lost and it is running on battery.

 

[Shinyshoes]

Thanks for all the feedback guys.

As I said before, Security is not a concern for me, so IF it did go down for any reason, it would just be the automation stuff that gets pooched. The Premise stuff looks very interesting. I might give it a try.

Also, The cost effectiveness of a PC is very attractive for me. My latest "home server" I built from spare parts and stuff that was being thrown out from my company. I had to spend $30 on a Raid card and the rest was given. There isnt exactly a lot of computing power needed for strictly Home Automation. Throw in a HTPC and things get complicated but I have yet to see an Elk or HAI that can do HD Video........

Im leaning towards the Weeder stuff and Premise. Now I just have to write some drivers......

 

[ano]

Do you let your HAI do that? If not, then why let your automation controller do that? I didn't install an update once in those two years, which is probably why it worked.

I'd like that feature, but it probably won't happen in our lifetime. They just implemented the concept of upgradeable firmware last year. Before that you had to mail away for a new ROM chip to upgrade.

By the way, you might want to reconsider your "no security" stance when you find out how much a monitored burglar/fire system can save you on your insurance. Mine cut my insurance bill by over 35% and even when I include the cost to monitor it, the discounts will completely pay for the system in about 6 years.