Home Theatre Automation - Please suggest

[AVSam]

I am of the opinion that Z-Wave is a good place to start in order to automate my home theatre room. I need to control all the AV gear from an iPad-Mini or iPhone. I also need basic light control (dimmers) that switch-on when I pause the movie and switch-off when I resume. I am not a programmer but have a good understanding of IT. Hence, I need an easy to use and easy to configure system. What controllers do you recommend ? - Vera Lite seems to be cost effective but then there is Fibaro Home centre lite and the SmartThings Hub. Furthermore, I have read good things about iRule and their excellent support.
 
All in all, I want a cost effective, easy to use, reliable and expandable system.
 
Any advice / help will be appreciated.

 

[wraslor]

I'm pretty new to this but I can give you my experience so far.  As for HT I use android for my "remote" but the ipad is pretty much the same.  I use a vera lite for my HA and have it setup as follows.
 
When I turn the theater lights on vera sees that and sends a wake command to the theater pc.
 
I have eventghost setup on the theater pc so that when I start media browser or xbmc the lights turn off.  Pause on /play off.  Vera has a plugin for eventghost that monitors events on your PC and allows them to communicate.
 
If I were using an ipad I would look at Irule or Roomie (roomie is easier to setup) as my remote interface both have vera plugins and allow it to control devices and scenes.  
 
I find the vera interface pretty easy to use and setup scenes, monitoring, etc.  Pair that with a remote app and a global cache ir blaster and you've got your theater automation that is easy to manage and use.

 

[znelbok]

A small CQC setup would do this easily.
 
CG100/iTachs for any IR control
Specific drivers for the rest of the devices and then your imagination as to how it all works.  The configuration is point and click type stuff so you dont need to know any "language" to be able to set up all the rules/logic
 
The iPad will work fine with CQC.
 
Once you have dipped your toe in CQC pool you will find that you can expand it quite easily to covers the rest of the house.

 

[bonofyed]

I have heard that iRule is pretty awesome.
Also, from what I hear its fairly user friendly.
But I have only seen videos of it, i have not myself tried it.
Obviously ZigBee is another alternative along with lightwave RF.
Any of these apps is going to take a little bit of configuration but i wouldn't call it "programming".