hoosier_engineer
Member
I am new to this, and have researched for probably 150 hrs, and hope someone out there can help. I need:
1. An alarm system
2. Video recording, probably to a Personal Computer
3. Home automation
I wired my house with door sensors, and ran CAT5e wire to places I want acoustic glass break and motion sensors, and keypads. Everything is 'home run' back to a central location where I will install the alarm control panel and PC. I have a couple of X-10 FloodCams I would like to install in a pre-wired (120 only) electrical box, at the rear of the house, and I would like to get a Pan, Tilt, and Zoom video camera which I can mount under the eaves at the front of my house, possibly something that may have infrared illumination for night vision. I have a pile of X-10 switches and dimmers laying around, too (admit it, so do you!).
In addition to the normal alarm functions, I would like to use the alarm system motion sensors as controls into a home automation system (while armed 'stay'). I would like to be able to use these sensors, as well as some outside wireless ones (I can provide 120 VAC but no signaling wire) to control camera position, and trigger video capture. I would like to be able to capture this video on a PC as an 'endless loop'. I would also like to log any motion detector triggers on the PC for time correlation back to the video capture. I have a television capture program called SageTV (which works wonderfully) that lets me convey live or captured video from one PC to another (my livingroom Plasma) over an Ethernet connection. I don't think it can support security video capture, but I would like this feature.
I may also want to add additional home automation capabilities at a later time.
If you are still reading this, you must be a very patient, helpful person. Getting to the point, here is what I have found, and some questions.
After looking at various panels, it seems the Elk M1Gold may be a good choice, but I can find no information on their website about the home automation capabilites, other than a few examples. Does anybody know what the syntax of their 'Rules' is? It looks like the words in capitals are keywords, but I don't have a clue as to the syntax of the language, or if they support flags ('remembered' conditions which can later be used in a trigger). They seem to be pretty proud of it, though... It does support X-10, but I can't figure out how (or if) the X-10 commands are mapped to Zones or Outputs (relays). The Elk seems to have analog inputs, so maybe it can handle Dim levels (we're talking variables here), does anybody know where I can find out about this? This panel has me so excited... Also, can I use more than one type of home automation system at the same time, such as X-10 and Zwave?
I haven't found any security panels that capture video, and I have some pieces laying around that I can turn into a PC, so I think this is my best option. I have an Nvidia 6600GT video card that I think does video capture, so I was wondering if I can take commands from the panel, control a camera, and trigger video recording (preferrably frame capture as well as continuous). A SageTV interface would be great.
Is the Elk a good choice? Is there a bettere one? How about a (reasonably cheap) camera/software that talks to a security panel? Or even an idea of were I should go... for more advice, that is.
1. An alarm system
2. Video recording, probably to a Personal Computer
3. Home automation
I wired my house with door sensors, and ran CAT5e wire to places I want acoustic glass break and motion sensors, and keypads. Everything is 'home run' back to a central location where I will install the alarm control panel and PC. I have a couple of X-10 FloodCams I would like to install in a pre-wired (120 only) electrical box, at the rear of the house, and I would like to get a Pan, Tilt, and Zoom video camera which I can mount under the eaves at the front of my house, possibly something that may have infrared illumination for night vision. I have a pile of X-10 switches and dimmers laying around, too (admit it, so do you!).
In addition to the normal alarm functions, I would like to use the alarm system motion sensors as controls into a home automation system (while armed 'stay'). I would like to be able to use these sensors, as well as some outside wireless ones (I can provide 120 VAC but no signaling wire) to control camera position, and trigger video capture. I would like to be able to capture this video on a PC as an 'endless loop'. I would also like to log any motion detector triggers on the PC for time correlation back to the video capture. I have a television capture program called SageTV (which works wonderfully) that lets me convey live or captured video from one PC to another (my livingroom Plasma) over an Ethernet connection. I don't think it can support security video capture, but I would like this feature.
I may also want to add additional home automation capabilities at a later time.
If you are still reading this, you must be a very patient, helpful person. Getting to the point, here is what I have found, and some questions.
After looking at various panels, it seems the Elk M1Gold may be a good choice, but I can find no information on their website about the home automation capabilites, other than a few examples. Does anybody know what the syntax of their 'Rules' is? It looks like the words in capitals are keywords, but I don't have a clue as to the syntax of the language, or if they support flags ('remembered' conditions which can later be used in a trigger). They seem to be pretty proud of it, though... It does support X-10, but I can't figure out how (or if) the X-10 commands are mapped to Zones or Outputs (relays). The Elk seems to have analog inputs, so maybe it can handle Dim levels (we're talking variables here), does anybody know where I can find out about this? This panel has me so excited... Also, can I use more than one type of home automation system at the same time, such as X-10 and Zwave?
I haven't found any security panels that capture video, and I have some pieces laying around that I can turn into a PC, so I think this is my best option. I have an Nvidia 6600GT video card that I think does video capture, so I was wondering if I can take commands from the panel, control a camera, and trigger video recording (preferrably frame capture as well as continuous). A SageTV interface would be great.
Is the Elk a good choice? Is there a bettere one? How about a (reasonably cheap) camera/software that talks to a security panel? Or even an idea of were I should go... for more advice, that is.