Man, do i know where your at. I had purchased the Elk before i even closed on my house!!!!
I hate MS Windows based solutions. I know IVB and other downplay the risks, but i think Elk's reliability is in it's hardware based simplicity not some complex, GPF'ing, bluescreening junk. I must admit, i was so in love with the idea, i fell for the april fools prank on this forum for a mini-din unit that had everything i wanted !!!!
In terms of software, my needs may or may not be similar to yours, but here's what i know i want:
priority #1 - a single (large/portable) touchscreen interface (read Viewsonic Airpanel or something) with:
1) *control of the Elk
2) whole house audio control
3) home theater control
4) * zwave lighting/hvac - less of a priority esp as i await elk's fix for the serial expander for vizia-rf control
5) a bunch of wishful stuff like pool, etc down the road
6) a way to check video cams
On the other hand, i am not interested in:
1) voice recognition (if i can't get my fat a&^ off a couch, well...) - sorry i know it has more applications!
2) multi-room video (if i spend all my life on a couch, welll - actually more importantly, my kids don't need to live on the couch)
3) walking my dog, mowing my yard or other things that (again, if i can't get off the couch, well...)
Not trying to slam people who do it... It sure sounds fun, but it's where you place your value. My wife and I love music as well as a clean, non-cluttered house - which is why those are important to me. And whatever i have it needs to be simple enough for her to use without a lot of frustrations (she doesn't like the Elk keypads much).
* My current struggles are do i really need software control of things like HVAC/lighting when elk does it for me? I think i could just browse to the elk's webserver to control when needed. Similar with lighting... Maybe not as fancy - but i'm just not sure...
Anyway, with lack of complete open source/linux based solutions, I think i'm forced into Charmed Quark / Mainlobby and this forum has gotten a lot of good advice from the reps from both products. Some people here seem to like to jump on David when he's trying to be helpful which i think is unfair.... He's very helpful (of course he wants you to buy his product, who wouldn't).
If your needs mirror mine, you might see:
http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?showtopic=7093&hl=
http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?showtopic=7126&hl=
Might also attend IVB's session on CQC... would give you some idea of what it is and does...
-brad