New Home Construction and Automation

JeffVolp said:
While I totally agree that a hardwired system should be the most reliable of all, it certainly is not an order of magnitude better. That would mean competing systems work only 10% of the time, or 1 command out of 10 actually works.
You aren't using the right definition for "order of magnitude". Where does only working 10% come from?

X-10/UPB/Insteon/Zwave = 99.9% reliable (optimistically)
hardwired = 99.99% reliable
THAT is an order of magnitude improvement and VERY believable.
 
Dean Roddey said:
I guess it depends on your environment. I think that the important thing is that, if you put in a hard-wired system, you never have to wonder if it's going to work or not. I use Z-Wave very reliably in my apartment, but some have problems with it. Same with other non-wired technologies, to one degree or another. If you install it and it has no problems, you are probably good to go. An occasional burb turning on a light isn't going to be that big a deal relative to the cost of a retro-fit. But, you may install a non-wired system and have various problems due to your particular circumstances.

So I think that that's probably the biggest difference. In particular if you are a professional installer, and you need to show up on site at the customer's place and start putting in a lot of lighting control, you know that the hard-wired system is going to work without question. Buying and putting in a non-wired system only to find out it doesn't work in that environment for whatever reason would be really painful for a professional.

And I guess it could be painful for the DIY'er, too, if he purchased a lot of of that paritcular technology up front without verifying that it works for him first. So it may be worth testing the waters with a simple setup first.
I agree 100% with your second sentence, and that is my point. But the problem is you can not just go on to say try it, and if it works you're golden. Just look at this thread as a recent example. I'm sure Delicious will see this and chime in but the point I'm making is even though you try it and it works great for you, it can STILL have problems down the road that are outside of your control. The only thing that you could do to better guarantee the reliability is an outside firewall/filter that would prevent any sort of outside interference. With that, then you could be alot more comfortable knowing your investment is safe. But unfortunately a super reliable one of those is not available...yet.
 
I would agree with Steve: an order of magnitude better does not mean 10 times more commands get executed correctly.

Better means never having to hunt for a noise-source. Better means never having a delay when you enter a room. Better means not having to 'reboot' your coupler/repeater. Better means not worrying about where you have a neutral wire. Better is never having to deal with X10.com's customer service.

David, I don't have the house wired yet, so I can't give you real-world experience, but the plan is an ELK M1G, which, through a serial expander supports this:
http://www.centralite.com/products/LiteJet/index.aspx
 
JeffVolp said:
The truth is hardwire is an order of magnitude better.

That is a bit of an exaggeration. While I totally agree that a hardwired system should be the most reliable of all, it certainly is not an order of magnitude better. That would mean competing systems work only 10% of the time, or 1 command out of 10 actually works. One could probably do better than that throwing tennis balls at wall switches.

I doubt that anyone would accept even 90 percent reliability - I certainly wouldn't. The question is how many 9's you need after 99% before reliability is adequate for you. A hardwired system will provide the most 9's. X10 may be the most susceptible to problems in an improperly designed system, but it can give a few 9's when used properly.

It is known that electronic devices can cause problems for some automation systems. If you don't go completely hardwired, I strongly recommend arranging circuits so that your electronic devices are segregated onto their own circuits. And add the appropriate filters to any circuits that will power compact fluorescent light bulbs. The small Leviton 6287 filter will fit into the back of deep electrical boxes, and will suppress compact fluorescent noise for both Insteon and X10 systems.

Hardwired is the best, but it is a costly option, and not one that can easily be evolved as your needs change.
I think it may have been better for steve to say that hardwired systems were exponentially, geometrically, or maybe even logarythmically more reliable than wireless.

Regardless, its my firm belief that when correctly done, a hardwired system is much more cost effective than a wireless system, as well as being exponentially more reliable.
 
speaking as someone who's having some issues with a variety of wireless devices (zWave, 802.11, and bluetooth), I'd like to add that once you factor in the psychiatric care and alcohol costs affiliated with getting and keeping a wireless system stable, hardwired is definitely cheaper.

I'm definitely putting in a hardwired lighting system when I remodel the house in 2-ish years.
 
You aren't using the right definition for "order of magnitude". Where does only working 10% come from?

Order of magnitude normally refers to a power of 10. I think we all agree that a hardwired system should work 100% of the time. If that is an order of magnitude better than a competing system, that competing system would only work 10% of the time using the standard definition.

I am familiar with the alternate definition, but it wasn't clear from "order of magnitude better" what definition was being used. If you are using the "9's" definition, I think many people here would be very happy if their PLC system had a missed command rate only one order of magnitude worse than a good hardwired system. While I haven't seen any missed commands in months, I doubt that mine is really that good. A good hardwired system shouldn't have any missed commands until the equipment begins to wear out.

I fully agree with using hardwired for critical systems, such as HVAC and security. However, one should consider the expense and inflexibility when comparing a hardwired system with competing systems for controlling non-critical items like lighting and other "convenience" items.
 
I fully agree with using hardwired for critical systems, such as HVAC and security. However, one should consider the expense and inflexibility when comparing a hardwired system with competing systems for controlling non-critical items like lighting and other "convenience" items.
The "critical-ness" of lighting control all depends on how you've implemented control. For me personally, after researching much of this, there's 3 shifts I'm making that will elevate this to "mission-critical".

(In ascending order of priority)
1) Automating lighting for security
- Automatically turn on lights when I pull into driveway. This is more of a warm&fuzzy type thing, although I suppose in Oakland warm&fuzzy is harder to come by than in the suburbs so it's important that it works.
2) Automating lighting to make up for bad wiring design.
- I have a few locations where I have no convenient lightswitches. In one location, i'm using the F6 on an Elk keypad to turn on/off the Entry light with a zWave screw-in lamp module. If I can't get that to work reliably, I'm hosed b/c I don't have any other way to turn the light on/off. Well, I can reach the switch, but my wife who's 5'5" can't.
3) I'm looking to move from controlling individual lights at the switch level to a single, 1-gang keypad per room. I'll centralize the wiring for rooms somewhere hidden, so that I don't have to have a plethora of switches in a room to control various lights. Once I shift from controlling individual loads to this model, lighting control has now become "mission-critical", and I'll have to implement a super-robust system so I can turn my lights on/off at will.

But, if you don't mind if your automated lighting isn't working b/c you're just doing HomeTheaterAutomation type stuff, then it's not mission-critical to you and you shouldn't overengineer your solution.
 
So it does seem that hardwired is the way to go. I'll be doing all the wiring for the house, romex and Cat-5. My plan was to make a home run of Cat-5 from every light switch and outlets I want control over to the mechanical room where everything will be located. That seems to be the easy part to figure out, but where else am I going to need to run wires too? All exterior windows and doors that are accessible from the outside for security? Then interior doors that I want to have motion sensors?

Is it going to be best to plan on a control pad for each room, or to cut down on initial cost can I just wire the home like I normally would without automation. (Ex. One switch to control each circuit) Can I buy the touch pads and install/use those without having the Automation hardware/software?

Thanks,
Bobby
 
BBall4 said:
So it does seem that hardwired is the way to go.
If you can afford it, consider your lighting 'mission critical', and don't want to worry about reliability issues coming up (aka you want to put it in and enjoy it and not have to worry about tinkering), then yes.

There are still 2 types of hardwire system - one with central control (romex from control to fixture) and cat5 only to switch, and the other where you wire traditionally and the switch just has an additional cat5 wire usually daisy chained. There are pros and cons to both of those methods. First should bit easier and cheaper to install because of less copper, but is more proprietary and you 'always' have to have this type of system. The latter if someone decides to go with traditional switches or PLC, you can because you have romex at the switches.. My purely personal belief is I would go with the former and there will always be a system to fit that model even if there was an issue witha single particular manufacturer. While the systems do stand on their own, you should also consider what will be controlling them - a panel like Elk or Omni, etc because that may influence your decision based on support.

As far as security and other wiring for the house, you may want to check out the Cocoontech PreWire Guide.
 
There are still 2 types of hardwire system - one with central control (romex from control to fixture) and cat5 only to switch, and the other where you wire traditionally and the switch just has an additional cat5 wire usually daisy chained.

I have only found 1 hardwire system that falls into your second category (normal HV wire layout with additional control wire for the automation) and that is OnQ ALC. I want to use this type of layout but it sure would be nice to have more options.

Anyone know of other "Traditionally wired" hardwire solutions?

Anyone ever seen, used or currently use OnQ ALC?

Chris
 
I'm not sure if I'm understanding you 100%, my idea was to traditionally wire the home so that no automation hardware would be required to make the house "function." Then I would just run a Cat-5 line from my control center to each switch/outlet that eventually I would want control over and just have the wire in the box. Then when I have the time/money to start with the automation I can just take out that switch/outlet and replace it with one that I can control, and continue to do this over time.

I don't see how the Cat-5 daisy chained would allow me this type of customization. With the daisy chaining I would pretty much have to do the automation 100% in the beginning?

Bobby
 
I guess I'm a little confused too. A hardwire system (of the first type) typically needs to be fully installed during construction. That is not typically wired as described above and you need the lighting controller as well as the switches to complete the system. You would most likely still use a separate system to full automate it.

The second method, using say EDT, you can wire the house traditionally, but MUST include the 'control' wire. With EDT I believe it is daisy chained from switch to switch. So as long as you put that daisy chained Cat5, you can put regular switches in and retro the EDT switches later since there is no central controller. Not sure about the OnQ and whether the low voltage control cable is daisy chained or home run.
 
I guess it's just going to take some research to find out if what I want to do is possible. I sure hope so cause I know that I won't be able to afford it when I build the house.

Bobby
 
Bobby, I know that OnQ ALC will do what you want. IE wire traditionally and add wired switches as you go to build the system you want. It looks like EDT will do the same. The thing you have to remember is that you need 1 cat 5 PER SWITCH, not per location. I don't know about EDT but you can do ALC either homerun or Daisy chained.

I have never touched or seen any of the ALC switches or talked to anyone who has touched or seen them. This kind of worries me because I don't want some cheap looking / feeling switches all over my house...

Chris
 
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