Archive for category Lighting
Marmitek EasyTouch panel gives touchscreen look for X-10 control
Holy Blast from the Past Batman! X-10! While this is the technology that first got me into home automation, I haven’t thought about it in years. While newer PLC technologies like UPB and Insteon are great, I think X-10’s days are past. But…..If you are still using any of their devices, Marmitek has introduced the EasyTouch control panel. While it may look like a touchscreen from the pic, it’s actually not. Instead, the backgrounds are generated by you printing your favorite image on photo paper and inserting behind the scree face. No pwer to the location you want the panel to hang? No problem, the unit runs on AAA batteries! Pricing starts at 179 GBP ($286 USD). So get out your double sided tape and stick this baby to the wall, then call your friends over to brag about your new “touchscreen” lighting control system!
On-Q becomes Legrand
Posted by admin in Announcements, Hardware, Lighting, Structured Wiring on September 2, 2009
At this year’s CEDIA convention in Atlanta, On-Q will officially announce its renaming to Legrand. For some time, On-Q has been named On-Q/Legrand, but on September 9th the product line will drop the On-Q moniker and just become Legrand. We’ll be anxious to see what impact this has. We’re a huge fan of On-Q, especially since their Studio series hit the market last year. Their low cost answer to distributed audio as well as a super sleek intercom system really impressed during this year’s EHX. Another product under the Legrand parent Company is Vantage, which is typically geared towards higher end projects. We assume Vantage will continue as its own brand for the forseeable future.
First Things First!
Before I get things started, I thought I’d take time to introduce you to my own personal system. Eventually I will add some pics, but for now you’ll all have to use your imaginations. Currently I have everything centralized to an equipment “Closet” in our media room that holds two Middle Atlantic 43 space Slim 5 racks. Although they are far from full, they are getting there. The heart of my system is MainLobby by Cinemar. It has been the lifeblood of my my home since about 2003 and I couldn’t imagine not having it. The house currently has 10 zones of audio, four surround sound systems including a dedicated home theater with a 96″ screen. Everything is piped through a Neothings matrix switch. Windows 7 Media Center is the center of my audio/video distribution and is handled by a combination of Linksys dma2100s and Microsoft Xbox 360s. I still have a Toshiba HDA2 HD-DVD (I know, I know, obsolete) and a Sony DBP-350 blu ray. A Wii is pumped through the matrix swtich, and through use of several wireless sensor bars, you can play a game in almost any room of the house. I am relying on Z-Wave for lighting now as my other ventures have failed (ok, I really only tried UPB). I have a mixture of handheld remotes, samsung q1 umpcs, and 12″ inwall touch screens. An elk system acts as the watchdog of the house, and also monitors two HAI thermostats. Finally, as of this week I have purchased two Crestron Pro processors that I hope to migrate my system over to. I plan to still heavily rely on MainLobby for graphics and the frontend, but I will have the crestron do the heavy lifting (more to come on this topic!). Well that about sums up my starting point, and hopefully gives all of you a baseline for all of my posts. Trust me, this site is not going to be all about me, but I thought it would be best to let you know where I’m coming from.