Den Home Automation Launching Soon

[Cambs]

This is an interesting product that (following a quick search) I've not seen mentioned here before - conventional looking switches, sockets etc. with an on/off switch and aimed at the UK market.

 

https://getden.co.uk/

 

It's taken them a while to get to market and website is not overly detailed but thought it might be of value.

[SteamyTea]

What is the difference between remembering to turn everything off before you go to work or away, and rememberer to turn everything off via your smart phone, when you go to work or away.

And what happens when you forget your smart phone, or change it and the app is not supported.

 

I think this is the real problem with home automation, it is overly complicated and expensive for little return.  And that is before you take into account all the security issues.

Edited March 21, 2018 by SteamyTea

[Pocster]

Nah !

its easy ! 

 

Home automation in my opinion means you do as little as possible I.e it’s automated .

 

for example ;

 

geniushub for heating ( nothing to do !)

mac running indigo ; z wave etc can be automated.

Edited March 20, 2018 by pocster

[MikeSharp01]

Yes but who is watching the IOT and weaponising all this data with highly trained deep learning algorithms so as to target you with offers to A:  buy more home automation. B: use their sevices to 'tune' your use or even more concerning C: work out a way that ensures your system is remote serviced, only by them, and this making all warranties void if you fiddle your self. ( If you don't believe me talk to alost any US farmer about their big green tractor and how its maintenance is geared to only the seller and the tractor stops till they get there.)

[Alexphd1]

I am with steamyT on this. I fail to see the benefit on this for me. Expensive product that will probably create more problems than solutions over the next 30 plus years which I expect my sockets switches etc to last. 

 

[Alexphd1]

£40 for a single socket.....???? I have just bought 100x Schneider metal single socket for £50 plus vat....

[dpmiller]

watching the promo video, would a single big isolator for the whole house not be handier than turning all the other stuff off?

[Trw144]

In my view the benefit of home automation  is to simplify and automate - not just to be able to do the action on a mobile phone. I think I ve said before - I have home automation and I ve used it to make my life simpler - example, my kitchen/dining room/lounge which is open plan has 12 different lights or groups of lights  - it differs in want I on depending upon what the room is being used for. I certainly don’t want 12 light switches on my wall and don’t want to waste 5 minutes remembering what each one does whilst I try to change the lights. Instead I have one switch and four pre-programmes moods - this is nt complication, this is simplification.

 

I m also sure someone in Russia could probably hack in and switch my lights off when I m eating my tea but I ll assume that I m not particularly high up there current list of targets.

Edited March 21, 2018 by Trw144

[Barney12]

+1 to ‘simplification’ being the key aspect. 

 

As as an aside:

 

I had a neigbour visit my build on Monday and she said “your light switches are funny”, to which I replied “they are part of an automation system which allows me to control what each switch does”. She looked perplexed and then said “but if they’re computerised how will they work when there is no power?”

 

 

[SteamyTea]

Sometime I think we have forgotten the lessons of Heath Robinson.

I am going to be blunt here, 12 sets of lights for one room is just bonkers.  It reminds me of a Mods Scooter.

 

[Alexphd1]

A bit of thinking when wiring goes a long way. When we stuck the tv on wall (years ago) we wired everthing (tv, sound bar, DVD player & sat box) back to one switch beside the door. Go into the room  to watch tv, switch everything on and last person leaving switches off when off to bed. Easy.

[jack]

2 hours ago, Trw144 said:

In my view the benefit of home automation  is to simplify and automate - not just to be able to do the action on a mobile phone. I think I ve said before - I have home automation and I ve used it to make my life simpler - example, my kitchen/dining room/lounge which is open plan has 12 different lights or groups of lights  - it differs in want I on depending upon what the room is being used for. I certainly don’t want 12 light switches on my wall and don’t want to waste 5 minutes remembering what each one does whilst I try to change the lights. Instead I have one switch and four pre-programmes moods - this is nt complication, this is simplification.

 

+1

 

Using a mobile phone to control things in the home is completely the wrong approach to home automation imo. We have ours set up so that everything possible is controlled by switches on the walls. The only time I ever open the app is to access virtual controllers for things like holiday mode or to check temperatures of the UFH or UVC.

 

Home automation enables things like the "bedtime switches" we have at our bedside. They act as switches for their respective bedside lights, but when you hold either of them down, it turns off all the lights in the house. That same long hold could also be programmed to set overnight zone alarms, change the behaviour of external lights, close all external shutters (if not already closed), close the garage door (if open), or anything else you can imagine. 

 

We also have a dedicated button at the bottom of the stairs that switches off all the upstairs lights. I can't tell you what a boon this is with young kids and a wife who never turns off lights.

I also have certain lights on a timer. For example, the kids' bedroom lights only stay on for an hour. I plan to install presence sensors as well, so the lights will automatically remain on as long as presence is sensed. 

 

Certain external blinds automatically close at a certain time each day. That time is set relative to dusk, so you don't need to keep reprogramming to take into account the change in when night falls. 

 

Of course, many of these behaviours would possible without home automation, but would require a lot of independent systems, which for me personally would be a much more complicated solution.

 

I wouldn't, however, suggest it's a cheap option, especially if you aren't reasonably computer literate. If you aren't capable of changing the programming yourself, you'd need to get someone in every time you wanted to make any significant changes. In general though, such changes should be rare once the systems are set up properly.

 

Oh, and I've chosen not to expose our system to the outside world. I can't turn lights on and off from afar, but it's a lot harder for anyone to hack into the system.

[Trw144]

3 hours ago, SteamyTea said:

Sometime I think we have forgotten the lessons of Heath Robinson.

I am going to be blunt here, 12 sets of lights for one room is just bonkers.  It reminds me of a Mods Scooter.

 

 

Yes but if you read the post it’s not one room - it’s really three rooms opened out into one large area, and therefore the lighting needs to adapt to each of these three uses - kitchen/dining/lounge. What I have done with automation is actually the opposite of your photo - that is the solution with lots of light switches on the wall. What I have is more akin to having no wing mirrors, but a single reversing camera capable of looking at any of the space behind.

Edited March 21, 2018 by Trw144