YWGAV

In my last post I questioned whether or not I should get a professionally installed home security system or whether I should buy my own equipment and do a homebrew security system monitored by a central station. I came to find some unfavorable reviews of that particular central station online (such as difficulty in reaching them via phone, delays in dispatching police or fire, etc).

Still, though, I was unimpressed with what companies like ADT, Brinks, et al had to offer. ADT had mixed reviews online – some people had no problems, others had a lot of problems. Brinks got good reviews for customer service and reliability (so, if you want a generic run of the mill security system, by all means look at Brinks) and even came recommended as reliable by a family friend who uses them.

As a relatively new homeowner, I’ve had to consider things I had never really thought about before. For instance, what colors I want decorating the guest bathroom, how best to clean a deck ( hot water, OxyClean and dawn soap), etc. On that long list of things “John totally didn’t even consider when he was buying a house” was home security. That’s somewhat ironic, given that my profession is security (though not directly of the physical sort), but true.

I wrote last week about the new home automation gear I’m installing in my new house – remote controllable light switches, a programmable and remote controllable thermostat, etc. Most of the new gear came in this weekend (they actually did a Saturday delivery – awesome!) and I got time to play with a little bit of it.

A while back I wrote about Home Automation, and how I was using it at my then residence to control a few lamps. While that was all good and fun, it still left a lot to be desired. I was really itching to do a more robust automation system, but due to circumstances (not owning the house), I really couldn’t make it all i wanted.

That all changed two weeks ago when I bought my first house. This nice long holiday weekend provided a perfect opportunity for me to start working on my home automation system. My good friend Jason gave me a handful of X10 capable standard toggle switches and toggle dimmer switches to get me started. When mixed with the wall-wart dimmers and relays that I used in my previous setup they provide a rather robust system.

I’ve been thinking about playing around with some home automation stuff, mostly just turning on lights remotely, dimmers and possibly timers. This has always been something that has interested me and there are a few methods available to allow me to do most of what I want without anything real fancy. A proof of concept demo’d to me by my friend Jason convinced me that I need to investigate this stuff further. Do any of you have any ideas on hardware and software to use for this? Ideally I’d like to have a way to remotely control some lights (for now) in my reading room. If I could do this from a web interface I could access on my iPhone, it’d be even sweeter. Oh yeah, and it needs to work on a Mac platform.