New to Home Automation need some help

I have a little bit of a unique opportunity to redo everything in my house. I am looking for a basic start to home automation. What I want to start with is small but eventually I might want to add more in.

So here is a little more refined punch list of what I need to control

Whole house:

HVAC
whole house audio
future integration of alarm system

Two of these lean towards z-wave for the ease of integration.

Downstairs in the entertainment room

7 Lighting banks consisting of the following
1. Three zones with 6 70w cans.
2. Wall Sconces. 8 45w lights.
3. Three zones accent lighting (2 cans per zone)
3 Motorized shades (mfg to be determinded later)
and of course all of the home theater gear.

I am hoping to be able to come up with a system that will allow two way communication. I want to have feedback from the HVAC and lighting if possible.

Like I said eariler I am looking at an IPad for control at least downstairs and possibly a android app for the audio as a secondard source of control.

What do you mean by having an opportunity? Do you mean you are gutting the house? Certainly this will affect going with more wireless stuff or using hardwired.

There are folks here who say that zwave is catching on and that lots of support is coming in the future. It isn't quite here at this point and I would feel more comfortable going with some of the other automation protocols.

ISY is a great piece of equipment. At present it supports Insteon fully and Elk partially with full integration of the Elk comming soon. We have also been promised full support of UPB very soon. ISY is a tiny little thing that has what realistically amounts to unlimited programming for home automation. It consumes very little electricity and never crashes. It supports HVAC control and accepts inbound IR. Outbound IR and relays require the addition of a global cache unit. It also works as a file server over http (can host a simple website on it).

UPB is very reliable on your lighting control using power line signals. It is pricier than Insteon. Assuming ISY suport comes, this will be hard to beat except for the 50% extra cost.

Insteon can be very reliable but you may have to clean "noise" off of your power lines using filters on "noisey" stuff in your house. It has had quality issues in the past but in my opinion they have been taken care since about 2 years ago. They are less pricey. If you want super-reliable, get the dual mode Insteon. The price here starts to get up around zwave and upb but is still a touch less. This offers the advantage of built in RF control of stuff like zwave does with the option of adding in less expensive Insteon components that work on the power line only or the super cheap x10 stuff that Insteon will directly link with.

I have an Elk m1g alarm. It is rock solid alarm system. It's built in home automation stuff works but is clumsy. Assuming ISY finishes their integration of Elk, then that becomes a moot point as ISY will take over all of the programming. Elk will be there as a rock solid alarm system that seemlessly integrates into a rock solid home automation system (ISY).

UPB would be my choice of protocols, but I use Z-Wave for one reason. It doesn't require a neutral so I had to go with it as some of my boxes are without.

I just wanted to point this out, as one needs to know whether they have neutral wires available before making a decision.

Personally; I still prefer a "wired" methodological approach to a "wireless" HA approach; this even with my lighting protocol.

As Deane mentions the other piece to the puzzle is what will work the best for the infrastructure that you have or the ability to change the infrastructure. Even though I have conduit and metal boxes (not really good for RF) its a major endeavor to pull new electrical cable from box to box or to figure out the logic of the colors of all the wires in 3-4 way switches.

There has been talk about various signals on the power / noise etc. The same holds true relating to wireless and various signal suckers and RF signal blocking. Even more so sometimes more pronounced because it isn't always apparent.

While one of the solutions is bridging of the wireless store and forward to extend the range; doesn't always work though. I am currently moving into the UPB world having started with X10 in the late 1970s / Insteon in the 2000's and a bit of Z-Wave thrown in. My X-10/Insteon has been rock solid and working well in the last 7 years and I really was looking just to update doing a bit at a time. I've had a couple of issues with the Z-Wave more related to the hardware than the function of said switches. The UPB switches have worked well so far. Using Upstart the switches all appear to be small little computers each unique yet each communicating with each via links. To date I have not see this unique approach to one switch. I cannot poll one of the legacy switches and get involved in a two way conversation with it as I can with UPB. Insteon comes close but I am not familiar with the values of what I see therefore much of the "speak" is just jibberish to me. Z-Wave is a bit better having the ability to turn or translate what I see into something meaningful. UPB does this the best though.

These are my personal comments and views.

After all is said and done and at the end of the day I always have to answer the "why?" question that my wife mentions.

Wife: "What's wrong with just turning on and off a light with your hand on a switch versus via a computer?" (old thoughts of the movie "Demon Seed (1977)")

The easiest and simplest answer is always "Why not?"

Guess I should have expanded on the unique opportunity a bit.

2 months ago a fire damaged a good portion of my house. We will be ripping off the entire upper floor of the house and the rest is going to studs. Every inch of electrical is being pulled out and new put it.

So for me it is a complete fresh start.

I have experience with Insteon as I had it running downstairs in my theater area. I was using a Pronto TSU-7000 to control that area. However with that it was clumsy becasue I had to rely on first setting all the levels to either full on or full off for my macros to work. That is what I am trying to get away from with going with a system that I can control from more of a smart device.

Sorry to hear about your troubles.

Most if not all of the lighting communications are now at the point of control via simple HW (like stuff with embedded OS) and software via a controller so you have the choice.

It is faster for me to program an event on a PC than it is via a remote. Its nice too when you can program the HA event on a PC and upload the event to a remote.

A total gut is a great opportunity.

Hardwire all of security stuff. When it comes to alarm systems you really want to avoid errors as they either leave you unprotected or cause very anoying (and possibley expensive) false alarms. Alarm wiring is pretty much the same regardless of what panel you go with.

Consider running conduit to a bunch of locations. It will let you change with the times and also avoid running miles of redundant and expensive "just in case" wires now.

Way off the subject, but if you are going down to studs, I highly recommend spray foam insulation. This comes up frequently on this forum and I am not alone in this thought. There is a little controversy about open vs closed. The added benefit of closed cell comes at a high price. Spray foam is like going from regular TV to HDTV. Closed cell is more like a better quality HDTV.

I wouldn't hardwire in your automatic lights. Use something like Insteon/UPB/zwave even though you are gutting the house. If you are highly adverse to having to figure out noise issues, UPB or dual mode Insteon. If you are willing to tinker a little to save about 50%, go with regular Insteon. It is functionally and aesthetically very nice once you clear up that one or two items with noise. Also, since you are redoing all of your electric, consider having the electricians organize your circuits to keep high noise potential stuff together. You can easily (and cheaply) filter whole circuits that way.

With ipads out there now and the growing number of HA apps that put everything together in a beautiful format, I think you can say goodbye to your Pronto.

As far as sound system stuff, I would consider running conduit to those locations for the controllers and from there to the speakers. I think you will see this field evolve wtih more fully digital solutions and keeping options open in the future is good.

Lou Apo said:

A total gut is a great opportunity.

Hardwire all of security stuff. When it comes to alarm systems you really want to avoid errors as they either leave you unprotected or cause very anoying (and possibley expensive) false alarms. Alarm wiring is pretty much the same regardless of what panel you go with.

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My question here. Are you saying to hardwire every window and door to get rid of the battery wireless sensors?

Consider running conduit to a bunch of locations. It will let you change with the times and also avoid running miles of redundant and expensive "just in case" wires now.

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Where all do you suggest that I run conduit? I have a room in the basement that is a storage room that will have the termination end of all my wiring runs. I plan on placing me server in this location as well. Havn't decided yet if I will do just a smaller smart home box or do a rack mount system.

I wouldn't hardwire in your automatic lights. Use something like Insteon/UPB/zwave even though you are gutting the house. If you are highly adverse to having to figure out noise issues, UPB or dual mode Insteon. If you are willing to tinker a little to save about 50%, go with regular Insteon. It is functionally and aesthetically very nice once you clear up that one or two items with noise. Also, since you are redoing all of your electric, consider having the electricians organize your circuits to keep high noise potential stuff together. You can easily (and cheaply) filter whole circuits that way.

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Hardwire automatic lights? I am guessing you are talking about something like running lutron wire to every location. I think that is a bit overkill. I'm guessing that I just need to make sure that I have a neutral in every box. With the complete re-wire I am guessing that won't be a issue.

With ipads out there now and the growing number of HA apps that put everything together in a beautiful format, I think you can say goodbye to your Pronto.

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Yea... my pronto bit the bullet. When I picked it up off the bar I must have drained about 1/2 cup of water out of it. But the insurance is paying to replace it including the programming. So I really am looking hard at ipad and some of the control software.

As far as sound system stuff, I would consider running conduit to those locations for the controllers and from there to the speakers. I think you will see this field evolve wtih more fully digital solutions and keeping options open in the future is good.

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I was thinking of running a couple of conduits straight from the storage room to the attic. (we as straight a run as possible) All of the audio is going to be on the second floor of the house... anything downstairs the home theater can handle, or the computer can take care of from the office. Do I need more than that?

Accompany the sound speaker cable with a control cable or two (cat5e/6 works well).

Much easier to have windows hard wired than to think about batteries.

I have conduit in the current house in IL and Romex in FL. I like the conduit as its easier to add to where the Romex is more difficult.

I build a "run" from the basement to the attic for the 2nd floor wiring. I drop wires into the bedrooms via the attic and to the main floor via the unfinished basement. All the wiring is homerun to one location in the basement.

In addition the basement home run is also wired to the media room /Family room.

I keep all of the network switches in one spot near the home run. I have all separate runs for the network. I also have 3 AP's wired with POE. (Don't really need three AP's).

Lots of information on this forum and from different forum members relating to base HA / security infrastructure. From the type of wire to use, easiest ways to run the wire, where to run the wire and how to run the wire....

Best of all are all the folks here are a friendly bunch.

I think you should definitely hard wire all the doors and windows. It is far better than wireless.

It is hard to say where you should run conduit not knowing the details of your house. If your basement and attic are unfinished, then run a few large pipes from attic to basement. You will want to run conduit to exterior wall boxes since insulation will prevent you from getting wires in there later plus you may not be able to get access to the top/bottom of those walls from attic/basement. Just figure everywhere you might want a wire of any sort in the future, and make sure you have a way to get to it without tearing out drywall. When you have them spray foam your house (which I know you will do, yes) have them spray the underside of the roof (not ceiling of second floor). Besides being more efficient, eliminating the need to ventilate your attic, and adding partially conditioned storage space to your house, it makes dropping wires to the second floor a lot easier.

As far as hardwired automatic lights. I have heard nothing but horror stories from a friend who had Lutron. He sold the house it was so bad. If you decide you hate your zwave/Insteon/UPB you just pull the receptacle and put regular ones in. My friend would have his system go down and he literally could not turn a light on until the Lutron guy with the proprietery software package showed up to repair and charge him a few hundred bucks.

To better describe my house... Guess I should have done that first. It is a two story built on slab. I call the basement the first story as the entry way into the house brings you to the second floor. I guess it could be called a split level but even that is a incorrect desctiption. I will try and post a couple of drawings later tonight to show what is there.

Downstairs is one large room with a couple of smaller ones off to one side at the end. It is back in those rooms where the storage and media closet(panel) will be located. The great room downstairs is where the insteon lighting was before the fire, It also houses the screen, fireplace and bar.. Picture a 16' x 45' room broken up into three areas by the use of beams in the ceiling and the lighting.

Upstairs is another wierd area. There are three bedrooms at the one end that will have a tradition attic space (well kinda as it is being built for foot traffic up there) The other half of the house over the kitchen and dining/living area has 25' vaulted ceilings.

Hopefully that helps with the ideas.

Lou Apo said:

I think you should definitely hard wire all the doors and windows. It is far better than wireless.

It is hard to say where you should run conduit not knowing the details of your house. If your basement and attic are unfinished, then run a few large pipes from attic to basement. You will want to run conduit to exterior wall boxes since insulation will prevent you from getting wires in there later plus you may not be able to get access to the top/bottom of those walls from attic/basement. Just figure everywhere you might want a wire of any sort in the future, and make sure you have a way to get to it without tearing out drywall. When you have them spray foam your house (which I know you will do, yes) have them spray the underside of the roof (not ceiling of second floor). Besides being more efficient, eliminating the need to ventilate your attic, and adding partially conditioned storage space to your house, it makes dropping wires to the second floor a lot easier.

As far as hardwired automatic lights. I have heard nothing but horror stories from a friend who had Lutron. He sold the house it was so bad. If you decide you hate your zwave/Insteon/UPB you just pull the receptacle and put regular ones in. My friend would have his system go down and he literally could not turn a light on until the Lutron guy with the proprietery software package showed up to repair and charge him a few hundred bucks.

Click to expand...

It sounds like you are going to have lots of non-accesable walls after the sheetrock goes up. Long runs of conduit are tough to fish wires through so you might see if you can find some closets to use as staging areas. Run some large conduits from your control room to your attic which will allow you to drop into your bedrooms. Your vaulted ceiling area and the entire first floor area will have no access. If you have some sort of closet either on the first floor or second floor that is central to those areas, run another large conduit into that room and from there spider out with small conduits to all of your potential data/AV locations.

If you think you may want data/AV wall plates on any of the outside walls of the bedrooms, run conduit to single gang boxes in the walls and leave the other end wild in the attic where you can get to it later.

For conduit, I mostly use the grey plastic conduit at home depot/Lowes that cost about $2 for 10 feet. If you warm it up with a propane torch you can flex it quite a lot. That plus a few 45's and 90's and you can get that just about everywhere for dirt cheap.

So here is the layout of the house. I have attic space above the three bedrooms to run wire. Actually the attic is being designed to have a floor load so down the road I can finish it off and have more useable space. Avove the rest of the space on the upper floor shown is the vaulted ceiling...

Downstairs I want the terimination of the media to be in the storage room. It is located right under the front entry of the house so not exactly centered but better than being on one end of the house.


Does that seem to be a good point to run from? Or should I move the media closet into the garage?

Ok got a few better plan drawings.





We approved the plans so this is basically how the house will sit.

Now my questions lean towards the following

1. Where all should I drop network jacks?
2. Where should I drop sat/cable locations? Currently we only have a tv in the bedroom and downstairs on one end of the room (theater). I want to put a few other drops in just in case for the future.
3. How should I place speakers for whole house audio? Should I include the bathrooms?

I am wanting to get started on the planning so I can have everything I need purchased when the time comes to quickly install everything so I stay out of the way of the builder.

Maybe I missed it, but is the builder OK with your running all of the LV cables? Just need to set the terms up front, so there is no miscommunication down the road. It's your house, so it shouldn't be a problem.