Controlling home theater lighting

This is a great thread! I am a home automation newbie as well though I have been interested for many years. I have a degree in electrical engineering as well as a background in wireless telecom and data networking so I get the technological concept here. Where I am trying to wrap my head is the application and product side.

Here is where I am. I am setting a fairly small dedicated home theater room. Nothing extravagant, but I would like to be able to control the lighting in the room and integrate it with a remote so that when I start a movie the lights go down, the movie starts, the TV starts, etc. From a home automation standpoint, I am trying to figure out what technology and products I should use for the lighting control. The integration with the AV control is not even critical as I can live with a standalone control device for the lighting for the time being. While that is the extent of what I want to do now, I would eventually like to expand my control environment to include the entire house including lighting, outdoor sensors (still trying to figure what is available there), and thermostat. So I want to be sure that whatever I buy now to control the lights in this one room will integrate into a larger control environment down the road.

In the short term, the lights I am looking to control would be stand alone plug in lights, the room overhead light, and possibly LED backlighting behind the television. From what I have read, it sounds like I would need one or more plug-in modules, a light switch module for the overhead, and another plug-in module for the LED backlights. The biggest question I have right now, is what can I use to control these "zones" independently? Given that I have dropped quite a bit of money on the AV gear, room prep, etc. I do not want to invest in a new PC or a $500 hardware controller to control three lights in a small room. From what I have read, Z-wave and Zigbee sound the most appealing to me. UPB has some interest but would that interfere with some HomePlug LAN modules I have installed? Also, given that my thermostat is not connected to the house electrical system, can you use UPB to control a thermostat? Suggestions?

Secondly, where can I obtain this type of gear both for my immediate needs and for the larger environment down the road? I am familiar with Smarthome.com and have been getting their emails for years with the intention of eventually getting into this. Any big box stores carry the basic equipment?

Thanks in advance to anyone who can provide any insight! I look forward to delving deeper into the world of home automation!

Welcome to CT!

I split your post from the other thread, so you get more attention (since the other thread was specific to someone else's scenario), hopefully you don't mind.

Z-Wave does sound like the better option here, which means you need a Z-Wave controller. The best bang for the buck type deal here would be the Mi Casa Verde Vera 2 controller. As for where to buy everything, try to stick with a CTVA listed vendor:

http://www.cocoontech.com/forums/index.php?showforum=59

Dan (electron) said:

Welcome to CT!

I split your post from the other thread, so you get more attention (since the other thread was specific to someone else's scenario), hopefully you don't mind.

Z-Wave does sound like the better option here, which means you need a Z-Wave controller. The best bang for the buck type deal here would be the Mi Casa Verde Vera 2 controller. As for where to buy everything, try to stick with a CTVA listed vendor:

(See below for link...I don't have enough posts yet to include a link!)

Click to expand...

Thanks, Dan! I watched the video on the Vera 2 and it looks pretty slick. To be sure I understood that, it does appear that the Vera can integrate to the AV equipment per their video. What I would like to be able to do eventually is to start a movie and bring down the lights to a movie watching scene automatically, all with the push of one button on either a remote or a iPad/iPhone interface.

You mentioned that you may want to expand to your entire house which is certainly an Insteon/UPB/Zwave situation.

If you are going to be content to just do your theater room I would suggest just an ir controlled setup. Specifically, Lutron IR controlled light switch and either a Harmony remote or a Global Cache unit. The GC unit will turn your iphone into a fancy remote if you buy the app for it.

The GC uses wifi to communicate with the iphone and then wired ir transmitters shoot the ir where you want it.
The Logitech Harmony has rf versions which transmit to the base station which has wired ir transmitters.

Regardless of what you do with your lights, you will still need one of the above two technologies to execute your theater componant controls.

Lou Apo said:

You mentioned that you may want to expand to your entire house which is certainly an Insteon/UPB/Zwave situation.

If you are going to be content to just do your theater room I would suggest just an ir controlled setup. Specifically, Lutron IR controlled light switch and either a Harmony remote or a Global Cache unit. The GC unit will turn your iphone into a fancy remote if you buy the app for it.

The GC uses wifi to communicate with the iphone and then wired ir transmitters shoot the ir where you want it.
The Logitech Harmony has rf versions which transmit to the base station which has wired ir transmitters.

Regardless of what you do with your lights, you will still need one of the above two technologies to execute your theater componant controls.

Click to expand...

Thanks, Lou. That pretty much confirms the impression I had been getting. I looked at the Global Cache hardware earlier after I stumbled across it while looking at the iRule iPhone/iPad remote control software. My receiver - Denon AVR-3811CI has a RS-232 port I believe. Some of the GC devices have that interface. I do not know what additional functionality, if any, can be had by interfacing the GC to the receiver via RS-232.

I will look into the Lutron hardware. I am beginning to see that to do what I want to do will be more costly than I want to spend right now due to the other expenses for this project. Maybe I can go Lutron IR in the interim and then once I learn more about the HA world and options, I can take the full plunge at that point, even if need to replace the few pieces I buy for the theater room.

Options, options!

FinanceBuzz said:

Thanks, Lou. That pretty much confirms the impression I had been getting. I looked at the Global Cache hardware earlier after I stumbled across it while looking at the iRule iPhone/iPad remote control software. My receiver - Denon AVR-3811CI has a RS-232 port I believe. Some of the GC devices have that interface. I do not know what additional functionality, if any, can be had by interfacing the GC to the receiver via RS-232.

I will look into the Lutron hardware. I am beginning to see that to do what I want to do will be more costly than I want to spend right now due to the other expenses for this project. Maybe I can go Lutron IR in the interim and then once I learn more about the HA world and options, I can take the full plunge at that point, even if need to replace the few pieces I buy for the theater room.

Options, options!

Click to expand...

If your okay with having a separate remote for lighting I would go with z wave and a handheld remote. then as you expand everything you can clone the remote to a more advanced zwave controller. maybe 40$/switch or lamp and then a hand held controller.

The GC wf2ir is considerably less expensive then the gc100 or the other models with rs232. I don't know if the rs232 actually gets you two way communications with an iphone app (kind of doubt it).

I have a wf2ir and it works very well. Keep in mind, however, if you do that instead of logitech harmony (or similar) you will need to have an iphone with the app loaded. This may not work out very well for your kids, visitors, or similar. Perhaps you decide to put an ipad in there, but that is a pricey remote in my opnion.

You will probably want your theater lights to run on the same macros that your theater equipment runs on. In other words, push one button and the projector turns on, the stereo turns on, the dvd loads up, etc etc, and the lights turn down. In this respect the ir light switch is great since all by itself it will work with the same remote as everything else.

In my house, I have Insteon. I have an insteon controller (ISY) that accepts ir commands. So, I can use my logitech rf/ir remote to control my insteon lights. This is great if you plan on automating dozens of lights, but if you only want one, that is a crazy expensive way to do it and it won't work any better.

I imagine zwave has an ir to zwave conversion of some sort. Perhaps that is a good option for you, but my guess is you will probably have to spend $$$ for that.

Depending on how far you plan to go with your automation I would also recommend taking a look at homeseer. It is a software automation system that is very flexible and, via plugins, can control most any automation device to one extent or another. I have been using it for 6 months or so and have been very pleased with it thus far!

Lou Apo said:

The GC wf2ir is considerably less expensive then the gc100 or the other models with rs232. I don't know if the rs232 actually gets you two way communications with an iphone app (kind of doubt it).

I have a wf2ir and it works very well. Keep in mind, however, if you do that instead of logitech harmony (or similar) you will need to have an iphone with the app loaded. This may not work out very well for your kids, visitors, or similar. Perhaps you decide to put an ipad in there, but that is a pricey remote in my opnion.

You will probably want your theater lights to run on the same macros that your theater equipment runs on. In other words, push one button and the projector turns on, the stereo turns on, the dvd loads up, etc etc, and the lights turn down. In this respect the ir light switch is great since all by itself it will work with the same remote as everything else.

In my house, I have Insteon. I have an insteon controller (ISY) that accepts ir commands. So, I can use my logitech rf/ir remote to control my insteon lights. This is great if you plan on automating dozens of lights, but if you only want one, that is a crazy expensive way to do it and it won't work any better.

I imagine zwave has an ir to zwave conversion of some sort. Perhaps that is a good option for you, but my guess is you will probably have to spend $$$ for that.

Click to expand...

For now, I have decided to go with the Intermatic (??? - seems to be marketed under several names) HA101 kit that has two lamp modules and the HA07 controller. Perhaps that is not the best long term controller, but it will get me started. I also picked up a couple of GE ZDW120 wall switch dimmers.

Lou's tip on the iPhone/iPad as a remote is valid. In my case it is not an issue because I am single and live alone, hence, if someone is in the theater room watching a movie or television, I will almost certainly be close by.

I do want to look more into the GC WF2IR unit. This, as well as the Vera 2 and Homeseer products definitely seem like something I need to learn more about as I look to eventually grow my HA system.

Good idea to start small, and if you are initially just working in one room then a couple of modules and a controller should work great for that. As you expand, especially with Z-wave, keep in mind that they form a mesh network and each device repeats signals for all the others to expand the network size and range. Best practice as you expand is to, at least until you have a solid network established, spiral out from the initial area in expanding circles to make sure your network solidifies as you increase its size.

I currently have about 25 Z-wave devices in my house and between my Z-troller controller and those devices my network is very solid, so at this point I am adding new devices where I need them because I have already established a solid core network.

Make sense?

chewie said:

Good idea to start small, and if you are initially just working in one room then a couple of modules and a controller should work great for that. As you expand, especially with Z-wave, keep in mind that they form a mesh network and each device repeats signals for all the others to expand the network size and range. Best practice as you expand is to, at least until you have a solid network established, spiral out from the initial area in expanding circles to make sure your network solidifies as you increase its size.

I currently have about 25 Z-wave devices in my house and between my Z-troller controller and those devices my network is very solid, so at this point I am adding new devices where I need them because I have already established a solid core network.

Make sense?

Click to expand...

Total sense. Part of my engineering background was in developing indoor wireless systems for a major national carrier. I can definitely appreciate the difficulties of indoor wireless propagation so your suggestion makes complete sense and is a good suggestion for anyone looking to expand a system.