SmartHomeUSA.com Home Automation

[ish]

As the topic reads, I am a noob.
Looking for good beginner info.
Any pointers?

[tommy]

Welcome to the wonderful world of home automation!

This is a nice sight that SmartHomeUSA has put together.

However, since it has only been up a few weeks, it is going to take awhile to build up a lot of good quality, informational threads. I know it will in time, but if you are interested in learning now, I would like to recommend another forum that has been up for a while and has an awesome amount of information (I don't want to insult our hosts here, but this site is still new and will continue to grow).

Go to {REMOVED} and you can read hundreds of posts by some of the sharpest people I have found on the subject. In time I hope to be able to direct people to this site once it gets some good threads started.

[Ralph]

Hi Tommy,

I hate to act like a censor, but I removed the site's URL. It's more precautionary then anything else. If we have URL's posted it can become a problem that gets far out of hand. The forum isn't a competitor, and it's actually a good source of information.

[Ralph]

Ish,

An excellent place to start is to figure out exactly what you want to do. Hopes dreams aspirations and eventual goals. Once that is mapped out you can find a decent starting point and build from there.

This will help avoid the pitfalls of loading up the house with todays most popular toy only to find out it wont work tomorrow. I'm more then happy to help in any way, and I am sure i'm not the only one.

Things to think about include:
Lights
Security
HVAC
Audio Distribution
Video Distribution
Phone Signal
Surveillance
Internet Connectivity

and how you would like them to interact with each other. For example do you want lights to come on automatically when you disarm your alarm panel.

[tommy]

I understand your reluctance to allow posts that direct people to others forums, especially if they are a competetive retailor. I have no problem with that.

The site I mentioned does not sell anything, is totally free, and an awesome library of knowledge. They welcome all. I have seen posts by representatives from several companies (manufacturers and retailors) that are there to help. I have seen posts by software authors, you can actually report a bug discovery directly to the author of your home automation program.

If you want this site to thrive and to draw in the quality of experienced users to really get some good informative threads started, you need to be very careful.

If you don't want to allow any names in the forum, set up a links page outside of the forum to direct users to other knowledge bases.

[Ralph]

I agree fully that a database of links is essential, if you have any suggestions for links please do send them to me. It is probably best if you email them.

I do appreciate all the effort you have put forth here, and I understand that it will be difficult at first without posting links to outside locations, but it also limits any issues we may have from confusion over suggestions made elsewhere being credited to us, as well as limiting any unwanted spamming from unwelcome guests.

[rykow]

I am looking for the same info. Since the site was removed how do we go about finding out what this resource is. Can't it be posted as a statement rather than a link,, i can retype it into my browser or search for it if you give us the groups name.

[Ralph]

The link was to another forum like this one, if it had information that would have helped I would have left the link in place.

I do highly reccomend Homeseer, and of course there is a forum there which you can read for more information, I also posted an answer to the other topic you started.

http://board.homeseer.com/

[tommy]

rykow:

Check your private messages.