Digital Home DIY

Filed in archive Home Automation on June 1, 2005

If you're interested in automating your home, you've got to start somewhere. CNET has a really nice section that breaks down your options for each room of the house. CNET explains what home automation is:

Put simply, home automation is anything that gives you remote or automatic control of things around the home. The systems that you can control include:

• Lighting


• Appliances


• Heating and cooling


• Security and monitoring systems


• Entertainment (home audio and video)


• Communications (telephones and intercoms)


• Lawn sprinklers

The concept of home automation is to connect all of these systems and devices so that they can be controlled from anywhere and react to one another. For example, as you arrive home, your home-automation system can automatically turn off the sprinklers, open the garage door, unlock the front door and disable the alarm, light the downstairs, and turn on the TV. Or if you power on the DVD player, it might automatically dim the lights, draw the shades, and direct all calls to voicemail.

See the Digital Home DIY at CNET.com