1.What is home automation?

Shop Home Automation Solutions on Amazon.comThis is the ability to control your home's lighting, appliances, thermostat, security, home theater, and more from either within your home or outside it. At its core, a home automation solution is a system consists of:

• - A controller that transmits commands.
• - A series of modules and adapters that connect to lights and appliances and accept commands from the controller.

2.How does home automation work?

Here's the situation: you're in the bedroom late at night and realize you've left the lights on in the living room. With a home automation system in place, you can pick up a controller at your bedside and turn it off remotely. When you press the button to turn off the lights, here's how it works in this basic implementation:

• - The controller issues a command to a module with unique identifier (such as the one connected to the living room lamp).
• - The command is relayed over your transmission system--either powerline network, radio frequency (RF), or Wi-Fi.
• - The module or adapter receives the signal and initiates the simple command ("turn off light").

3.Does this work just when I'm in my house?

The amount of control you want over your home automation--and where you want to access it--can also dictate the type of system you need. If you just want control over lighting and appliances in other rooms while you are physically in your home, a closed home automation system with controller specific to that system will be fine.

But if you want to access your home automation system remotely from your office or vacation destination, you'll want a system that can be accessed using a Web browser or even your smartphone.

4.What is X10, and is it different from Insteon, ZigBee, or Z-Wave?

Shop Home Automation Solutions on Amazon.com There are several home automation technologies that utilize different standards and thusly don't talk to one another. This is unlike Wi-Fi networking, where all Wi-Fi-enabled devices speak the same language. The main technologies for home automation are X10, Insteon, ZigBee, and Z-Wave.

• - X10 uses powerline networking to send commands to switches. However, commands go only in one direction--from controller to module--and they can sometimes not reach the destined module due to interference. Also, there is not feedback loop, so the controller can't tell if a command was received and acted upon.
• - Insteon also uses powerline networking, but also adds RF (radio frequency) connectivity to create a wireless system. It is backward compatible with devices that use the X10 standard.
• - Z-Wave uses a proprietary, low-power RF signal to wirelessly send commands from the controller to modules. It's been adopted by more than 200 manufacturers worldwide-- including Black & Decker, Schlage, Wayne Dalton, Leviton, and ViewSonic--enabling you to more easily mix and match components from different companies when setting up your home automation system.

5.What is powerline networking?

Shop powerline networking kitsPowerline communications networking uses the existing electrical wiring in your home or office as a closed medium for transmitting data between devices.

6.How can I use powerline networking in my home?

Powerline networking can be used just like a wired Ethernet or wireless Wi-Fi network for connecting to the Internet, sending video files from a computer to your HDTV or game console, printing across a network, backing up to a dedicated server, and more.

Additionally, because it uses existing electrical wiring and outlets, powerline networking is a great choice for use with home automation solutions.

7.What are the advantages to a powerline network solution?

Because you're using already the electrical wiring infrastructure of your home--and the electrical outlets that are spread throughout your home--powerline networking offers great flexibility on where computers and peripherals can be placed.

If you've had difficulty in creating a strong Wi-Fi network in your home--due to many factors, such as heavily insulated walls or interference from other devices in the home such as cordless phones--a powerline network can provide a stable, reliable connection throughout your home. And you can even pair it with a Wi-Fi router for wireless access.

Finally, a powerline network doesn't add any charges to your electrical bill.

8.What are the disadvantages to powerline networking?

If your home electrical wiring isn't up to date, you might not get optimal performance from a powerline networking solution. It's not as fast as Gigabit Ethernet speeds (the fastest networking solution for home or office), but it is on par with current Wireless-N Wi-Fi networking.

Powerline networking is often touted as one of the easiest and most affordable whole-home networking solutions because you don't have to lay a lot of cable or install more wiring in your walls. However, you will still need to purchase adapters that will plug into your electrical outlets. Compared to buying multiple adapters, the price of a single wireless router might make more sense depending on what you'll be networking.

You also have to be careful to choose powerline networking adapters and accessories that use the same standard. There are three standards available from a variety of manufacturers:

• - HomePlug AV (available from manufacturers like Belkin, Linksys, Netgear, and ZyXEL)
• - UPA, which stands for Universal Powerline Association (available from D-Link, Netgear, and others)
• - HD-PLC, which stands for High Definition Power Line Communication (available from Panasonic)

9.How does powerline networking compare to other networking options for data speed?

It's not as fast as Gigabit Ethernet speeds (the fastest networking solution for home or office), but it is on par with current Wireless-N Wi-Fi networking and it is fast enough to handle HD video (which requires a 25 Mbps data speed).