Smart Homes Often Dumb, Never Simple

An anonymous reader writes: Writer Adam Estes has tested over a thousand dollars worth of smart home gear from companies like Wink, GE, Lutron, Cree, and Leviton. Most of it worked correctly out of the box — which he said was great. But almost immediately, devices stopped responding and defects manifested themselves. Even after getting replacements and reconfiguring the devices, he found himself wondering if it was worth the effort to wrestle with all these devices, and ended up appreciating the simplicity of a plain old light switch.

Estes says, "Installation woes and bugs aside, my smart home never seemed handy. I had to tape off the regular switches so that the power would stay on and the bulbs' smart features would work. Even then, I had to pull out a smartphone or a tablet any time I wanted to dim the lights. That was never convenient. I could turn the lights on from my office, but that didn't really make my life better. I could impress my friends with a stray smart home feature here and there, but more often than not, I found myself embarrassed by the glitches of my smart home gone dumb." He concludes that while many smart home products can and do work, the biggest lie their marketers tell us is that it'll be simple and easy to set up and operate all these gadgets. Those of you who have wired up parts of your home, how has it worked out so far?

Comments

A smart phone is rarely convenient

[Overzeetop]

Even ignoring those in the house who don't always have a smartphone with them (young children, grandparents) and any visitor who isn't on your network, needing a smartphone to control most things is simply awkward in inefficient when compared to a dedicated remote control.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

It's not as though the current offerings leave you with much of a choice; but 'smart' is never going to be worth it if it is merely a high tech re-implementation of what you can already do with a few bucks worth of mechanical switches. Even if it works flawlessly, it's still going to be expensive and unexciting.

The only real shot for 'smart' is to do things that conventional systems cannot or do not. Exactly what those things are is a bit vague(lighting and drapes that automatically adjust to available sunlight? automatic dimming when you fire up the TV? subtle color temperature modifications to facilitate greater alertness or easier sleep depending on time of day?); but unless they figure those out, there simply isn't any any way that 'smart' could possibly be worth the trouble. If they do, then we can talk; but 're-implementation of a light switch by dragging an entire wireless LAN and more computing power than existed on earth in the early 80s' is just dumb, even if you polish it properly.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[TellarHK]

I think the missing key in current smart home options that most people can actually afford to purchase, is reliable voice control. I know Google's acquisition of Nest (and whatever Apple gets around to doing) will make a big difference here, but I can already say that I'd be a lot happier with my "smart" lighting if I had:

A: More money for more components such as light switches and socket replacements.
B: Voice controls that were as responsive and reasonably reliable as the Amazon Echo, which gets it right a surprisingly large amount of the time.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[michelcolman]

Exactly. If you need your smartphone to be able to dim the lights, you're doing it wrong.

Smart homes should still have switches and dimmers in the usual places where people expect them (not actual switches, but transmitters obviously) and then, on top of that, allow extra functionality like one button mood lighting, switch of all lights, switch on all lights (if you suspect a burglary), remote control, etcetera. If you get rid of the simple old-fashioned concepts, you're just making things harder instead of easier.

It's one thing to say "the light switch is next to the door, but never mind, I'll just do it for you with my smartphone" (which is way cool) but quite another to say "oh, you want light in the toilet? No, there's no switch, but let me get my phone, just as soon as I can find it, hang on..."

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[vlad30]

I have seen smart home implementations work very well when designed into a new home with all the required sensors and switches at all the right places. It is usually the retrofit ones that go poorly as the necessary cabling is to hard to install.

As for controlling it from your smartphone unless you have backup with other switches and remotes it will be difficult for those that are not connected e.g. children

Cool features that could be turned on remotely is heating a spa pool so its hot when you arrive home so yes there are very few items that are worth the long distance remote reguarly most like turning off the lights is used when you forgot to do it at home however a few sensors and that is automated too

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[eth1]

I think the missing key in current smart home options that most people can actually afford to purchase, is reliable voice control. I know Google's acquisition of Nest (and whatever Apple gets around to doing) will make a big difference here, but I can already say that I'd be a lot happier with my "smart" lighting if I had:

A: More money for more components such as light switches and socket replacements.
B: Voice controls that were as responsive and reasonably reliable as the Amazon Echo, which gets it right a surprisingly large amount of the time.

But the GP's point still applies. Voice control is still just re-implementing the dumb light switch, making it more complicated and prone to failure (although it would be an improvement over a smart phone or remote, and definitely useful for mobility impaired, etc.).

The key is automation. If you're not doing that, the whole exercise is relatively pointless (IMO).

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[gregmac]

Yeah this is exactly the problem. The idea of a control that is fixed in a predictable easy-to-reach location, with tactile feedback (so you can use it without seeing it -- eg in the dark because the lights are off) and requires a single press to activate (eg: a switch on the wall) is a very good one, regardless of the fact that most if not all people have been trained to be used to this feature their whole lives.

There's this huge marketing effort dedicated to "control your lights from anywhere" and "do cool stuff with your smartphone" combined with a focus on products that don't require rewiring (eg: "smart bulbs" and plug-in modules). Great, it's a neat technology demo to get people sort of interested in doing more, but if it's taking away the simplicity of a light switch to get it, it's not going to succeed.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[boristdog]

Pardon me as I adjust my tinfoil hat, but convenience isn't the ultimate goal. I imagine the ultimate goal is to capture as much data as possible for a variety of uses.

Exactly that. Plus the fact that they've created a whole new market to make people feel like they need to buy something they don't need.

But I'm old. I've seen the "smart home" touted every few years for the past 4 decades. It was probably touted in the 60's as well, but I was too busy playing astronaut then to read about it. The "smart home" and the "video phone" come around with a new implementation every 10 years or so, then they fade into the woodwork until the next group of geniuses thinks "You know what people just HATE? Flipping switches to make things happen!"

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[Ol Olsoc]

Cool features that could be turned on remotely is heating a spa pool so its hot when you arrive home so yes there are very few items that are worth the long distance remote reguarly most like turning off the lights is used when you forgot to do it at home however a few sensors and that is automated too

side note - our old spa had a timer on it. Our new one is insulated so well that there isn't much point to stop the heating cycle. Its an outside spa too. The only time the heaters kick on full is when we are out using it in single digit weather. Whic by the way, is simply tremendous fun.

side note: make certain your neighbors know you have one, because the first time you use it at 0 degrees, (as in F) it looks like a conflagration.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[sumdumass]

Well, you brought up some interesting points. Like your thermostat monitoring your adjustment habits and automatically adjusting the temp for when you are away and home or normally turn it up/down, by displaying usage statistics along side your electric and gas usage and telling your water heater tank to not bother keeping the stock hot over the next 5 or 6 hours because you will be gone for the next 7 hours. Of course you should be able to still press buttons and turn nobs to override it, but you should also be able to sit at a web panel and adjust it too.

Your fridge, Your right, open it by hand. But let read a QR code when you put milk and eggs in or something that is perishable then have it remind you if something if at the expiration date or if you are low so you can stop and grab more or even create a shopping list for you. You should be able to pull a screen up on your phone or web panel and monitor it or perhaps it sends you a reminder at the end of the work day or something.

Don't think of it as fixing any problem, think of it as making saving money easier and general life more convenient. It doesn't need to be a solution. It's more like an enhancement I guess.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[Aighearach]

Voice control for lights reminds me of capacitive lamps; lighting in a metal case that you turn on/off by touching the metal. Really cool the first time you see it, especially for kids. Not actually any different functionally, other than malfunctions in an electrical storm or cycling the light at every brownout/ or power supply flicker.

But I will give voice control some credit; it is at least useful and reliable as Clap-On, Clap-Off.

As an accessibility device for the blind, though, voice control will be a major improvement. Combined with good interface design it would be possible then to have appliances with a voice-discoverable features and menus. For the most part we're not there yet. But I only fault product design for that. The blind don't need the voice control to be really great, only the masses need that. For people just trying to control important devices, they can simply learn to enunciate as the computer requires.

Re:A smart phone is rarely convenient

[drinkypoo]

I've done all that for over five decades using just my mind and a note pad.

Why shouldn't people dumber or busier than you enjoy the same benefits?

No shit

[smooth wombat]

and ended up appreciating the simplicity of a plain old light switch.

What a stunning revelation. A simple analog switch is better than hundreds of dollars of technology.

The familiar phrase rears its head again: Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should.

Re:No shit

[frovingslosh]

Actually a simple on/off switch is digital, not analog. You would need a dimmer to be analog.

Re:No shit

[Anubis IV]

Precisely. I've been looking for a simple way to automate various things around my home, but I've been holding off until these systems can pass the "if I sell the house tomorrow could the new owners get by like normal without an instruction manual" test.

Which is to say, the bar for entry should simply be "works like a dumb device", with any technological enhancements layered on top of that functionality so that it supplements the dumb functionality, rather than replaces it. Instead, many of them outright eliminate the dumb functionality or else make it dependent on the smart technology, meaning that they're utterly useless if the wrong link in the technological chain has a hiccup. If I move out tomorrow, I want the new owners to be able to use the place like a normal house without having to configure arcane systems, regularly maintain misbehaving technology, or worry about which OS they're running on their phone or personal computer.

Re:No shit

[flibbajobber]

I'd argue that it would be binary, but not digital. It's not communicating a signal represented as a number - it's transmitting some level of power, which is available in two amplitudes (none and some). So it's analogue, binary (as opposed to continuous), but not digital.

A dimmer makes it continuous, so it would no longer be binary.

PWM, BPSK, etc. are similarly binary, but not necessarily digital. Few people consider a switch-mode power supply to be digitally controlled - it has continuous input, continuous output, and continuously-variable pulse width, yet the output pass device is only in one of two states - switched or unswitched.

Discrete != digital.

Re:No shit

[frovingslosh]

Oh, you children! Something doesn't need transistors or ICs to be digital (and things with transistors and ICs can still be analog). Switches and relay logic is digital, and you don't get much simpler than turning on the switch to light the light. In this case the voltage is the signal, and its message is "I want some light". It doesn't matter if the switch is controlling DC or AC, it is still a basically digital on/off concept. Dimmers can be either digital or analog in design, but in function the end result is that they are analog in nature, in that they allow for an apparent variable range of output (light) from a single source..

Remember, there are 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.

There's a reason the REAL gear is expensive

[St.Creed]

You buy cheap stuff, you get in trouble, You can't get decent quality from those new market entries, because the market has been in place for decades, there's a lot of established and well-supported hardware out there, but... it's industry standard, and expensive. So the new entries try to bring their own standard in the home-market but with cheap gear that doesn't work well.

A colleague of mine, who is an IT architect, has designed his house from the ground up with the industry-standard switches, controllers, light, shutters etcetera. And even after 20 years the stuff he bought then is still supported and he can get upgrades and replacements for everything and it all works - all the time.

Works Perfectly For Me

[friedmud]

I bought:

* Logitech Ultimate Home Control
* Logitech Home Control
* Nest
* Philips Hue Bridge
* 3 Philips Hue Luxe Bulbs
* 2 Philips Hue bulbs
* Philips Hue Light Strip
* 2 Philips Hue Taps

The Ultimate Home Control is in the living room along with the colored Philips Hue bulbs and the Light Strip. I also put one Tap in there right where the normal light switches are.

The bedroom is the regular Home Control with 3 Luxe Bulbs... again with a Tap where the normal light switches are.

Everything synced up perfectly and works perfectly. Having integration with the Logitech remotes is awesome. You just press "Watch Movie" and all of my AV gear resets for watching a movie while the lights dim: awesome! After the movie you turn the system off and the lights automatically come back on: sweet!

If you don't know what a Tap is... go check it out: http://www2.meethue.com/en-us/...

It's essentially a "light switch" that makes running the whole system super easy. Each one has 4 buttons that I've set up as different lighting combinations: Everything on, dim, dimmer, everything off... essentially. I have both set the same way in both rooms so that you can easily remember what the buttons do. Also: they don't take batteries! They're powered by the force of pressing the buttons themselves... so they are very reliable.

All of this is so dang simple and fool proof that my wife even loves it... she is a non-techie but she loves the extra flexibility with the lights. If she's reading at night she'll even pop open the Hue app on her phone and dial down all the lights except the one on her side of the bed.

My advice: don't go cheap. Buy actual name brand stuff: Hue, Logitech, Nest. Don't try to cheap out on something that you need to interact with all day every day...

Homes shouldn't be retrofitted for smart

[dino213b]

Some years back, I worked in home automation. During that time, I realized that the key is not retrofitting a home (that's an invitation for trouble or gimmickry) but to build a home with smart features in mind in the first place (ex: vent airflow and temperature sensors, actuators to adjust vents, etc.) Unfortunately, house builders were not really serious about the effort at the time and resorted to gimmickry anyway, when they could (calling a movie theater room with a single light and a touch panel controller 'home automation.')

What landed me the job was my "resume" - which was a side project where I automated a window shade controller and controlled it remotely through a linux machine. I cannibalized a worm gear out of an old VCR, connected it to a rotary window shade thing. Believe I used a segment of duct tape as a rudimentary U-joint. The motor was controlled by the parallel port and an H bridge, and a cron task would open the window shades in the morning and close them in the evening.

That was my first lesson in home automation: longevity. Home automation products, being new, aren't really tested for durability. My prototype certainly wasn't. At some point the contact switches I used for measuring rotation failed, and I came home to my venerable Linux machine twisting the window shades for hours.

It takes a college degree...

[Lab Rat Jason]

I'm still waiting for a simple way to control my TV, and DVD player. Universal remote is a double negative (or a double positive resulting in a negative?) While it's possible to unify a TV, a receiver, an xbox, and a cable box; it is far from simple. If you need a CS degree to get your IOT house in order, I really don't see it being mainstream. So yeah, in short, the OP nailed it... never simple.

Re:Tried and gave up

[wkk2]

I had a high end system with lots of keypads and dimmer switches. I removed it after finding out that the dimmer switches didn't get along with any LED bulbs. The only feature I really was happy with was "all lights on" triggered by the fire alarm. The furnace blower rotor locked at 2AM on a cold New Years day. It was nice to have all the lights on when I started searching for the source of the smoke.

Insteon Experience

[jtgreg]

I started with a few X10 components and moved to Insteon from SmartHome. My experiences and the acceptance by wife, teenage boys, and friends:
Wins:
- Control of outdoor low voltage lights. Works great, nice to have different schedules for different days of the week. No one cares but me.
- Christmas lights. Nice, but cheap timers work as well. No one cares but me.
- Combining switch locations. Our kitchen has switches in five different locations. Replaced one of the switches with a multi-button scene selector for the kitchen. Big winner with everyone.
- Panic button turning on all outside lights. Wife likes in concept, she still has not pulled out her phone to activate it if I am around.
- Indicator in kitchen that garage doors are open. Very popular
- Motion controller turning on lights when approaching front door. Popular, but cheaper to install a light with motion sensor.
- Wife wants ability to activate spa before we get home. On the list, but relatively expensive to add to Smarthome or pool controller.

Losses:
- Smart phone control of lights. I am the only family member who ever bothers to use their phone.
- Anything that changes indoor lighting unexpectedly. Startles everyone, even when they know about it.
- Even with Insteon's redundancy, I still have problems communicating with several devices. This is an ongoing debug effort.
- I am the only one in the family who can program this system. Software is almost user hostile.
- I have many systems with home control capabilities that do not interact: a satellite box, pool controller, garage door opener, Apple gear, Harmony remote, and Insteon.

Who processes the commands?

[s.petry]

Maybe you were hinting at this, but just in case... Given our current technology, I refuse to use any voice recognition. Samsung is sending everything you say to a 3rd party, who can do anything they want with everything captured by the TV. Siri is no better, so I refuse to use Apple's voice recognition as well. At least with Siri currently, I'd have to push a button to use the service.

If we somehow had enough processing power and software _in_ the house I'd consider it.. but that system can't be directly connected to the internet to be used and I'd have to have full access to monitor communication in my house. I have a nice soldering gun to fix unwanted web cams and microphones I don't want and can't control. I believe the 2nd amendment protects my right to use my soldering gun in my house for protection!