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iHome's iSP5 SmartPlug Is Far From Perfect, But It's a Cheap Way to Give HomeKit a Try

jimi78 said:
Do you consider turning on the light switch or fan a workout?
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Sitting too long is one of the worst things you can do for yourself. Even a smart device will remind you every now and then to get up out of your dang chair! JEEZ!
 
mactastic said:
Another thing that people need to realize about home automation is that replacing switches or even re-wiring your entire house doesn't actually give you an automated home. There is a lot of logic that needs to be created that is, by necessity, highly customized.

A lot of the value of a system like Control4 is that they program and maintain it for you. If you're not comfortable around bare electrical wires AND computer code-style logical structures, the DIY market is not for you at this point. People pay a lot of money for proprietary systems because those companies do all the heavy lifting for you. You tell them what you want, and they give it to you, for a price.

The problem with mass-market appeal for home automation is that not many people are comfortable doing it themselves, and it's not affordable otherwise if you're not in the upper income brackets. A couple of things could change that. The more likely, IMO, will be that at some point energy management gets mandated in the electrical codes. All new construction and major renovations will be required to install HVAC and electrical systems that can interact with a demand-response system to some extent.

The other would be if someone managed to come up with a control system for home automation that did what the Nest does for HVAC control: watches you for some period of time while you "train" it, then it's able to refine it's automation capabilities by keeping tabs on you. But the complexity of such a product to cover enough use-cases to appeal broadly is very high. If the Nest messes up and declares you AWAY when you're actually not, you might get hot or cold before you can fix it. If your house decides you're AWAY when you're not, it is way more disruptive, and has safety implications if things go dark at the wrong time. But such a control hub would remove the technical side of things. It's much cheaper to pay an electrician to change out some switches once than it is to pay a control company a monthly service fee.

I spend way more time tweaking and testing the code portions of my system than I do installing devices.
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Generally true. I don't do much wiring changes, but the logic area is another story.

Then there is HomeKit, which has not shown itself to be either stable or flexible. It tends to trash many existing installations and gear. It tends to be replacement gear rather than additive gear. Insteon is a good example. Their current hubs don't work with it and the new hub is effectively unavailable. However the current hub works just fine with apps, the watch, all current devices and has a public API.
 
Can someone confirm whether or not using iCloud is a requirement? In other words, can HomeKit be used without it if I do not want external network access to my devices?

-tnx,
Jeff
 
canman4PM said:
The "smart" won't be in products like this one. It'll be in the hub (and the subsequent programming the user puts into it) that controls the products like this one. Some products, like the NEST, will be smart on their own and even smarter when linked to a well programmed hub. Other products, like this one, will just obey whatever it's connected to. Analogy: "Despicable Me". The controller will be Steve Carrell. This product is a Minion.
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Yes, I agree. The problem with these "minions," as you put it, is that, right now, we're the hub. If the approach is to continue to make us the hub (and I hope at some point that changes) then home automation will fail. I also think using smartphones as the hub is the wrong approach (something else I'm seeing a lot of). They should be the interface to the hub, not the hub. The hub should live in your house and be connected to the "minions" and do all of the controlling. If the hub does something you don't like or you want to change how something works, then you pull out your smartphone and make the change.
 
canman4PM said:
Agreed. Ideally, you want a new build. Then you can have every switch, socket, etc on a wired connection to the hub, which does all the ON/OFFing with the hub being the only wifi connected device in the house.

But for those of us with already built homes...
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This to me is the biggest hurdle.

Given tech today one could easily imagine a sensibly built and wired home that had various control panels in lieu of switches to control lights, along with controllers for various appliances. All of this could be controlled both by wall devices and by a smartphone, as well as programed.

But there's a massive legacy housing stock that is wired in the traditional way. I have multiple switches for my living room lights (recessed), which were installed so that I could put lights on in different parts of the room and at different brightnesses. Could I do that with a single homekit switch/device? Sure, I'll bet I could, and control it with my iphone. But to do that I'd have to rip out the 4-switch box, rewire everything, and install a single multi-wire switch in the box instead. Then repeat for each room. Plug in devices aren't going to get me there.
 
avanpelt said:
or the last few years, my wife and I haven't walked around our home turning lights on and off anymore. They either come on and go off when we've programmed them to do so or we can control them manually from our phones from anywhere in the world. If we hear a noise in the middle of the night, we can turn all the "connected" lights on with three taps on our phones without getting out of bed.
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I have automatic lights that come on and 9off too, they just aren't connected mto the internet and coswt a small fraction of what these devices do.

As far as turning things on and off from anywhere in the world; why would you want to?

Middle of the night? That's what the motion sensor lights are for. You don't even need to wake up and tap your phone. They just come on. In any event lights on or off, you still would need to get up and see if it's a burglar or the cat.

So yeah, maybe someday it might stop being a solution looking for a problem. Right now though, HomeKit devices seem to be duplicating the function of existing devices, albeit in a less reliable, more expensive way.

Plus the whole security risk angle. I'm not worried that someone from North Korea will turn on my lights when I'm not home. The real risk is a vulnerability in these devices access protocol will allow them into my network to access my computer or device.
 
Will these Wi-Fi devices interfere with other such devices?

I have had some interference to my mouse by something in the room, but I plugged in everything again with no more interference problems.
 
Le Big Mac said:
But to do that I'd have to rip out the 4-switch box, rewire everything, and install a single multi-wire switch in the box instead. Then repeat for each room. Plug in devices aren't going to get me there.
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It's not actually that bad. For a retrofit, it's as easy as removing and replacing the existing switch. Signals are sent via power line, radio signal, or both.

There are issues where existing electrical boxes are too small, but otherwise it really is just a drop in replacement.
 
Daalseth said:
I have automatic lights that come on and 9off too, they just aren't connected mto the internet and coswt a small fraction of what these devices do.

As far as turning things on and off from anywhere in the world; why would you want to?

Middle of the night? That's what the motion sensor lights are for. You don't even need to wake up and tap your phone. They just come on. In any event lights on or off, you still would need to get up and see if it's a burglar or the cat.

So yeah, maybe someday it might stop being a solution looking for a problem. Right now though, HomeKit devices seem to be duplicating the function of existing devices, albeit in a less reliable, more expensive way.

Plus the whole security risk angle. I'm not worried that someone from North Korea will turn on my lights when I'm not home. The real risk is a vulnerability in these devices access protocol will allow them into my network to access my computer or device.
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From a remote location, it would be practical to make it appear to others that someone is in the house, discouraging most would-be burglars.
My dogs have been instructed not to bark unless they see someone coming up the driveway with a gun or a machete. They are light sleepers. :cool:
 
I still see automation like this as being s niche market. I can say that I would love a smartphone controlled outlet to keep my son from turning the wii u off and on constantly lol.
 
mactastic said:
My system pings our Wii, if it gets a response after bedtime, I get a notification.
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My son is two. It's not about bedtime. It's about wanting to press buttons sometimes when I am not looking. I have different problems than you for now but I'm not looking forward to monitoring middle of the night game sessions. Lord knows that it how I grew up. Mom never suspected a thing lol.
 
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Ed217 said:
Mine already does all that as well, based on GPS. Same for door locks. Same for Thermostat, which is a Nest.
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You have a central home automation system that talks to all of these devices? I'm wanting one system to control it all, not lots of various systems working independently from each other.
 
I'm a little disappointed with the performance of this product. I had much higher hopes for it since it is Apple endorsed and an iHome product. While it was easy to set up on my lamp, the product is very inconsistent recognizing the rules (timers) set. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don't the app will not stay logged in, doesn't remember your log-in and does not have touch recognition, so I often am having to log in and enter password just to turn on or off the lamp. There is much room for improvement!
 
It's more about automation. If you do things manually then yes it takes the same amount of time if not longer. That's like writing a script to automate your file copy from d to e but instead of running the script you manually copy the files over.

What I'm saying is you're not using it for it's intended purpose. Which is automation. Automatically turn on lights based on where you are for example is the point of this. So when you walk in your home the lights turn on or if you walk away the lights turn off. THe same can be said for heat, tv's, fans, whatever.

Macwick said:
This is why - for the most part - home automation is a solution looking for a problem.
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pragmatous said:
It's more about automation. If you do things manually then yes it takes the same amount of time if not longer. That's like writing a script to automate your file copy from d to e but instead of running the script you manually copy the files over.

What I'm saying is you're not using it for it's intended purpose. Which is automation. Automatically turn on lights based on where you are for example is the point of this. So when you walk in your home the lights turn on or if you walk away the lights turn off. THe same can be said for heat, tv's, fans, whatever.
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Yes. Have all of that now, fully automatic.
 
Targets R Us said:
Can someone confirm whether or not using iCloud is a requirement? In other words, can HomeKit be used without it if I do not want external network access to my devices?

-tnx,
Jeff
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I believe most current hardware and systems are web based in one form or another.
 
Le Big Mac said:
This to me is the biggest hurdle.

Given tech today one could easily imagine a sensibly built and wired home that had various control panels in lieu of switches to control lights, along with controllers for various appliances. All of this could be controlled both by wall devices and by a smartphone, as well as programed.

But there's a massive legacy housing stock that is wired in the traditional way. I have multiple switches for my living room lights (recessed), which were installed so that I could put lights on in different parts of the room and at different brightnesses. Could I do that with a single homekit switch/device? Sure, I'll bet I could, and control it with my iphone. But to do that I'd have to rip out the 4-switch box, rewire everything, and install a single multi-wire switch in the box instead. Then repeat for each room. Plug in devices aren't going to get me there.
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Wireless is the future trend, not wired so much anymore. You can already do most of what you want with wireless controls. Its not perfect, but it works well.
 
"the devices do not work with enterprise WiFi networks and thus won't be usable in corporate environments or colleges."

Why is this?
 
jettredmont said:
No, you need the physical switch to remain in the "on" position, always. If you want to turn it off manually, find the iHome plug attached to the wall, and press the little toggle button on the top-right (behind the little green light). Then, yes, "Siri" will know that the light is turned off.

Doing it your way (turning the lamp off at its built-in switch) will just make the lamp not respond to the iHome controller until you toggle the built-in switch again. This is two switches in series. They both have to be "on" for the light to get power; if either (or both) is off then the light is off. You are thinking of it as something like a "three-way" wall switch (when you have light switches on both ends of a hallway so that toggling either will toggle the light between on and off), which would be awesome but electrical outlets don't have the third powered prong which would be required to allow such fanciness (there is a third prong but it is for ground fault). So, that won't ever happen.

This is the fundamental issue with trying to retrofit home control into legacy "dumb" devices. You won't see the really nice benefits until the devices themselves are smart enough to understand home control.
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That makes sense - and what I feared...I can see the expression on my wife's face when I say that instead of just turning the lamp on, she either has to hit another switch or load/run some app on her phone? The sarcastic question "so this is progress?" would ensue shortly thereafter ;)
 
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