All Winners

Given the number of loads and architectural elements integrated, you might expect multiple control points throughout the house. Instead, the entire system is controlled using a single 12-inch Crestron panel in the kitchen area.  

Rather than having multiple control points, the homeowner has learned to love schedule-based control and custom lighting profiles. He loves the various profiles so much that the ability to edit and create his own presets on the fly was a major requirement of the layout and programming of the single controller.  

Audio/video distribution and home-theater are conspicuously absent from this integrated home. In the entire house, there’s only a single television and stereo viewing/listening area. Automating the baby grand piano wasn’t in the cards, either.

Those interior designers can be hard to please, but this one seems happy with the minimalist invasion of high technology in his designing life.

See No Evil
While working within the constraints that nothing in the home be altered, custom electronics installer Twilight Sounds helped move the homeowner into the 21st century while modifying existing technology he was already comfortable and satisfied with.  

The project exemplifies how automation systems do not necessarily need to be all encompassing, but more important, they need to meet the requirements of homeowners. This owner, reluctant to have modern technology installed, tested the waters with a one-room overhaul, and soon realized that more extensive controls could enhance his life, too.

Just a few weeks later he had Twilight back out to wire the entire house, outside, pool and hot tub. At the owner’s behest, just as much care was required of Twilight to leave no trace of its work, even when integrating the Pentair pool system to the automation system over existing Cat 5 burial line.    

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Stephen Hopkins

Stephen Hopkins is chief technology editor for EH Publishing. He writes product reviews, features, and focuses heavily on 3D TV, iPhone and iPad apps, and digital content.