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| iPAD Home Control and Entertainment Apps |
Redefining the role and expertise of the custom electronics integrator
Several profound and disruptive changes have dramatically impacted our custom integration industry over the last 12 months. It is imperative that the residential custom installer comprehends the impact of these changes for one to be successful in the next decade. These changes are the direct result of the ongoing transition of discrete, disconnected analogue electronic entertainment devices located in different rooms throughout the home to today's intelligent digital entertainment devices connected to each other both inside and outside the home. Content has evolved from discrete physical media products distributed throughout the home (CDs, DVDs, VCR tapes) to digitally stored products available from centralized home servers and/or directly from the Internet cloud. Our clients now expect that they can enjoy a Netflix movie streaming download to each of the main TVs in their home. They want to manage and control this content by not only using traditional handheld key button remote controls but also an array of iPad, iPhone, and Android based multi-touch graphical devices.
In my opinion the successful integrator in the next decade must have a thorough understanding of the following three areas to best meet the current and future electronic integration needs of our clients.
Streaming entertainment products and services
Entertainment content for our clients is coming from their broadband connection as much as it is from their cable or satellite services. They are watching TV from Hulu, movies from Netflix, and music from Pandora. These experiences are and will be delivered from products like Apple and Google TV. They will be watched and listened to in the fixed whole house audio video solutions that we design and implement. But they will also be seen and heard from a myriad of mobile devices inside and outside the home. The integrator has to know how to best match this emerging broadband entertainment content with the needs of their clients. A challenging task since the landscape for these entertainment solutions changes daily - but we are expected to be the paid professionals that keep up to date with these evolving technologies.
iPad/iPhone/Android Control Platforms
The iPad, iPhone, and Android products are 3 of the more powerful electronic solutions to enter the home since always on broadband internet services were wired to our residential clients almost a decade ago. The iPad in less than 6 months has become a phenomenal control platform, capable of integrating the control of intelligent home network devices onto a beautiful 10" tablet that has quickly become our “exobrain” life assistant. (“Exobrain” is the term that Scott Adams, the author and creator of the comic strip Dilbert, used to explain the extraordinary power of the iPhone)
When we install a Sonos whole house audio system there is an iPad application to control the music system. When we install a Lutron RadioRa2 system there is an iPad application to control the lights. When we install a Control4 AV control solution there is an iPAD application to control the TV media experience. I have mentioned only three representative examples in the above scenarios but I am confident that by CEDIA 2011 every manufacturer of an intelligent, networked device for the home will have a control or monitoring application for the iPad. Sometime in 2011 the integrated home will consist of a page of applications that allow our clients to control everything from lights, sound, tv, security, pool, and hot tubs to viewing and controlling the home's electrical energy production (think solar panels) to electrical monitoring and usage patterns. The custom installer will spend less time on writing custom control programming on a proprietary display panel and more time involved in the designing and installing of electronic subsystems that deliver the “ap experience”. The simplicity, ease of use, and familiarity of the iPad platform for lights, sound, and AV control will spur demand for the installation of these electronic subsystems.
Understanding the home network
We have become the designers and integrators of digital home networks. Understanding the infrastructure and operating characteristics of the hardware devices that carry the home’s audio, video, and data is no longer an optional skill set. The custom electronic integrator must know how to install, manage, and troubleshoot routers, switches, wireless access points, computers and network attached storage drives. The quality and reliability of the whole house custom electronic solutions that we provide our clients depends upon the skill with which we design and deploy these network infrastructures. These networked solutions offer some amazing benefits for our clients but they come with an inherent set of challenges. Internet connections go down, switch ports fail and routers can lock up. An electronic failure that affected only one room or one device’s performance in the past can now impact the entertainment, communications, and control of our client’s entire home. The attraction of digital solutions is that they are highly leveraged architectures - one content source for many destinations or one control interface for many subsystems. Obviously a network failure unravels all of these benefits quickly so reliable system designs that include levels of fault tolerance and data backups are essential.
Our custom electronic integration channel is on the threshold of offering the richest entertainment, communications, and control products that we have ever offered to our clients. Enabling these rich new experiences for our homeowners will require the professional talents of custom integrators prepared to deliver iPad based control solutions and reliable, high quality digital streaming services across a robust and well managed IP network connected home. Are you ready to deliver and support these compelling solutions today?
