Everything centrally controlled

Smart Home: The house only becomes intelligent through networking

(djd).

Motor drives for roller shutters, awnings and garage doors, TV and home entertainment control via smartphone or tablet PC, outdoor lighting with motion detectors or individual room control for heating: many households already use various comfort functions that make life easier, help save energy or improve safety. “With more and more individual components and remote controls existing side by side, you can lose track of things,” says building and living expert Oliver Schönfeld from the consumer portal Ratgeberzentrale.de. Because mostly different systems and techniques are in use, which cannot be interlaced among themselves and possess in each case own controls.

Simple installation by radio cross-linking

But “networking” is the magic word when it comes to turning your own home into a real smart home. This means that a wide variety of components can be centrally controlled and monitored via a single system. Networking can take place via cable connections or via radio. The great advantage of wireless connections is the low installation effort, as time-consuming cable work is no longer necessary. Systems such as TaHoma from Somfy, for example, can be installed in the shortest possible time and expanded with additional components at any time. Under http://www.somfy-smarthome.de there is more information in addition.

Different functions to scenarios bundle

A further advantage of such central control systems is that various functions can be bundled into so-called scenarios and called up time- or event-controlled. For example, at a pre-set time in the morning, the roller shutters automatically raise while the bath is preheated and the fully automatic coffee machine starts in the kitchen. Or the window awnings can be raised on their own when the sun is shining on the façade, and then retract again when it starts raining.

Simple control technology for the Smart Home

(djd). Almost every German household today has so-called connected devices, i.e. smartphones or tablet PCs. This means that everything is already available that is required for the central control of a home automation system such as TaHoma Connect from Somfy. The central software of the system runs on each commercial Tablet PC, the Smartphone or also a normal PC, the operation is simple and self-explanatory. More information: http://www.somfy-smarthome.de.