Smart Home Blog

Mavromatic - well-known home automation geek, shared his opinion about Windows CE based touchscreen controller CUWIN 3500. It seems really cool! For about $600 we get 7″ touchscreen panel with resolution 800 x 480, SD slot, Ethernet port, RS232 x 2 / RS485 x 1 or RS232 x 3, USB, Visual Basic, EVC supports.

Theoretically, it can be use as LinuxMCE Orbiter. Because it provides a software for Windows CE. If yes, it can be the best combination of the price and functionality for wall-mounted control panels.

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MCEGuru is a software for Windows Media Center users which allows to control it from several touchscreen devices. One of those device can be Nokia Internet Tablet - Nokia770, N800 or N810. Once installed on the device and MCE the MCEGuru gives you following options:

• See your photos
• List your movies and videos, with their thumbnail image
• List TV channels configured on your Media Center, as well as the program guide for them
• List all the music available on your Media Center, and even listening to it directly on your controlling device
• Manage current playlist on your Media Center
• Control the currently playing media on your TV, browse in it, etc…

To install MCEGuru on your Internet Tablet use that direct link or check the project page on Maemo site.

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Clipsal started to sell its new Black & White Touch Screen. It has diagonal 4.7″ and offers resolution 320 x 240 pixels. Thanks to enhanced contrast and superior backlighting the work with panel should be very comfortable. The panel can be programmed via USB port, which can be used as PC adapter, using Clipsal software (PICED). Additionally, it has RS232 port for integration with third part systems.

The panel doesn’t require additional power supply. It should be enough just connect it to the C-Bus network. There are two variants of that panels: with C-Bus Logic Engine features and without them.

The new Clipsal Black & White Touch Screen is available with price £649.84 (with C-Bus Logic Engine features) in the Cbus shop.

[via AutomatedHome]

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British Columbia-based embedded board and development services vendor Techsol announced a customizable touch-panel equipped single-board computer based on Linux. The wall-mounted, 4.6 x 3.7 x 1-inch TPC-43 comes with a 4.3-inch touchscreen with resolution 480×272. It’s powered by an undisclosed ARM-920T-based system-on-chip (SoC) clocked at 200MHz or 266MHz and has 64MB of “mobile SDRAM” and 64MB NAND Flash. The TPC-43 is based on Linux and supports both Qt and GTK+ for producing GUI.

Additionally the TPC-43 comes with zPoint Experimenter’s Kit to setup and control a ZigBee mesh network. As you may know ZigBee is a modern wireless technology for home automation. It’s a competitor of Z-Wave which looks more perspective for me.

In any case the price in $400 seems reasonable to such device. To have possibility play with ZigBee devices you should be 100 bucks additionally. So, the whole set will be $500.

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A new model of luxury remote with touchscreen NevoS70 was announced on the CES 2008. Its features include:

• Non-line of sight control using Z-Wave(TM) bidirectional wireless communications to ensure reliable command execution and to show the power status of entertainment equipment in the home
• Extended battery life and broad home coverage
• Connection to the home network for multimedia control with industry standard wireless technology (802.11g)
• Ability to view and control any device that has a compatible embedded web server, such as many web-based cameras and media servers
• Control for many home automation devices
• Access to web-based services to deliver real-time information such as news, sports and stock quotes

Together with a NevoConnect NC-50 base station, NevoS70 provides non-line of site IR control, serial device control and power sensing for efficient macro programming and control. NevoS70 communication is based on industry standards—WiFi, UPnP and Z-Wave—to ensure compatibility with a wide range of devices in home entertainment, control, and networking.

Sounds amazing! Looks also. To get NevoS7 in your hand you should just wait a bit and pay $1,199. This is a tiny cost for such perfect device.

[via CePro]

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