While there’s certainly no shortage of people clamoring for dedicated home theaters they can fine-tune for optimum performance, there’s also a growing number interested in creating flexible entertainment systems that can deliver sound, video, and even Internet-based content throughout the house. For them, issues such as ubiquitous controls, the ability to share components, and unobtrusive installations are more important than creating the ultimate home theater experience.

First, James K. Willcox profiles two dramatically different approaches to the connected home. In a house perched high atop a mountain overlooking Pittsburgh, the owners have created a veritable high-tech palace that allows them to exercise an incredible amount of control over their whole-house audio system, computer network, automated lights and curtains — even their fireplaces and spa jets. The owner of a recently remodeled colonial home in the Chicago suburbs created a system that lets his family access music, Internet radio, and cable-TV music channels from almost every room in the house.

Then, Eric Taub takes a look at an IBM lab in Austin, Texas, that shows what it will be like to live with everything connected through the Net and access at your fingertips wherever you go.

Pittsburgh Palace
Chicago Connection
Idea Central

Pittsburgh Palace
By James K. Wilcox
Photos by Scott Goldsmith

When they began construction on their 10,500-square-foot home on Mount Washington, which overlooks Pittsburgh, Peter Karlovich and Steve Herforth knew they wanted a certain level of control over the lighting and blinds. But they didn’t anticipate the high-tech showplace their home would eventually become. In fact, by the time it was completed last August, it included a whole-house music system, a DJ/ dance area with disco lights, a computer network, and a touchpanel system for controlling the lights, blinds, electric skylights, security system, sauna, spa jets, and three gas fireplaces, plus an outdoor fire pit and a separate gas fire sculpture.


Homeowners Steve Herforth and Peter Karlovich with installer Matt Mandros.

The installer, Matt Mandros, founder and president of MGM Automation in Pittsburgh, said the project started with discussions about light controls, but quickly became something much more ambitious. “Peter’s background as a software architect makes him fairly technically minded,” Matt says. “And he knew he wanted to have the house wired and to have computer networks, but he hadn’t waded through all the options yet.”

Peter, who sold his software company and retired at the height of the dot-com boom, was familiar with lighting systems but knew little about whole-house audio. “We focused first on the music system,” he says. “because I wanted to make sure it and the lighting system would fit together seamlessly and unobtrusively.”

The key to operating everything from touchpanel controllers lies in making the system’s main components — a LiteTouch lighting-system controller and an Elan HD system controller and RS232-based integration controller — seamlessly work together. The house has 18 UStec four-port multimedia tecPorts, several single tecPorts for cable, data, or phone lines, 58 LiteTouch control stations, 11 Elan volume controls, two Elan keypads, and eight Elan Via touchpanels (both in-wall and tabletop models).


The first floor of the 25-room connected home features a dance floor with DJ booth and a billiards room, while the second floor has a living room/media room next to the dining area.

Working with Peter and Steve during the initial stages of construction allowed Matt to future-proof the house. “If it hadn’t been such a wide-open canvas, I don’t think we would have gone as far as we did with the automation and integration,” Matt says. One consequence, however, was that the project’s budget ballooned from about $130,000 to more than $180,000, not including the plasma TVs and DJ gear, which the homeowners purchased separately.

Peter didn’t want a wireless computer network. “I guess with his background, he was cognizant that wired networks are more secure,” Matt says. The main interface with the whole-house audio system is through PCs in the living room and DJ area, so anything connected to those sources becomes available to the whole house.

The homeowners were generally in favor of prewiring to anticipate future needs. “Peter always wanted to have his options open. Flexibility was very important,” Matt says. One example was the decision to include fiber-optic cable within the wiring. “Currently it’s dark,” Mandros says, “but it’s there if he ever needs it. He’s still exploring the possibilities.”

The house’s clean, open architectural design and the owners’ love for entertaining dictated that the whole-house A/V system couldn’t be intrusive. So the large high-definition plasma TVs sit flat against walls, the 35 speakers are all mounted in the ceiling, and most of the gear is stored either on racks in a storage area under the three-car garage, or in the case of the Elan Via DJ media server and Nuvo AM/FM tuner, in the DJ booth.

The living room features a 60-inch Zenith plasma HDTV — and spectacular views of Pittsburgh.

The living room/media room has a 60-inch Zenith plasma HDTV, a 7.1-channel Harman Kardon A/V receiver, and seven Proficient Audio in-ceiling speakers. The speakers, which have angled woofers and pivoting tweeters, are mounted in backboxes to improve the bass. A PC connected to the receiver and TV lets the owners listen to Internet radio or music files, surf the Web, or stage photo slideshows when entertaining. “When we’re having a party, we can distribute music throughout the house — and it’s a big house — at the touch of a button,” Peter says. Because the  room’s focus is the windows that look out over the city, Matt had to make sure nothing, including the controls, detracted from the surroundings.

The control system and most of the components are located in a room below the garage.

The rest of the house has 28 Elan ceiling speakers with pivoting tweeters. Matt also installed Elan in-wall subwoofers in the kitchen and billiards room. Powering the whole-house system are four Elan 60-watt-per-channel 6-channel amps, plus a 150-watt-per-channel stereo amp. Music from any of the nine zones can be played in any of the other zones, and Internet access and signals from the high-definition cable box can be routed to any of the video displays.

Many of the rooms, like the kitchen, are wired for mono rather than stereo. “With stereo ceiling speakers, the sound can be very poor because either you don’t get good separation, or you’re getting sound from only one channel,” Matt explains.

In addition to the 60-inch plasma in the living room there are two 43-inch Pioneer plasma TVs and two 15-inch Sharp Aquos LCD TVs. But the owners aren’t that excited about video. “The infrastructure lends itself to a DVD server, which would let them stream movies over the Ethernet,” Matt says. “Every place that has a high-def display also has broadband capability, so it’s ready to go when they’re ready to go.”

All parties seem happy with the results, and they’ve discussed other projects, including installing a home theater under the garage. Not surprisingly, Matt calls Peter and Steve ideal customers. “They were not only open to suggestions, but it was apparent early on what they wanted, and they communicated it clearly. With some customers, there’s a lot of detective work.”

But Peter’s software background made him an unusual client. “I asked Matt to get me the software used to program the lighting system and the Elan sound system,” he recalls. “Typically they don’t give that to end users, for fear they’ll screw it up.” As a result, Peter has tweaked the lighting controls and reprogrammed the Via touchpanels to give each of them the ability, among other things, to turn music on in the entire house at the touch of a button.

Steve would step in occasionally and rein Peter and Matt in. “He’s not unfamiliar with technology, but he knows that I can go a little too far,” Peter says. “He’ll say, ‘You know, that’s a little too complicated.’ And he’s right. If our guests use the bathroom, they shouldn’t need a Ph.D. to turn on the lights.”

— James K. Willcox

Chicago Connection
By James K. Wilcox
Photos by Larry Evans

Eighteen months after completing an extensive renovation of their colonial-style home just outside Chicago, real-estate management and consulting executive Bob Chodos and his wife, Chris, decided their multiroom audio system needed an upgrade. Many of the rooms in the 5,500-square-foot house already had built-in speakers and individual volume controls, but Bob and Chris felt hamstrung by being able to play only one source at a time throughout the rooms. They also wanted to tie their home computer network into the audio system, which would allow them to listen to Internet radio and to digital music files stored on their four PCs.


The whole-house audio system can be operated from the PC in the home office.

The homeowners turned to John Baumeister, owner of Baumeister Electronic Architects in Chicago, to handle the installation. “I had John centralize the sound system so I could, from various locations, listen to music from the CD changer, music stations from the Comcast digital cable box, or even access Internet radio stations,” Bob recalls. While video wasn’t a focus of this installation, he wanted the system set up so it could be incorporated in the future.

The house’s technology backbone was substantially upgraded during the renova tion, which included running Cat-5e high-speed voice/data cable and Cat-3 voice cable and linking the network through a central router and firewall. “My initial plan was to centralize the computers,” says the tech-savvy homeowner, who until recently handled much of his firm’s information-technology matters. “I work on a virtual private network (VPN)that links my home office to my office in Chicago, and I have my wife’s computer and two of my boys’ computers tied in to the network.” This lets them share a printer/fax/scanner/copier as well as high-speed DSL Internet access.

In tackling the installation, John had to work not only with the installed backbone, but also within the family’s budget. And he had to meet their desire for a clean, uncluttered look, which had led them to install ceiling-mounted speakers in most of the connected rooms. “When I first visited, Bob told me he wasn’t happy with the sound in his home, which was set up as a single zone,” John recalls. “There was one preamplifier/amplifier going through a Niles switch box that allowed him to turn the sound on and off in different rooms, with volume controls situated in each room. But he had to go back to his office area to control everything.” Because the wiring passed from the office to the area in the basement where all the house’s wires and cables converged, John was able to relocate nearly all the equipment — including a Sony 400-disc CD changer, a Comcast digital cable box, an Escient FireBall music server, and even an old Tandberg cassette deck — to Middle Atlantic racks in the basement. The result is that the office is now relatively free of gear, and the system can be controlled via the home’s four computers or the Crestron color touchscreen in the kitchen.


The Chodos's next project is to bring their media room — which includes a Sony HDTV and Definitive Technology speakers — into the home network.

Crestron was a natural choice given both John’s experience with its products and Bob’s familiarity with the company. Along with the kitchen touchsceen and X-Panel applets (mini software applications) that run on the PCs, the system has an audio distribution processor and a control processor. “My suggestion was that instead of buying separate control interfaces, we could access the system through his existing computers, which would save a lot of money,” John says. Powering the whole-house audio system is a Niles 12-channel amplifier, which pumps out 60 watts to each channel. From almost any room on the main floor, you can select any of the audio sources — including PC- and Internet-based music, which is sent to the Escient server — and play it in any of the wired rooms.

Since Bob and Chris’s large (28 x 32-foot) kitchen is a main congregation place both for the family and for guests when they entertain, it was a focal point of John’s efforts. It originally had a pair of JBL speakers in the ceiling, but just two speakers couldn’t provide adequate coverage, according to John. By manipulating the wiring — going across some cabinets, around the fireplace, over to the other side, and back up through the ceiling — he was able to relocate the JBLs to a less-trafficked end of the room. He replaced them with a pair of Sonance Symphony 624TR two-way in-ceiling speakers, which have a pivoting tweeter that helps provide broader coverage. To fill out the sound, John placed a 1,000-watt Velodyne subwoofer out of the way next to a cabinet.

The media room, which has a 34-inch Sony direct-view HDTV, a Denon 5.1-channel receiver, and a Definitive Technology surround sound speaker system, operates independently from the main system. But whole-house audio is piped in via a pair of soffit-mounted JBL ceiling speakers, and John added a Velodyne sub to beef up the sound. Music from the whole-house system can also be pumped out to a large patio area as well as to the three-car garage where Bob has a workbench.


The kitchen/dining area is controlled by a Crestron touchscreen.

Crestron touchscreen

Possible projects include adding the master suite and bath, as well as the kid’s  entertainment area — all of which are prewired with speakers — to the whole-house system. And Bob has already talked to John about installing a home theater in the basement — which is prewired for 5.1-channel sound — as well as adding sound to another patio area off a bedroom. John says that thanks to the extensive prewiring and the multizone capability of the Crestron PAD8 processor, additional zones can be created simply by adding amps and, where necessary, speakers.

A basement area has been set aside for most of the equipment for the house-wide audio system, including a PC and an Escient FireBall music server.

The process has had its hiccups, however. “At the beginning, I didn’t do a good job of explaining to John the degree of tonal control I was looking for,” Bob acknowledges, “so we changed out equipment until I got what I wanted. When we finally hit upon the kind of control I was looking for, my budget got blown.” As a result, the project came in about $10,000 over the initial plan to spend about $20,000.

But Bob is very pleased with the installation, including the improvements to the home’s backbone as well as the integration performed by Baumeister Electronic Architects. “John did a great job, and I liked working with his guys — they were ‘can do’ kind of people who helped bring my house into the 21st century. The system is a lot easier to use now that we have this level of control. Before, people were popping speakers and afraid they’d blow up the system. Now it’s point, click, and go.”

One unexpected benefit of the audio system is that the family is watching less TV. “The music is running constantly, and I’m playing more classical music and jazz all the time,” Bob says, “so it’s exposing my children to that, and they like it. And I find us sitting around in the kitchen talking more than watching television. If I had my choice I’d take all my TVs out. We use them too much.”

Idea Central
By Eric Taub
Pervasive Computing Lab Photos Courtesy IBM

It could be the couch potato’s dream come true. Thanks to research now taking place in an Austin, Texas, lab, the widescreen LCD TV that just arrived in your living room could become your home’s control station, not just serving up TV shows but also letting you see what’s in the fridge, controlling who you let into the house, and telling you when to service the car — all accomplished with just a few clicks on the remote.

Think not Big Brother, but Big Blue, for this is the work of IBM’s Pervasive Computing Lab, a demonstration home that illustrates how things will be when the Internet isn’t just a part of your life but has insinuated itself into virtually every aspect of it. Call it Two Degrees of Technological Separation. Just as it’s said that you’re only six connections away from everyone in the world, the day may come when you’re no more than a step or two removed from controlling every electronic device in the house.

“The technology resonates with customers in every walk of life. The lab acts as a paradigm enhancer, a way to think outside the box,” explains Bill Bodin, IBM senior technical staff member and creator of the Pervasive Computing Lab.

At the lab, IBM has created a future living room, kitchen, and garage filled with “smart” appliances and gadgets. Each can receive data from the Internet and be moni tored from an HDTV, a computer in a Rome cybercafé, or a cellphone while traveling in Bangkok. (Instructions are routed through IBM’s Service Gateway central control station.) That information can then be displayed and manipulated using a remote control connected to a large-screen TV, the keyboard on a laptop or cellphone, or just about anything that can issue a command. Every electronic device — even a light bulb — receives its own IP address, allowing it to be monitored and to respond to outside data.

Heating could be activated not just at set times but in response to impending weath er conditions as gleaned from Internet sites. Light bulbs could be switched on based on the cost of electricity, the time of day, and the additional heat they generate. And still images of the kids could be sent throughout the house, to be displayed in active picture frames in the living room just before the grandparents show up.

In the future kitchen, crock pots will be replaced by intelligent appliances that heat or cool depending on information embedded in the product and commands sent by the homeowner via cellphone as he or she sits on the train home. When the fridge is running low on milk, a new supply could be automatically ordered through a direct connection with the local grocery.

Maintaining couch-potato mode, a homeowner could use the TV’s remote to transmit music files to the garage, to be automatically downloaded into the car’s digital server. On cold days, the car could be started and the seats warmed just before it was time to leave. When service was due, the maintenance system could automatically send an e-mail to the local dealership requesting an appointment.

Pundits have long predicted the melding of a digital TV and a PC. Under IBM’s Pervasive Computing Lab scenario, we might soon wonder how to define the difference between a PC and a toaster.

Continued on next page

In the Pervasive Computing Lab’s kitchen, almost everything is monitored and controlled. Electronic tags embedded in food packages provide a list of ingredients and cooking instruc­tions that can be sent to the smart oven. Cookie monsters beware: even the countertop is part of the network. Pick up a tagged item — like a bag of Oreos — and a signal can be sent to a monitoring station’s display, anywhere in the world.

The refrigerator’s least impressive feature is its ability to keep food fresh. Its embedded touchscreen, which can control mundane tasks like turning on the heat and closing the blinds, can also be used as a Web browser. Messages can be written on the screen using a stylus or just a finger. When the intended recipient accesses the network, the message is displayed on his or her screen, wherever it is. And a camera mounted inside the fridge lets you see what’s there. You can then use the screen to put together a shopping list. While this saves energy, it frustrates the desire to open the door in the hope that chocolate cake has magically appeared.

— E.T.

 

Setting the Standards

Consumer-electronics and PC companies believe so strongly in the concept of the connected home that 116 of them have joined the Digital Home Working Group (DHWG). This year-old alliance is figuring out how to standardize the way digital TVs, audio systems, PCs, and cellphones can connect and talk to each other with the least amount of hassle. The group’s founding fathers — which include Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Nokia, Philips, Samsung, Sony, and Thomson/RCA — decided to act because connecting digital components is often complex, kludgy, or almost impossible.

The Working Group’s role is to adopt standards, not create them. In developing the rules for the connected home, it chose from a library of off-the-shelf file formats and networking/connectivity protocols. DHWG-compliant products will all sport wired Ethernet or wireless Wi-Fi network connections. Once plugged together, each device will recognize every other, automatically. To ensure that every device can read any soundtrack, video, or photo file, they’ll all  be transferred using mandatory formats. Devices must convert files stored in any other format before sending them to another networked appliance. The idea is to make terms like MP3, WMV, MPEG-2, and JPEG irrelevant. Once standards are in place, people won’t need to know what formats their files are in, because they’ll all smoothly transfer and play.

While the Working Group is concentrating on making it easy to move personal files around a home network, it also expects to set standards to make rented or purchased content easy to share within the home. But that will require a new set of copy-protection standards to stop TV shows and movies downloaded from the Internet from being stolen or illegally transmitted to other users.

By all accounts, the DHWG’s work has gone swimmingly, with the first set of standards due within the next few months. But the bonhomie enjoyed by its members doesn’t take into account the very real differences of opinion that exist about the direction home networking will take. Consumer-electronics manufacturers expect the TV to be at the center of any A/V-friendly home network. Or the network might be completely decentralized, with a host of “intelligent” devices all capable of shifting and displaying files. Computer companies not surprisingly see the PC, with its powerful processors and extensive storage, as the natural hub for any network.

But the consumer-electronics companies will point out that computer functions are already becoming incorporated into many entertainment devices, blurring the line between a PC and a TV. For example, all of RCA’s HDTV sets that include a digital tuner have the Windows CE operating system as the backbone of the set’s architecture. With it, people can access the Internet directly through the TV.

While the DHWG’s standards are flexible, there’s no guarantee they’ll always evolve with the times. Like cellphone and digital video recorder technology, no one knows how a home network will actually be used until people embrace the concept and start using it.

—E.T.