Vast array of smart gadgets, order only if you're comfortable with electronics.
Written: Mar 09 '05 (Updated Mar 10 '05)
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This is a web store to visit if you love gadgets, and have some idea as to what you want. Those with limited technical inclination should avoid this store, it requires a bit of geekness. If however, your inner geek feels called by the products offered, Smarthome can become an addiction, especially the auction section (discussed below).
Smarthome has been around for 10 years. During this time, they've become one of the largest home automation companies on the internet. The list of things they supply is a bit eclectic, switches, automatic switches, spy cams (in guise of everything from smoke detector to teddy bear), automatic drapery, home security systems, water leak detectors, wire and cable. If you need to do something a bit unusual in your home (like add a light switch to control a light but notice there are control wires to permit connection), and don't happen to have bare walls (unsheetrocked), Smarthome offers an array of products to help you solve your problem and possibly improve your life (or frustrate it) with advanced electronic controls.
The website tries to be helpful, by bundling categories, and having a search button at hand. Unfortunately unlike other web stores the site doesn't even fit in a 1024 x 768 box. Thus you are required to scroll to see some of the options. Categories can be confusing, even overlapping. There are two stores presented and linkable off the main homepage (the retail and auction store) both of which have similar products, but dissimilar pricing and shipping times. This can be confusing as they are indeed tightly related, but at the same time not quite the same. The auction store shares shipping with the retail store, they are also bundled for purposes of payment and shipping, and share identical shipping (almost) and return policies (note you cannot complete a Smarthome auction order until you have a winning bid, sometimes not for days after you win, as you receive must receive a notification of winning bid email notice from the Smarthome auction website, you click on a link in the email, and then ordering / shipping is identical with the retail store, though you get a special price on your auction product(s) reflecting your winning bid price ... If you came just to browse, and are not a gadget geek, you will not enjoy this store.
Many of the devices sold at Smarthome are X10 based. X10 has a bad reputation due to the X10 pop up ads from x10.com, the term X10 also refers to an open (but aging) protocol which exchanges information over wiring allowing lights, doors, TV's and other things to interact semi-autonomously and without traditional control wiring between them. A comprehensive review of X10 and it's virtue / pitfalls is beyond the scope of this review, though as X10 is such a large percentage of the Smarthome product base, it wouldn't be appropriate to entirely ignore it, a summary of X10 follows; At it's best X10 permits for example control of many devices in the form factor of a single standard switch (up to 8 devices with some X10 controllers), X10 often permits dimming lights as a virtually free extra feature, X10 controlled circuits can be remotely activated or deactivated by other switches, controllers or sensors ... even activated or not by time of day or status before or after sunset, even a device going on or off (or having it's status changed as in being dimmed) can be detected and noted by a home security system or intelligent controller, thus an appeal of X10 generally is a feeling of security (see more on why this may not be so below), home automation and reduction of wall clutter are some of the wonderful things X10 can do for a home. It is worth noting that generally the folks at Smarthome do not discuss or permit discussion of negatives about any product or class of products on their website. Only pro comments or discussion is permitted. Older homes may require expensive booster devices, many homes will require mid-priced bridging devices for X10 products well across a home. Large TV's, PC's, and UPS devices can create noise which may need to be filtered by mid priced filter devices, Smarthome sells X10 boosters, bridges and filters, however they may only be discussed as positives like "this really solved my problem" you cannot say for example "this solved the problem of half my X10 devices not communicating with the other half". X10 signals in one home may even leak to another, to solve this there is an X10 filter to block signals before the main circuit breaker (if you have split service you may require several filters then bridges to reconnect the disconnected segments internally, not only expensive but complex!). An X10 filter is an expensive device which really should be professionally installed. You won't read about people discovering the need for these things on the Smarthome website. An advanced X10 signal booster starts at $119 on the auction site ($149 retail), similarly bridge units start at $25 on the Smarthome auction ($39 retail). The point is buyer beware, older homes, homes with advanced features, many appliances, advanced appliances or large homes (over 2,000 sq ft) all may require booster or bridge devices to get X10 to work well (there is a workaround called boosterlinc if you search for this on the Smarthome website you'll see products with integrated boosterlinc are among the most popular and hot selling things they have). The open X10 standard also lacks any real security, all devices trust all signals. Unless filtered, someone could plug an X10 device into an exterior wall socket and control your home, thus it isn't ultimately a great security solution (this is another example of something you'll never read at Smarthome.com).
Smarthome has a related Smarthomepro web site, if you have a contractor (or are one) there is where you would shop it offers professional discounts and contractor pricing. Linked off both Smarthome retail and pro sites the common auction site. On a search you may wind up by accident at the smarthomepro site, you'll know this as there won't be any prices. You can just redact the pro from the url and get to the device you searched in on at the retail store. They should of course offer a retail link from every pro web page or stop having search engines point to the pro site, however this would require a bit more introspection than Smarthome enjoys (more on this later).
The retail store, has the highest prices, and is great if you know exactly what is needed and don't mind paying a premium. The pro store is inaccessible to most consumers and is not reviewed here other than to state prices are a bit lower. The auction store has an array of "stuff" offered at various price levels, it is best if you want something expensive and wish to try to get it at a discount. The auction store is a bit like an online yard sale, but a bit slower and cleaner. Generally items are on auction for 3-4 days, starting price and final bidding price often follow no predictable rules by class (that is some items are introduced at a starting minimum bid of $1 a similar product may have a minimum bid of $59). Prices paid for products also vary considerably from auction to auction. My strategy is to bid on things I'd order anyway up to about 80% of the retail price, if the item isn't one which I'd order or is an alternative, but has some interest, I'd bid on it only if the discount was at least 40% off store price, sometimes 50%. On occasion I've gotten an item at 50% off. The danger is having a pile of expensive stuff sitting on your home office desk waiting to be installed. Bidding on items permits you to either meet the minimum bid price, or beat the current bid by $2 or $5 (varies based on value of item) you can bid over the minimum, and your over bid will serve as a proxy (that is the auction will accept the minimum bid as your bid, but allow you to automatically outbid any other bid via proxy up to the maximum you were willing to pay for it). This assures you get the lowest possible auction price, and allows you to bid low and establish an automatic limit. Usually It is worth watching auctions for a bit, then starting slow. Bidding initially on a hot auction is going to be an expensive learning experience.
Smarthome is always introducing new stuff, and seems to have a product churn over time, but it is a slow churn relative to the size of the product inventory (which includes thousands of items).
Smarthome features products from several sources (manufacturers or OEM's (as in rebadged)) of the same or similar item(s). Prices on the generic stuff is for the most part reasonable, but for name brand stuff you can almost always do better elsewhere on the web.
Ordering is easy, there is some excitement if you "score" a bargain at the auction. Shipping doesn't depend on weight (most of the time, cable is an exception, there may be others) but on price. For the most part you can get whatever you ordered shipped for about $10 or less (but not much). Check your state, most don't pay sales tax, thus it's whatever you order plus up to $10 for shipping as the final cost.
Customer service has been very good and friendly. In one order I was missing a part, called and they agreed to ship a replacement without any hassle. My only concern has been the auctions, after your winning bid, you must wait for an email permitting access to your item (there is a workaround, if you know the auction number, you can activate the script which invokes the auction close before you get your email, however this requires a bit of work, and if you don't understand what was just stated, you'll have to wait for your email to arrive before closing out an auction). Sometimes the email notification (and access) has arrived after 72 hours (which is the time they give you to confirm an order). When this happens, they auto ship, and you lose the opportunity to bundle stuff into a single order, essentially you pay double for shipping (or worse if they are late with 2 notifications). Smarthome is good about fixing this before it happens, bad about fixing it after it happens. Thus you need to be on top of your bids / auctions to not get over billed for shipping. Call if you won an auction, and they haven't yet sent a winning email. They can tap out an email to you instantly, then you can bundle a large order for a very small (if any) increase in shipping cost. My strategy is to always try to bundle as much as possible so my orders and auction use is in waves.
Shipping tends to take 2-3 days to get out the door, they advertise same day, why I have no idea. Only the Fedex ground is reasonably priced, all other solutins double or more than double shipping costs. Smarthome does seem to make a good faith effort to try and ship on time, however it seems their websites faith isn't matched to the reality of the shipping department.
In summary, Smarthome can make your life better if you want something simple. It isn't the place to go to say wire up a home security system, unless you know exactly what you want and like splicing and crimping cable. In between novice and expert, your level of comfort with electronics and electrical power should be your guide. My advice is start small, with something you need and think the store can help with. Always check elsewhere on the web before buying at Smarthome, outside the auction (which will have the best prices IF you can bid low and prevail), prices can often be significantly lower elsewhere (especially on name brand stuff).
Customer service, support, and technical support answer the phone with reasonably short delays, and offer positive views of most any product. After sale technical support isn't available via an 800 number, but pre sale is, they never know and you get the same people. However if you are doing something a bit complex, and are stuck, the technical support department may disappoint.
For my home, I ordered automatic drapery, this allows the drapes to close at night and open in the morning. The triggering event is dawn and dusk which is detected by a driveway floodlight / X10 sensing device. Via an intelligent programmable controller, a signal is sent, processed and my drapes close UNLESS the track lighting is on over the bay window, when the light is turned off the drapes automatically close if still after sunset. Also sheer drapery is closed during the day when my projection TV is activated and in the afternoon for western facing windows to prevent high intensity sunlight from creating too much brightness.
Recessed lighting, fan, vent hood lighting and other ancillary lighting (under counter) are also controlled either indirectly via person in room detection and ambient light condition at the time of motion or via direct control of a switch (I have programmed a smart controller to defer to the manual setting of a switch, that is if it is set on before a motion event, it will not automatically be turned off, if it is turned off when a detector would normally keep it on, then it is kept off, all this involves communication with a programmable controller AND personal programming, setting conditions and using flags).
The technicality to achieve this, the issues regarding wiring, the need for signal boosters and what not, are all complex, fortunately I have background in electrical engineering and am a programmer. Thus while a bit rusty on some areas, I was able to achieve a very pleasant automation system. I do NOT advise anyone to try aggressive projects without help unless they have a background conducive to playing with this stuff (or are 14 years old and thus able to do anything :-) ).
Currently, I'm installing mini magnetic contacts to my doors, and wiring them to a sensor which will permit both security and lighting control (for example turning on the front foyer doors after sunset if the door is opened and front door sensors detected motion. The effect is to welcome members of my family home with automatic lighting appropriate to their task and time of day. Thus you can get a smart home out of Smarthome, however it takes work and believe me, a bit of programming.
The above brings up another failing of Smarthome, for a large technical website with diverse and complex items, they have no online user forums. The benefit of such forums has been demonstrated countless times with complex products. Generally aside from minimal solutions, people may be stuck with Smarthome products which they never get to operate properly. Rather than having forums which discuss positives and negatives, and how to's with some real technical depth provided user to user... Smarthome avoids any criticism, edits out any negative reviews, and discourages user to user help. An example would be setting flags with their smart home automation software. It was a problem for me, and Smarthome wasn't helpful at finding a resolution. However my guess is others will encounter similar difficulty. Instead of offering a place for users to help and encourage each other (perhaps even to disparage non-viable products) Smarthome has elected to avoid this altogether. While it's hard to argue with their success. It is clear to me that a competitor with slightly better prices and decent moderated online forums with experts offering help online will eventually come along and eclipse Smarthome.
They also need to rethink their web store, it should fit neatly on a users screen and not require scrolling. Scrolling is only required due to the mass of junk they push at the start of the home page. Clutter isn't helpful to getting started, and scrolling for various functions is not really appreciated. Most newer websites run by large online stores have everything you want on a single non-scrolling homepage. Smarthome needs a smarter web presence in my opinion.
Recommended:
Yes
What product did you purchase or try to purchase? X10 8 in 1 switch w/dimmer, automatic drapery, X10 IR controller ...
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