Re: What bedside clock for a HA-er?

[Dan Ward <mail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Sorry for the rather large latency in my responce, I have been away
all
week. you have just hit on what I was thinking while reading this thread.

NetRemote, would be an ideal candidate for this.  You could easily make
a "Pretty" gui, and have it communicate via xAP, or Girder or
Homeseer
to you HA system.

You would also have a small amount of redundancy, if the link (Network)
failed, you would still be woken up, as NetRemote would be doing the
alarm function.

This has actually recently come up on the Promixis forum.
http://www.promixis.com/forums/showthread.php?p=106385

Dan

Paul Gordon wrote:
>
> I've just had a brainwave...
>
> How about a iPAQ (or similar) PDA? - I have a HX4700 that sits on the
> desk in my study usually, connected via USB to my main workstation PC.
>
> I wonder how well this could be "customised" into a
"smart" alarm
> clock?...
>
> Any thoughts anyone? - anybody done this already?
>
> Paul G.
>
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: ukha_d@xxxxxxx <mailto:ukha_d%40yahoogroups.com>
on
> behalf of Paul Gordon
> Sent: Tue 07/11/2006 20:28
> To: UKHA_D Group
> Subject: RE: [ukha_d] What bedside clock for a HA-er?
>
> Indeed. There's no doubt that a PC based solution would easily have
> the best flexibility by far, both in terms of processing power,
> interface choice, input feeds from other sources, integration with all
> the other HA, etc. etc.
>
> But it does have some significant downsides, such as power
> consumption, hardware requirements, the amount of work required to
> design, customise & implement the whole thing (it's by no means
"out
> of the box"), and not least the concerns over reliability.
>
> If you run a CF card instead of a HDD, what OS do you run? - I'm
> guessing it's not any flavour of Windows on that hardware... - therein
> lies another pitfall; - I only know Windows OS's to the degree that
> would be necessary to get a complete system up & running, and I
don't
> have the time, (or the inclination) to learn *nix just so I can get a
> better alarm clock! - I'm not knocking it, it's just not for me....
>
> I have a built-in "box" headboard with room inside to house
a
> full-size PC, so a flash case isn't a problem (nor for that matter is
> having a small case, or indeed any case at all). My main concern is
> with the visible parts, I don't particularly want (and SWMBO would not
> allow) something that is overtly "PC like" at the side of
the bed, nor
> do I think a laptop on the bedside table is an aesthetically pleasing
> arrangement. So I'd only want something small, and convenient "up
top"
> - I may just get away with a wee touchscreen, provided it's on the
> smaller side of wee!
>
> The idea does have potential, but there are some gotchas to look out
> for....
>
> Paul G.
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: ukha_d@xxxxxxx <mailto:ukha_d%40yahoogroups.com>
on
> behalf of Kim Wall
> Sent: Tue 07/11/2006 19:07
> To: UKHA_D Group
> Subject: Re: [ukha_d] What bedside clock for a HA-er?
>
> Paul Gordon wrote:
> > Now that I have more or less expunged X10 from my home, I no
longer need
> > the X10 mini-timer as my bedside clock, so I'm looking for a
"suitable"
> > replacement..
>
> Old laptop?
>
> We've got a PII laptop by the bed with a 512meg CF card in place of a
HD
> so that it runs totally silently (unless made to do something CPU
> intensive, which practically never happens). We mostly use it for an
> IRC client on one of the virtual consoles (what HA we have has an IRC
> bot interface), the odd ssh session to check email, and Firefox in X
for
> those late-night random conversations that can only be resolved by a
> quick check of googlepedia.
>
> The laptop doesn't actually do alarm clock duty itself (we already had
> the vibrating alarm clock from hell in a slightly more accessible
> place), but there's no reason why it couldn't. I used 'at' and
'mpg123'
> as an alarm clock for a while when I was at university, and I expect
> there are alarm clock plugins for popular media players.
>
> Kim.
>
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