matte
2020-04-22 08:45:07
- #1
Sorry, but what does that have to do with intuitiveness when I have 46 (!) buttons alongside 11 room controllers and 2 touch displays, plus 2 other control systems? I haven’t even started with operation on the phone.
What are the buttons good for? So that you can operate the blinds in every room? That’s exactly what a controller is for. Or are they for the lights? That should be solved by presence detectors. The motion sensors are not a unique feature of KNX, but they do make the system much more intuitive.
A brief excursion into our house:
We have about 190m² with 11 room controllers (MDT glass button 2 smart) and the Gira X1 as logic engine and visualization for the phone. For that, there is a presence detector in almost every room.
Blinds go up/down automatically in the morning/evening, during the day they are automatically shaded. In the parents’ area, the covering only goes down in the evening, and up in the morning only after pressing a button in the bathroom.
When the TV is turned on, the bus system decides, depending on the brightness and position of the coverings, whether a command is necessary and lowers them. Additionally, the subwoofer is powered on and the presence detector is locked for lighting. Also, the Sonos in the kitchen is muted.
When the TV is turned off, the covering goes up if it’s daytime. If automatic shading is necessary, that is started instead. If it’s dark outside, the covering stays down.
If we open a window or door, the covering goes to the desired position for ventilation.
For windows with venetian blinds, only the slats are adjusted; for doors, the covering goes up so you can go outside. Unless the door is tilted open, then only the slat is adjusted. By the way, that works with MDT blind actuators out of the box without further logic. Window contacts are necessary for this. For tilt/open differentiation at doors, two contacts per door were installed.
When it comes to lighting: we have a presence detector in almost every room that automatically controls the lighting. Exceptions are, for example, the dining table lamp or the bathroom mirror cabinet. Between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m., areas that can be dimmed only turn on dimmed and turn off again dimmed.
If no presence is detected, the lights turn off. This also applies to manually switched lamps.
The presence detector in the guest WC switches the light and starts light background music via Sonos. The roller shutter works as described above; no manual operation is necessary.
If I think about it, we really only use 5 of the 11 buttons regularly (2x in the bedroom next to the bed, bathroom, kitchen, and office).
The rest just hangs there, provides the temperature for heating control, and is usually unnecessary. If you add children, you get 2 more in the children’s rooms and one in the children’s bathroom.
I don’t know why I’d need the massive amount of buttons anymore.
You have to stop thinking about KNX in terms of participants and think in terms of functions. With scenes, you operate many participants simultaneously and everyone knows what to do.
For example, if you want to cook, one button on the room controller is enough to turn on the lights, start the music, supply potential standby consumers like the extractor hood with power, and turn the ventilation up a bit.
There are no limits to ideas here, but the only thing this has in common with conventional electrics is that you have sockets and lights and are supplied with power.
Of course, you can have it built that way, but I think it’s wasted money and would find it a shame to spend so much and then not use the possibilities.
The advantages of KNX hardly come into play here.
What are the buttons good for? So that you can operate the blinds in every room? That’s exactly what a controller is for. Or are they for the lights? That should be solved by presence detectors. The motion sensors are not a unique feature of KNX, but they do make the system much more intuitive.
A brief excursion into our house:
We have about 190m² with 11 room controllers (MDT glass button 2 smart) and the Gira X1 as logic engine and visualization for the phone. For that, there is a presence detector in almost every room.
Blinds go up/down automatically in the morning/evening, during the day they are automatically shaded. In the parents’ area, the covering only goes down in the evening, and up in the morning only after pressing a button in the bathroom.
When the TV is turned on, the bus system decides, depending on the brightness and position of the coverings, whether a command is necessary and lowers them. Additionally, the subwoofer is powered on and the presence detector is locked for lighting. Also, the Sonos in the kitchen is muted.
When the TV is turned off, the covering goes up if it’s daytime. If automatic shading is necessary, that is started instead. If it’s dark outside, the covering stays down.
If we open a window or door, the covering goes to the desired position for ventilation.
For windows with venetian blinds, only the slats are adjusted; for doors, the covering goes up so you can go outside. Unless the door is tilted open, then only the slat is adjusted. By the way, that works with MDT blind actuators out of the box without further logic. Window contacts are necessary for this. For tilt/open differentiation at doors, two contacts per door were installed.
When it comes to lighting: we have a presence detector in almost every room that automatically controls the lighting. Exceptions are, for example, the dining table lamp or the bathroom mirror cabinet. Between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m., areas that can be dimmed only turn on dimmed and turn off again dimmed.
If no presence is detected, the lights turn off. This also applies to manually switched lamps.
The presence detector in the guest WC switches the light and starts light background music via Sonos. The roller shutter works as described above; no manual operation is necessary.
If I think about it, we really only use 5 of the 11 buttons regularly (2x in the bedroom next to the bed, bathroom, kitchen, and office).
The rest just hangs there, provides the temperature for heating control, and is usually unnecessary. If you add children, you get 2 more in the children’s rooms and one in the children’s bathroom.
I don’t know why I’d need the massive amount of buttons anymore.
You have to stop thinking about KNX in terms of participants and think in terms of functions. With scenes, you operate many participants simultaneously and everyone knows what to do.
For example, if you want to cook, one button on the room controller is enough to turn on the lights, start the music, supply potential standby consumers like the extractor hood with power, and turn the ventilation up a bit.
There are no limits to ideas here, but the only thing this has in common with conventional electrics is that you have sockets and lights and are supplied with power.
Of course, you can have it built that way, but I think it’s wasted money and would find it a shame to spend so much and then not use the possibilities.
The advantages of KNX hardly come into play here.