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I have been looking for information on white goods available in the UK that support home automation such as KNX (http://www.knx.org).
Back in February I raise this question on a UK KNX forum but didn’t receive any replies.
It appears that Miele with Miele@Home (http://www.miele-at-home.de) is based on KNX PL (powerline) but an e-mail enquiry to their UK site together with a copy to the Miele KNX contact listed on the KNX website didn’t receive a reply …
Are such products available in the UK? Or are they the white goods equivalent of concept cars and only seen at shows?
Re: White goods and home automation (eg. KNX)?
Here’s the problem…
Other than TCP/IP which is a protocol for communication there’s no standardisation for HA. We have X10, Z-Wave, CBUS, KNX, Lutron Lighting, Crestron and a host of other proprietary control systems.
Until one emerges a clear winner with a good user base you are extremely unlikely to see any in whitegoods other than in concept or show pieces.
Gorenje had something as well at some point but I think they’ve seen the light and given up as well.
Sure, you can embed a web server to see what the machine is doing but that’s about as much use as a chocolate fireguard in real life other than basic control and, it still won’t necessarily speak to anything else unless you’re a techy person that wants to program. In other words, not for the mass market.
Quite what the point is escapes me, even although I use HA extensively as until some way is invented to load the washer or put food in the oven I really don’t see the point. I’m quite sure I’m not alone.
Then, on top of that, people won’t want to pay for it as even now they won’t pay for a decent appliance most of the time let alone one with features that they’ll likely never use.
K.
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