We were promised great things with the advent of IOT. In a home application, this manifests itself as smart home tech, and can offer great conveniences when used properly. But I don’t think the technology is mature enough just yet.
For starters, there is still no standardisation of the protocols used in Smart Home systems. A wide array of wireless transmission technologies can currently be adopted should you be in the position to develop your own system.
And there’s also no real regulation to control how the frequencies are supposed to interact with one another, which means there’s a very real chance that you’ll have to utilise different applications to control various appliances and fixtures around your home. If that’s the case, then wouldn’t you have been better off walking up to a switch/device and switching it on/off as required?
If the whole point was convenience, then you’d have not fulfilled the brief successfully.
Greater Concerns
Also, as this is technology in its relative infancy, once a manufacturer cracks the smart home code (which software and hardware combination works the best), many products on the market will suddenly lack support. To keep something commercially viable, it’d have to ape the formula of the ‘winning’ product.
You can see this with the smartphones of the mid-to-late noughties. Whilst some phone makers opted to build their first smartphones with QWERTY keypads, others preferred a full length, bezel-to-bezel touchscreen. A lot of the manufacturers who swore by the keypad either switched to touchscreens, or they no longer do any form of meaningful business.
Smart Home That Works
But that isn’t to say that there are no smart home systems that are practical and futureproof. They exist, but the manufacturers know the value of their product and will charge you an arm and a leg for it.
These systems utilise switches that communicate with a neutral wire, necessitating the need to replace all of your existing switch faces and sockets for smart home units. Each powerpoint will also need an extra wire run, which is needed to feed the server that is usually located in your DB Box.
All the extra work and the proper integration does not come cheap, and makes very little economical sense in a HDB renovation, seeing that it can cost as much as the renovation itself.
At Least Three Years Out
Technology and electronic companies are all working on their own smart home eco-system. And there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Affordable, reliable and wireless smart home systems are not that far off the mainstream. Manufacturers like Xiaomi already have a comprehensive line-up of smart home gadgets. Some additional refinement to their app is really all it needs to be properly practical.
But where things are today, and with all things considered, we are not ready for a fully integrated smart home system just yet.
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