Image courtesy of Flickr user blitzmaerker under a CC license.
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What Kind of Digital Home Upgrades Have You Done?
Ethernet, streaming music, smart power, oh my! What 21st century upgrades have you made to your home?
If you follow me on Twitter, you already know that I spent today cleaning out my garage and assembling a new grill. My question for you guys this week is simple. What kind of digital home improvements have you done to your home or apartment? What would you like to do?
What exactly is a digital home improvement? Well, it's simple. It's anything that adds 21st century technology to your home. Have you run Ethernet to free yourself from the tyranny of wireless networks? Did you install a streaming music solution, like the ones from Sonos or Logitech? Have you explored smart power, to more accurately tell when and how much power and gas you're using on a minute-by-minute basis? What about home automation? Are there any digital home improvements you'd like to see us tackle and write about?
Image courtesy of Flickr user blitzmaerker under a CC license.
Image courtesy of Flickr user blitzmaerker under a CC license.
51 Comments
Daggityon Sept. 4, 2010 at 7:01 p.m.
I'd really like to know more about setting up Wake On Lan. Would love for my phone to connect to my wireless network to turn on my computer.
Robo_Zuulon Sept. 4, 2010 at 7:25 p.m.
I've toyed with the idea of wiring up my home with RJ45 in each room. I know it's a big job, and the only stumbling block I keep running into is that I keep thinking to myself: "is some new wireless, or wired technology going to just make all this work totally obsolete in 4 years?"
Technicolouron Sept. 4, 2010 at 7:30 p.m.
I so want to set up a Server in my home that will hold all my files and run my tv server. If only money grew on trees
DrKurtsvanHassenpheferon Sept. 4, 2010 at 7:42 p.m.
I'd love to run cat6 throughout my house eventually, but for now I've got a WRT54G acting as a bridge for our entertainment center.
Tornon Sept. 4, 2010 at 7:48 p.m.
Just ran 100ft of cat6 cable through the house yesterday actually.
MrHeiston Sept. 4, 2010 at 7:59 p.m.
Installed a digital timer for the front porch, which, having grown up with shoddy mechanical timers on lights, is a pretty cool switch. It even uses longitude and latitude to set on/off times!
Also just cancelled phone and cable, replacing the former with a MacMini running Plex and the latter with Google Voice'd cell phones.
I'm really interested in making a homespun multitouch computer (like Microsoft's surface), so seeing some stuff on that would be pretty swell.
Also just cancelled phone and cable, replacing the former with a MacMini running Plex and the latter with Google Voice'd cell phones.
I'm really interested in making a homespun multitouch computer (like Microsoft's surface), so seeing some stuff on that would be pretty swell.
Timekillson Sept. 4, 2010 at 8:05 p.m.
I'd like the WOL info as well; tried forwarding the ports to my WHS but can never get it to wake up from the Internet.
Tips on running ethernet when you have neither a basement nor an attic (WTF, El Paso - who taught you people how to build houses?) to use to drop lines down. I do have cable in the rooms I want to run the ethernet to, but I can't snake between studs to another whole room...
P.S. - who is the amateur electrician featured in this article? http://www.maximumpc.com/article/is_wiring_your_home_worth_it
That coverall is tres sexy.
Tips on running ethernet when you have neither a basement nor an attic (WTF, El Paso - who taught you people how to build houses?) to use to drop lines down. I do have cable in the rooms I want to run the ethernet to, but I can't snake between studs to another whole room...
P.S. - who is the amateur electrician featured in this article? http://www.maximumpc.com/article/is_wiring_your_home_worth_it
That coverall is tres sexy.
eolithon Sept. 4, 2010 at 8:10 p.m.
Ethernet, naturally. I also installed a programmable touch-screen digital thermostat that's near flush with the wall. That's all for this house, but likely won't be here much longer.
Derangelon Sept. 4, 2010 at 8:33 p.m.
I plan to set up a gigabit LAN in my apartment and build a file server. I will also toss an n adapter into my laptop. I'd love to go all n, but I don't think the wireless adapter in the Droid X supports it. Nor does my PS3, but thats wired to the router anyway.
eternalbetaon Sept. 4, 2010 at 8:35 p.m.
Haven't done all that much in my place yet, although that is only because I am renting as of now (but considering making an offer). I'm in the very early days of converting my DVD collection to all digital after being inspired by several Tested how-to's!
TheRedDeath25on Sept. 4, 2010 at 8:55 p.m.
I would like to buy a second HDTV so when friends come over they can play games on it while I play on mine, would also be good for halo match with friends.
LXon Sept. 4, 2010 at 9:01 p.m.
How about reviews/reccomendations on monitors for those who wish to upgrade? I'm personally using a 19" one right now and I'm intending to upgrade to a 22" or so one which can play 1080p (my current's only up for 720p). Or.. a tutorial about colour calibration for monitors! That could be interesting as well.
nickb64on Sept. 4, 2010 at 10:19 p.m.
I'd like to run Cat5e or Cat 6 to every room, set up a home server, build a new machine or two for and my mom & sister, get a new gaming rig, and replace our SD TV with an HDTV and maybe get a PS3 or Xbox 360(my sister thinks she wants one with Kinect), but unfortunately money does not grow on trees.
thirdspacedon Sept. 4, 2010 at 10:47 p.m.
I have ran Cat 6 in my home office. I was rewarded with a minimal file transfer speed boast, but I guess I am ready for the future (unless Light Peak comes along). I also run a Windows Home Server box like Will (1st gen that I upgraded CPU and RAM). I wish the HP WHS box had gigabit ethernet. I use and original Apple TV as a whole house music streaming solution.
afterburner1978on Sept. 4, 2010 at 11:44 p.m.
Last Christmas, I finally got a bluray player, and it came with Netflix streaming ability. I already had Netflix streaming on the Xbox360 over wireless, but I wanted the full use of my 20 down cable internet plan. You know for HD streaming. Anyways, I was not gonna go through the hassle of dropping cat5 from the attic into the walls. So I ran a networking cable from my router in the bedroom to a cat5 modular wall jack that I installed. Inline coupler in the wall to another cat5 modular jack on the other side of the wall with a small networking cable between the 2 jacks, left it in the wall.
Wah-la! I now have ethernet in the living room, running to a small hub/switch in the entertainment center. Yeah, its cheap, but hey it works, and the old man that we rent this house from will just think its another phone jack when we move out! ;)
INCSlayeron Sept. 4, 2010 at 11:47 p.m.
I wired the house wit Cat5e cables for full connectivity between my 2 computers my 360 i also hooked up a fileserver running Archlinux and a old computer running clearOS as a router
ThatWasBrillianton Sept. 5, 2010 at 12:29 a.m.
I'd like to turn my whole house into a Faraday cage, so that the aliens can no longer broadcast into my brain while I'm watching Saved by the Bell.
crusader8463on Sept. 5, 2010 at 2:08 a.m.
Nope, I'm living at home so I'm too broke and not able to even if I was able to afford it.
AtomicEdgeon Sept. 5, 2010 at 2:21 a.m.
I've had a media server setup for quite some time now. A server with 2 TB hard drives with all my movies and TV on, running XBMC to one of my TV's, and then shared out so another small PC can run the same database of video in another room on another TV. Then I have AirVideo on my iPhone running so that I can access the video remotely, and an XBMC remote app that I can use to browse the media library and play/pause stuff.
It sounds a lot more complicated than it is. It's just a pain having to use XBMC, when PLEX is better, but I can only run that on my macbook and not on my media PC's. One solution that I have looked at is using the media server just to share out the media and then get a mac mini which just boots straight into plex. the only thing with this, is that a Mac Mini is more expensive than an old PC that I built from bits I had lying around!
For those that dont know, Plex is an offshoot of XBMC made just for OSX. What makes it better in my opinion, is that they recently released an update that replaces the old library and scraper (the plugins which download all the meta data for your media) that XBMC have been using forever, and they are much better.
I am thinking of writing up a simple guide on how to get some of this going, as I had huge problems trying to find simple information about all this when I was first looking into it. I will obviously post it on Tested when I have written it up!
It sounds a lot more complicated than it is. It's just a pain having to use XBMC, when PLEX is better, but I can only run that on my macbook and not on my media PC's. One solution that I have looked at is using the media server just to share out the media and then get a mac mini which just boots straight into plex. the only thing with this, is that a Mac Mini is more expensive than an old PC that I built from bits I had lying around!
For those that dont know, Plex is an offshoot of XBMC made just for OSX. What makes it better in my opinion, is that they recently released an update that replaces the old library and scraper (the plugins which download all the meta data for your media) that XBMC have been using forever, and they are much better.
I am thinking of writing up a simple guide on how to get some of this going, as I had huge problems trying to find simple information about all this when I was first looking into it. I will obviously post it on Tested when I have written it up!
Using a laptop as an alarmclock. Waking up to Pandora every morning is amazing.
And also contemplating creating an RFID door-unlocking system. It seems easy enough and there are instructions all over the web on just how to go about it.
And also contemplating creating an RFID door-unlocking system. It seems easy enough and there are instructions all over the web on just how to go about it.
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