Smart Home and High Tech Living

Ah, but I digress. High tech entertainment living. Save that subject for another day.

Fortunately the smart home has evolved into more than just high tech gizmos to entertain our primordial instincts. Today’s smart homes includes appliances that clean our dishes, sense how long to cook our food and tell us when it’s done, and to automatically adjust the temperature of our houses when we are expected home at various times of the day and week.

Many smart homes include sophisticated home security systems that allow us to watch what is going on in our home live from anywhere in the world via a camera/computer link to the internet. Home security features also include the ability to automatically call us or the police when a problem is detected in the home, e.g. a break-in, low or high temperature reading in the home, water spilling on the floor, etc. Smart home technology is also found in window technology today. There are windows that can sense how much light is passing through them and automatically lower integrated blinds or electronically switch polarized glass to block out some of the sun’s rays thus keeping our homes cooler.

High tech heating and cooling systems today include sophisticated thermostat control systems that allow homeowners to program multiple temperature settings into their thermostats so that their HVAC system turns on heat or air conditioning at prescribed times during the day and week. Other smart HVAC technology allows homeowners to call in and change the temperature in their home on the fly.

Home lighting technology has also come a long way in recent years. You can buy lighting fixtures that include motion detectors and light detectors integrated into them so that they can automatically turn on or off depending what is desired. We’ve also seen a dramatic increase in high tech appliances. Microwaves, dishwashers, vacuum cleaners and refrigerators have all evolved into sophisticated high tech appliances that better support our needs and in a more energy efficient way. And yes, we cannot forget mentioning communications in the home. Today’s modern home has wire and wireless router technology built into it so that the average home can support networked computers, printers, and televisions and can be connected to the internet.

Overall smart home technology has improved both the convenience and efficiency of our lifestyles and truly has brought high tech living to the masses. It will continue to advance and bring both positives and negatives to our home. The question will really come down to how we, and our primordial instincts, will use this technology to improve our lives rather than destroy them.