Home Comfort and Efficiency: Zoning
For many, maintaining consistent temperatures throughout their home can be a challenge. But now, homeowners can enjoy steady comfort from floor to floor and room to room thanks to Trane’s new Nexia-compatible zoning system.
At the heart of the zoning system, the Trane ComfortLink II Control—an easy-to-use advanced command center—communicates with the home’s HVAC system and the Trane Wired Zone Sensor to direct more heated or cooled air where it’s needed, and less where it is not. Together with Nexia Home Intelligence, the Trane zoning system can control heating and cooling throughout the home more efficiently, reducing the home’s energy consumption and helping to prolong the life of the HVAC system.
Trane zoning capability will be available via select Trane dealers in early 2013. Visit trane.com to find a dealer near you, who can help determine if your home HVAC system is compatible with a Trane zoning system.
New Nexia Partnerships
Nexia Home Intelligence also expands through new partnerships, including solutions through Budget Blinds to bring home automation capability to the brand’s motorized window covering products. Providing connectivity that allows homeowners to use their blinds for energy efficiency, safety and privacy, Nexia makes it simple to manage window coverings through its scheduling feature and remote access capability via computer, smartphone or tablet.
As I stated earlier, home automation has been largely a DIY affair, with the home owner having to play the role of system integrator in order to make the whole system work. Seeing a firm like Ingersoll Rand, with brands as mainstream as Schlage and Trane, step into the picture to provide the integrated solutions that can be installed by a Trane dealer is a welcome development. Their solution consists of a special routing device which attaches to your router, and hardware that establishes network connectivity via one of several protocols. This home automation network is exposed to the internet via your home connection, and the control software communicates with the system and the sensors to bring advanced control capabilities to your home.
The hardware looks very nice and mainstream; check out pictures of the Nexia-enabled hardware here:
And some screenshots of the software that can control the system is here:
I was able to play with the equipment in the booth, and it looked very professional. The control software worked without issue and looks to be a pretty comprehensive solution. While I have not been able to actually review this product line in the field, I believe that Nexia should be on your radar screen if you are planning a home automation project in 2013. This product line is in the market now, with some of the zone heating/cooling capabilities due to be released in early 2013. We’ll keep you posted on developments.
Nexia Home Website
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