Years ago, home automation seemed like a futuristic fantasy. Today, the reality of this remote-controlled lifestyle has already reached an impressive number of homes across the globe. The trend doesn’t show any start of slowing down either. Perhaps the best news of all is you don’t have to be especially wealthy or extremely tech savvy to enjoy the convenience that home automation has to offer. All you need is some of the easy-to-install and operate equipment available from X10. As forerunners in the field of home automation, X10’s products are popular both for their affordability and their user-friendliness.
Basic X10 Home Automation Products: Remote and Receivers
X10 has a number of home automation options on the market, ranging from individual remotes and receivers to entire systems. If you want to start small, here are some of the products you could consider purchasing to begin your path toward automating your residence.
Consider picking up one X10 remote and two X10 receivers. Aside from that, all you’ll need is two plug-in lamps and a screwdriver. That’s it! No fancy cords, outlets, or wires are required. That’s because X10 is able to work through your home’s existing electrical wiring. This added convenience is one of the reasons for X10’s popularity. If you’d like to print out a clear label for your X10 products, you could consider printing them off of a computer or with a label-making machine.
Select Your Lights
First, you’ll choose two lights in your home that you want to connect to your X10 remote and receivers. You can designate one as “unit one” and the other as “unit two.” Select the light that’s nearest to the spot where you’re going to store your X10 remote control.
Set up the X10 Receiver/Antenna
Next, put the receiver with the antenna nearby this light. If you should ever want to disable the system, all you need to do is remove this first antenna.
Add Labels to the X10 Remote Control
It’s important to label your remote control so you won’t get mixed up about which light you’re controlling. You can either print and cut out a label from a computer or label making machine, or manually write out a label with a permanent marker. Trim the label you’ve made. It should fit the size of the remote control’s plastic shell. The label should have a name on it that will help you to distinguish the two lights from one another. Make different labels for each lamp. For example, one could say, “table lamp” while the other says “floor lamp.”
There are a few more steps involved in setting up your X10 basic lamp automation system. We’ll explain these in the next article in this series. As you can see, there’s really not much involved in the process. Once you get started incorporating X10 home automation into your daily life, you may decide to fully automate your home by adding a few pieces at a time or by installing one of their complete home automation systems.
X10 Home Automation & Security
X10.com is the everyday person’s best source for home automation. Since 1976, we’ve been providing unique home gadgets at reasonable prices. Visit us online at x10.com and find out what you’ve been missing!
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