Product Description
Do you long to listen to your favorite CD from anywhere in your house? To set up a wireless network so you can access the Internet in any room? To install an iron-clad security system? To fire up the coffee pot while you’re still asleep and wake up with automated lighting? Smart home technology can help you do just that! Smart Homes For Dummies, Third Edition, shows you how easy it can be to create and live in a cutting-edge, fully connected home-without break… More >>
#1 by Anonymous on May 11, 2010 - 2:48 am
I was looking for specific, real-world help in creating at least a partially ’smart’ home. What I found was vague and amorphous predictions for the ‘future’ and not remotely enough concrete advice or help. Here is an example of what I found on two pages (pp. 42-43) picked at random: “will allow you to…are going to be…what’s coming down the pike…you’ll be able to…will change drastically” This is “Everything you need to prepare your home for the 21st Century”? I think not. This book was very, very irritating. If I had seen any part of it before placing an order, I never would have bought it.
Rating: 1 / 5
#2 by David Burstein on May 11, 2010 - 4:41 am
Danny Briere, a friend, is a top industry consultant who built Telechoice into an industry leader. I also write about technology, so I know his professionial work. The book shows another side to him – playful and joyous. This stuff is fun – and it ain’t worth a darn if you can’t make it work. Briere and Hurley help you choose, plan, and solve the inevitable problems with a sense of humor. Very well done.
Rating: 5 / 5
#3 by Dan Poirier on May 11, 2010 - 6:38 am
I have read this book in its whole entirety. It is very well written, thorough, and sectionally organized. It covers a diverse range of interesting issues in relation to the title’s subject. The approach to reading this book can be tackled from a stand-alone-chapter format, and/or in a chapter-linking format, and/or obviously as a whole book format.
Rating: 5 / 5
#4 by Noah M. Osnos on May 11, 2010 - 6:57 am
Very little information of any real help here. No reviews of current equipment, or help in wiring. Very basic descriptions of home automation. Only for the truly dumb.
Rating: 2 / 5
#5 by Alan Scott on May 11, 2010 - 7:35 am
This is the first ‘dummies’ book I’ve ever read. You can read the book from “start to finish” (as I did) or jump around the chapters that may interest you. While it did provide some interesting information which certainly helped me, it also provided page after page of pointless repetition. I’m wondering who the publishers think their market might be, it’s not so much for ‘dummies’ but more for the ‘utterly stupid’ who probably wouldn’t be reading the book in the first place.
My advice is just Google something like “Cabling for Smart Homes” or “Wiring for Smart homes” and you’ll get all the info you need without having to suffer wading through a lot of the tripe found in this publication.
Rating: 1 / 5