Smart Home

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas! It might not have snowed yet but the days are shorter and we’re all going home in the dark. We’ve made a handy Christmas present guide for those that are cost conscious when it comes to the electric bill and keen to do your bit to live a bit greener. Our gifts are the useful presents you never thought of buying for yourself, but you’d wish you’d kept instead of giving them away.

1. Minim+ Electricity Monitor– £37.95

For those that are still yet to receive their smart meters, this clever device gives a simplistic view into your home’s energy habits. You can view your live energy usage view a speedometer-like display to help you keep track of costs. This self-install device uses a CT clip or LED reader to transmit the data wirelessly to your device.

2. Nest 3^rd Generation Learning Thermostat – £220.00

This sleek thermostat will help slash your heating bills and boost your smart home credentials. Perfect for any parent who constantly adjusts the heating. A cunning bit of kit that learns your households’ routine and adjusts the temperature around it. Furthermore, you can also change the temperature and boost the hot water from your phone, perfect for after the work’s Christmas do. Available in four different colours – Copper, Silver, Black & White. Our team of NEST pro installers can get your device up and running and saving you money!

3. Wifi plugs – £15.00 – £25.00

Smart plugs are a great way to connect your home electronics with your Wifi network, giving you full control to turn the device on and off from your phone. For those of you that already have Alexa, Amazon offers a smart plug that you can turn on and off using voice control.

4. Philips Hue Lighting – Starting at £128.08 – Starter kit

Never come home to a dark house with Philips Hue. Automate your lighting experience and control your lighting from home or away with this amazing device. You can connect up to 50 lights to a Hue bridge and with up to 12 accessories such as switches and dimmers to choose from choosing your configuration can be ever-changing. Also compatible with voice controls systems like Amazon’s Alexa, Google Home and Apple’s Homekit you’ll never need to get out of bed to turn a light off again.

5. Wiser from Drayton – £52.79

Now we may not be plumbers, but we still think that this is a good idea especially for older houses. Instead of controlling your house’s temperature in one zone, this device gives you the capability to control each individual radiator individually. These battery-powered valves can control the time and temperature of each associated radiator via the Wiser Heat app or via your Amazon Echo. The internal batteries have a two year battery life and include open window detection to prevent heat from being wasted.

#1 Sonos was founded in California in 2002 with one aim: to transform your home sound system for the digital age. They’ve waved goodbye to the days when your music or hi-fi system was restricted to one room in the house and tethered there by a mass of complicated cables.

#2 The Sonos wireless sound system works by first connecting one single speaker to your home wifi network, then you can add more Sonos units (up to a maximum of 32, placed around the house) using a dedicated secure wireless mesh network known as Sonosnet.

Sonos wireless speakers and components

#3 Key to the whole system is the the Sonos Controller app (both Android and iOS) which walks you through the set-up. It’s really simple and actually involves not much more than just pressing the speaker’s sync button (to link it to your network and any other Sonos speakers), finding the connected speaker on the app and then entering your wi-fi password. The Controller app then makes actually managing and playing your music really easy.

Sonos Playbar

#4 In the Controller app, you can assign each speaker to a particular room of your house, and add your favourite streaming services such as Spotify, as well as play any tracks, playlists and albums stored on your smartphone. The Controller intelligently recognises which speaker you’re using, and which room you’re using it in. Adding other speakers is via a tap in the app to add, press the sync button on the back of the speaker and  – it’s done. You can also pair single speakers in one room to work as a group in stereo together.

#5 The current Sonos products include the Play:1, Play:3 and Play:5 speakers, the Playbar, Playbase and Sub, the Sonos One smart speaker with Alexa voice control and the new Sonos Beam soundbar, all perfect additions to any smart home.

Contact us to find out more about Sonos and how we can get it working for you and have your music flowing from every room in your house!