Letters to the Editor

Submit your letters by Email to news@hometoys.com. Please include "Letter to the Editor" as the subject and make sure you give us your name and home town. If you don't want your Email address included with the letter then indicate that in the message.

Terry Printy <TERRYP@NGC.COM>

This newletter is GREAT! I've surf the WEB and hit a number of sites that deal with Whole House Automation and this Web Site is genuinely the best I've seen. Thanks for all the great info, I'm finally starting to see clearly how I can implement CATV and A/V distribution from my home theater, as well as security and automatic lights. Excellent work and keep it coming.

Barrie Candeas <barrie.candeas@gsc.gte.com>

Great timing. I have been into the X-10 world to control lighting and other low level activities for some years now. I've just purchased a home theater system and am now looking at DSS. I would love to build a distribution system for audio/video throughout my home and gardens. In the past when I attempted to use splitters to push my cable system throughout my house I quickly came up against the signal loss problem.My cable company was no help. They just told me to get rid of the splitters.Could you spend some time explaining tilt and amplication to overcome loss problems. Many of my friends are having the same distribution problems and info in this area would be greatly appreciated.

Well Gary, I sent your question off to Doug Moses and he was gracious enough to submit an article on this subject for all to read. Have a look at CATV/Video, (Signal Balancing) in this issue. Hope this helps and special thanks to Doug.

Phil Devinsky <pdevinsky@monmouth.com>

I have been searching for Home Automation info and surfed right into this site. This newsletter was written for me, I am a systems analyst and was interested in these new computer programs for use with X-10 technology. I've been using X-10 technology for over 8 years but just recently was interested in the computer interface. I received some negative info on the CP290 with Win95/NT use and was searching for more info or alternatives to the "ActiveHome" software provided by X-10 Powerhouse.

Anyway thought it was worth a few lines to hope you continue this endeavor and perhaps if I find something worth to contribute I will. Until then I will continue my quest for that holy X-10 grail.

David Saxe <saxe@eecis.udel.edu>

You guys are doing a great job. I'm new to the field and have learned much valuable information from reading your newsletter. Keep up the good work!!!

Steve Matthey <smatthey@aristotle.net>

Great concept. Looking forward to the next issue.