08.29.2007 — Providers of multiroom audio systems have some of the best-looking, user-friendly, affordable keypads in the industry. The problem is that they’re good for just one thing: controlling music. What a waste of perfectly good real estate.

Why not use them to control other systems in the house like lights, thermostats and a complete home automation system?

Now you can, with a new software-based solution from NuVo, maker of affordable whole-house music systems. In theory, NuVo Control Pads will be able to operate virtually any third-party control system that connects to the company’s Grand Concerto multiroom audio system.

All menus and all navigation programmed into the third-party controller can be accessed through the keypads. That means NuVo can even control additional sources and devices that are connected to the main third-party system. “You can control it all,” says project design engineer Pete Maley. “You don’t have to connect [NuVo] to all the sources.”

Maley says the work on the integrator’s side isn’t too cumbersome. “They just write four or five separate commands,” Maley says.” They tell us [the Grand Concerto] what the menu items are and what commands to send them.”

No, it’s not a two-way solution. You can’t get status feedback or metadata. “Currently you can only use NuVoNet sources for two-way,” Maley says, adding, “We’re going to make it possible to let anyone make NuVoNet sources.”

The first takers are HAI, Superna and Exceptional Innovation. I saw a demo at EI just before CEDIA, where you could use a NuVo Control Pad to activate scenes and control devices programmed through EI’s Media Center-based Lifeware automation system.

Elegant as they are, NuVo’s Control Pads suit high-end home automation very well. “Some manufacturers charge $2,000 for a touchscreen,” Maley says. “You don’t want to put that in every room of the house.”

Controlling Lifeware through NuVo’s Grand Concerto