A touch brews coffee, turns up the heat and fires up the TVs

By Darrell Proctor, Rocky Mountain News
January 8, 2005

LAS VEGAS - The home of the future has plenty of bells and whistles, but it's as simple to operate as pressing a button.

A button that controls the lights, the heat, the air conditioning, television, radio . . . even the coffee pot.

Manufacturers of home electronics have showcased their top products at this week's International Consumer Electronics Show here, and in some cases that's meant showing off electronic homes.

The NextGen, or next generation, home, set up in a parking lot at the Las Vegas Convention Center, has its technology literally built into the walls. Another NextGen home will be displayed next week at the International Builders' Show in Orlando, Fla.

The home's design is a showcase for convenience, efficiency and safety, and also a bit of fun. Wake up in the morning, press a button and the television turns on, the coffeemaker starts brewing, lights come on in designated rooms.

The home theater includes wireless Internet over television, controlled by a laptop that can be used from across the room. You don't need a mouse; surf the Web using a stylus that allows you to write in the name of the site you want to visit.

Mike Rosen, a Philadelphia architect and designer of the NextGen home, developed a product called CoreWall that puts all of a home's central systems - from lighting to plumbing, heating to electrical, and a computer mainframe - inside one wall of the house.

The wall is custom-made and can be taken to a building site, where it's ready to go once installed. It significantly reduces the amount of wiring and pipes needed in a home.

Said Rosen: "Normally you design a home to fit the needs of the homeowner or the client and technology is woven in. What we did with CoreWall was ask the question, What if you designed a house that revolved around technology?"

In effect, it's the same strategy used by the high-end Danish electronics company Bang & Olufsen. B&O, which has a U.S. office near Chicago, used CES to show off its systems and those of Rockleigh, N.J.-based partner Creston Electronics in the new Skylofts at MGM Grand.

It took nine months to transform the top of the MGM into 51 two-story lofts, ranging from 1,400 to 6,000 square feet. Each unit has networked audio and video, lighting, heating and air conditioning. There's also a one-touch system to control the draperies. The network uses more than 2,000 feet of cable behind the walls of each loft, which - at least for now - can only be rented for hotel stays. They're not available to buy.

The units feature plasma TVs in nearly every room, including the bathrooms, where a large set on the wall above the tub is complemented by a smaller set recessed into the mirror above the vanity.

The demand for these technologies for the home is growing. ABI Research, a New York- based technology research firm, projects the market at $4 billion by 2008.

Among the other high-tech home gadgets already available:

• Sharp's CES booth is dominated by its Aquos LCD TV, with a 65-inch screen.

• Samsung has gone even bigger, offering a 102-inch PDP (plasma display panel) television.

• Irvine, Calif.-based Smart-home's Insteon technology allows for one-touch computerized control (just load the software) of a home's lighting, heating and air conditioning and television.

Bloomberg News contributed to this report.