KNX (EIB)

Post by **Snelvuur** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 11:07 pm

Anyone has some knowledge/experience with KNX?

If you where to have a new house would you put cables to almost every room and if so what kind of cables would that be besides the normal UTP?

http://www.auto.tuwien.ac.at/Projects/hba/knxlive.html is for instance a cd with a KNX tunnel interface.

I know there is ALOT of stuff to get for it but this all requires ofcourse cables instead of x10/zwave.

Erik

Post by **steven** » Wed Nov 26, 2008 6:17 pm

Hey Snelvuur,

I'm actually in that position right now, I bought a house and i'm in the middle of renovating it completely, and i must say KNX sounds better then communicating over a power network. However i'm a complete newbie at domotica, so i was wondering if someone on the forums here have a reason not to choose for KNX?

I was actually quite surprised not to find any information on KNX on the forums over here so there must be a reason why nobody here is using it?

-Steven

Post by **Pieterpaul** » Wed Nov 26, 2008 6:56 pm

I think the main reason for not using KNX is because it is hard to build it into existing houses (without creating a whole lot of mess). Both X10 and wireless have their potential reliability issues, although they are not so bad in practice. In case you are building a new house and you have the choice to add additional wiring (at little cost), there seems to be no good reason to use X10 or wireless (except maybe for cost of the devices, but I have no idea about that).

Post by **Bwired** » Wed Nov 26, 2008 10:47 pm

If you are building new cables is no problem if you have the money and know the place to put the outlets.
I would go for wired as well. The main question is: How about open connectivity?
If you want to play with it and connect some additional devices of another brand what are you're options then?
You don't want to call your supplier for every change.

Post by **Pieterpaul** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 3:13 pm

I thought that KNX was an open protocol and I assumed that devices from multiple vendors would interoperate (much like X10 devices). But then again, I have no experience with this equipment.

Post by **steven** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 4:34 pm

Pieterpaul,

Indeed, that's what they state on the website as well: http://www.knx.org/knx-standard/introduction/

"KNX technology the worlds only open STANDARD for all applications in home and building control"

Also it's specification are written down in a handbook: http://www.knx.org/knx-standard/knx-specifications/

-Steven

Post by **Pieterpaul** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 6:03 pm

Open standards are nice, but if vendors interpret them differently, devices may still not interoperate correctly. But again, I have no idea if this is the case for KNX devices.
It would be good if forum members with KNX experience would speak up here (and if we don't have any: it would be good if we got some KNX members [:)])

Post by **Bwired** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 11:55 pm

Agree, until now, I think no KNX members on this forum.

Post by **Henk** » Tue Dec 02, 2008 1:22 am

Indeed you will not find easily EIB/KNX in the DIY domotica - not only it is a wired solution but also it is more complex. Also you will not find it as an offering in the many domotica Internetshops. It is the product for the professional installation branche (Hager,ABB,Siemens) - mostly used in office building automation and in the top end of housing (exclusive bungalows) You will need software like ETS3 to configure the KNX modules. It's design is so different - KNX will work without a central controller .. the control is distributed in each module ... based on the vendor specification. There are IP gateways but mostly those gateways are closed systems.

See www.hager.nl for modules and also pricing.

Henk

Post by **Rene** » Tue Dec 02, 2008 9:25 am

After the domotica beurs I also got interested in KNX. What I understand from the documentation I read sofar, is that it is not only using wires but the bus can also be implemented using RF or powerline.

Rene.

Post by **Henk** » Tue Dec 02, 2008 9:58 pm

Yes, there are RF implementations of KNX .... but I have doubt how compatible it is ... one vendor claim that they are the only one with an implementation based on the KNX standard.

Also this KNX implementation is not in line with Z-wave en Zigbee ... likely the RF standards of the future ....

Henk.

Post by **Lexje** » Sun Sep 27, 2009 10:38 am

I realize this thread is quite dated.
I have passed a KNX training, so if there's still need for information I might be able to fill in...

Just ask

Erwin