Denver – Crestron put much of its promotional effort at the CEDIA Expo on its Pyng app, which simplifies home-automation setup, but the company also came to the CEDIA Expo with other new products in home automation, multiroom audio, lighting, and shades.
The company updated its AirPlay streamer to add native music-streaming services, with Sirius XM to start; launched a second multiroom-audio amp/matrix switcher in its mid-price series; and unveiled new handheld and tabletop home-automation remotes.
The company also introduced its Bluetooth-equipped PinPoint proximity sensor, said to be a first in the home-automation industry. Each Pinpoint sensor is about the size of a matchbox and plugs into an electrical outlet. They use Bluetooth to detect when a user walks into a room with a Bluetooth-equipped mobile device.
For people using Crestron’s iOS home-automation app, the app will then automatically display the home-automation controls for the room that the user just entered. Users won’t have to navigate through the app’s room menus to control systems in that room.
The app also lets a music source follow a user from room to room. Users who turn on a music-streaming source in one room, for example, can walk to another room, and the source will automatically begin to play in that room.
The range of each sensor can be adjusted up to 70 meters. Pricing was unavailable.
Also in home automation, the company unveiled new RF remotes, including the $3,200-suggested tabletop wireless TST-602 with 6-inch touchscreen and the $1,500 TSR-302 handheld remote with 2.8-inch touchscreen and keypad. Both feature rechargeable batteries, and the 302 uses inductive charging.
Compared to their predecessors, they add faster Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n in place of a/b/g for streaming video and security-camera video. Both also add speech recognition compared to their predecessors. The 602 also adds web browser compared to its predecessor.
Both remotes use Crestron’s extended-range RF gateway for remote home-automation control.
The company also extended its remote line down with two remotes targeted for use in secondary rooms, such as kids’ rooms. The HR-150 and HR-100 are 50- and 34-button remotes, respectively. They lack displays and are priced at $350 and $300, respectively. They operate on four AAA batteries.
In lighting control, Creston unveiled a universal dimmer for its panelized lighting system, enabling all types of lighting loads in a house to dim at the same rate whether they are LED, compact fluorescent, or incandescent.
In shade controls, the company expanded its selection of brushless DC motors with a smaller diameter motor that fits in 3-by-3-inch spaces and another that fits in pockets in a window jamb.
Crestron also expanded its selection of shade colors and fabrics by more than 100 to appeal to the design community, and it teamed with Hartmann & Forbes to offer hand-woven shades. Hartmann & Forbes is known within the design community as a luxury maker of hand-woven natural window coverings, wall coverings and textiles from sustainable fibers.
Also in shade solutions, Crestron launched a new power supply that diagnoses wiring errors. Installers can, for example, find out if two communications wires are shorted together and where.
In audio, the company is offering a firmware upgrade to add native SiriusXM internet streaming to its AirPlay-equipped CEN-NSP-1 network streamer, which connects to Crestron multiroom-audio systems to distribute music from iOS devices throughout the house. Native support for other streaming services is in the works.
With native streaming support on the CEN-NSP-1, a user’s iPhone won’t mute streaming-service music when a call comes in as would happen if the user streamed a music service from the phone itself, the company said.
The streamer also connects via USB to iPods, turning them into music servers. Multiple streamers can be added to a multiroom-audio system.
Also in audio, Crestron revealed the $2,500-suggested C2N-AMP-6X100 multichannel amplifier/matrix switcher, which features six powered stereo zones at 2×50 watts per zone and two unpowered stereo zones. Up to four of the components can be connected to create a powered 24-zone system.
In the midline amp/switcher series, the C2n-AMP-6X100 joins the $1,300 C2N-AMP-4X100, which features four 100-watt powered stereo zones and no unpowered zones.
Crestron also offers the high-end Sonnex audio-distribution system.
