Add some Spring Light to your home

Control 4 has launched their biggest user update in years, with the new Smart Home Operating System 3rd generation (OS3) user interface.

What does it mean for the Control4 user?

This is not just an upgrade, it is an entirely new operating system. What does this mean for the client? Less digging through numerous screens and menus, easier navigation and at last customisation, so clients can get to their desired items more smoothly.

The user interface is now more intuitive, offering greater fluidity in transitioning through the control pages, so that the system is responsive and interacts more effectively.

Each user interface has been optimised, depending on the control device – what does this mean? The screen, will be automatically adjust to optimise functionality and appearance whether you are using a small smart phone screen or a larger TV screen to navigate your control system.

What are some of the new OS3 features?

– Customisation

Favourites
Most clients that have a smart control solution have more than 40 connected devices, so the advantage of a favourites menu, is that it enables users to prioritise devices to allow easier navigation, accessing key aspects of their system quickly.

“The Control4 Smart Home OS is designed to remove complexity. Every home is a mix of products from a variety of companies, a Smart Home OS embraces this reality, providing broad choice rather than creating a collection of tiny walled gardens that limit homeowners.”

Charlie Kindel, Control4 Senior Vice President of Products and Services

OS 3 allows clients to select favourite operations to see on the main home screens of each room. The familiar home page icons are still present e.g. ‘Watch & Listen’ but these can now be deleted and replaced with a custom button in each room e.g. Music or Spotify or Radio – making it clearer and quicker for the client to get the desired result. For example, in a kitchen, you might want easy access to get the right lighting or music in place for dinner; while in the living room your main concern maybe getting a one touch button to jump straight into your favourite streaming service e.g. Amazon Prime or Sky

Room-based home screens still play a major part in the Control4 setup, but you can now also prioritise what rooms are most important to you, and swipe through them in the order that you want. Rooms will also remember what you’ve done previously, making it easier to initiate the things you use most often such as light scenes, music artist, albums
or playlists and so on.

One of the great new additions is that clients can now set up their own favourites!

Clients can create a whole-home dashboard for at-a-glance views of the most vital devices from any room. For example, in the master bedroom, you can ‘favourite’ the front door lock, garage doors, lighting and security cameras to ensure the home is secure before going to bed.

– New Screen features

The media screen, where you can see what’s playing in each room – whether that be music, movies or both – has also been overhauled, with a new media bar with artwork, volume slider and an indicator for music quality. They have introduced 1000s of new features including a Global Room Driver for lights and music – so that you can control multiple rooms – great if you are entertaining in several rooms of your home! You can even set a threshold, so for example if you turn the music up in all rooms, it will only increase to a maximum threshold, set by you, so no blowing the speakers or ear drums!

There are also enhancements for climate control screens, security, shade control, native support for streaming high-resolution audio, and a whole lot more.

– Wallpaper

On each screen, you can now add or create a unique background which can be viewed on the smart phone, tablet or even your TV screen. This is a handy way to quickly identify which room you are operating and its a great tool to help memorise key screens for each member of the family.

Professional Integration with personalisation for home-owners

Achieving the sophistication clients want to manage their home, requires the knowledge and experience of a professional installer; however, only a family knows the nuances of their day-to-day lifestyle. The new Control4 Smart Home OS facilitates professional installation to make sure everything works together, while empowering families to make their smart home experience uniquely their own.

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