Question when setting up two houses

Community Playground General Discussions
1

I am preparing to set up our 2nd home and am ordering everything I will need. The house has a guest house located about 200’ behind the main house. I am running Cat 6 to the guest house, and will run add a router to provide wireless via our guest account. My question is should I set up two separate z-wave control units, or is it better to try to piggy back with plugs etc to make the jump. We will likely lease the guest house and I prefer not to give them access to the main controls for the main house, so I am thinking two separate systems using the same wireless. Any suggestions would be helpful as I dig my way through this site.

Thanks

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It is highly unlikely that you will be able to propagate the Z-Wave signal over a 200’ distance. I would recommend a second Vera and Z-Wave network at the remote location.

Your desire to have a separate system without access to your primary system would seem to require a separate Vera and Z-Wave network.

Two house, two Veras, two Z-Wave networks, two MiOS/Micasaverde accounts.

3

Thanks, that’s kind of the way I was leaning. Do you think there will be any issues with having them on the same wireless network with IP addresses or such? We are going to use the home wave app as I have a friend who has had good success with hit.

We are just getting started with Z-Wave and are going to start with the thermostats, door locks, motion and a video or two. Makes it easier to keep an eye on things living 700 miles away.

Thanks again

4

Connecting your Vera via WiFi may present WiFi issues. Connecting via cabled ethernet is your best choice. You stated that you were running ethernet cable in your previous post. Use it.

There will be no remote access issues with having two separate Veras connected behind the same firewall/router. Certainly none for Homewave.

There can be possible security issues by having your guests being able to access your Local Area Network(LAN). Vera has no meaningful local access control, and none at all by default. This means that anyone on the LAN can open a browser and have unfettered access to Veras on that LAN. If anyone were on your LAN and stumbled upon your Vera they could turn on/off lights unlock doors… There are a few passionate discussions on this forum about network security and Vera’s lack thereof.

If the LAN security risk is a concern, you can mitigate against it by using a router with more advanced capabilities like IP subnets, VLANs, and other firewalling techniques.(This is a subject that is advanced and unrelated to this forum.) Perhaps an “easier” way to avoid this complexity and expense(good routers cost more) would be to use multiple inexpensive consumer router/firewalls such as described here. There are many ways to accomplish this network segregation. I’d say to do it right by having a professional consultant do it for you. It seems, to me, that the relatively minor expense would not be a big concern for you.