Low-cost effective dimmers...

[Les E]

I have been looking at the Lutron Telume dimmer for light control in my home cinema mainly to control halogen spots and maybe a couple of ceramic uplighters.

I would like to control via my remote but at the same time intergrate it as the the projector/dvd starts the lights go down...and vice versa at the end of the movie.

In this scenario, I am I looking at the right product? I have seen it retailing around £99 and I really don't want to fork out much more than this if it doesn't suit my needs (I know the the Lutron graphik eye would suffice, but it's a bit pricey!)

Any thoughts or experiences anyone?

[johnscarlet]

try a search forTLC dimmers

[hornydragon]

Varilight dimmers from www.tlc-direct.co.uk £25 ish depending on finish jobs a good un.......
http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Main_Ind...s_5/index.html

[ivor2003uk]

plenty of lutron telume dimmers on ebay at the moment, going cheap

the telume can be used with universal remotes , and is a real nice dimmer ,


Different league to the varilight dimmers to be honest

[hornydragon]

IR reception on Telume is useless......and varilight will work with any remote not just learning ones (BOSE and B&O Excluded...)

[digisocialist]

Agree with Hornydragon on this one. Get yourself a cheap Varlight dimmer, programmable to most (if not all) remotes.

To operate several devices from one button of a remote, your essentially looking at a macro driven solution which is where the 'brains' comes in. I'm not sure of all the solutions available in the market place, but by way of example the Marantz Learning Remotes allow macros to be layered behind buttons thus allowing for tighter control of automation e.g. create a button called 'Cinema' and behind it layer macros for DVD power On/Play, Lights Dim, PJ ON etc and all that you want is done for you. The money of course in this example goes on the Remote (not on the dimmer switch, which is relatively cheap).

[MikeRJ]

Some downsides I have found with the TLC dimmers is that they run quite hot, and they lose the remote code in the event of a power glitch/outage and require reprogramming. They can also power up in a "switched on" state after a power glitch which is a bit worrying.