Request For Assistance: Remote Power Switching

perhaps try one of those POE "power over ethernet" little boxes that give out a 5V current, and then trigger a darlington series to trigger a relay to light up your lights! perhaps.. those little switches go for less tha 10 euros

If you want a fully DIY implementation then just use a "Rabbit". It's a very small and inexpensive development board, it's well documented, and has a built-in wired ethernet port. Just use the DIO to control a 5V or 12V coil AC relay through a transistor. The AC wiring is the easy part. There should already be examples of how to integrate a "micro" web server that runs out of onboard FLASH memory. Like I said, it's well documented, and popular with the budget minded DIY crowd. Just one word of caution...use a dual-pole AC relay and switch both the white neutral and black live wires at the same time (the green earth ground should ALWAYS be connected to the outlets). Your specific application will define the current rating of the relay and the necessary wire gauge (I suspect 12-14AWG). For the AC input just chop the end off of a standard 3-prong power cord. And remember to double check ALL of your wiring before plugging into the wall! AC will kill you long before the main circuit breaker trips so respect it!

As for X10 I can tell you my experience with it. Mostly it works, but its slow. Sometimes it doesn't work. There's a plethora of interface options - several manufacturers make nice in-wall light switches for example. This is nice to give a normal tactile interface as well as remote control via remote (use the RF remote) or computer/web. If you want web control you need the CM11A interface, I think it's called, or the firecracker. Eons ago X10 was having firesales on firecrackers + peripherals so I picked up a bunch of this stuff. To date, I haven't found a decent interface program on the computer - the best was MrHouse or something, a kinda of clunky, yet functional, perl cgi implementation (you supply the host).

Interesting. Yeah back in the day I remember we used to install the ones you mention that are designed for servers. I am surprised they haven't come down in price - they weren't all that expensive - maybe somewhere around $500 or so? But yeah, for an electric blanket that's probably overkill. Are you building a central media closet - or have another application in mind?

m2m-world.blogspot.com/2007/03/remote-control-for-untility-companies.html The company creates and black box that plugs into your asset. The black box has a built in pager that responds to pages that it receives. Based on the page that it received it performs an action - turn of the power supply, turn on the power supply, turn the motor on etc. I am sure they must have built in some sort of security mechanism - could not find any information on that on the website.