Keeping Track From Afar

WHEN you’re not at your second home, there are basically three things you want to be able to do from the comfort of your primary residence: maintain security, monitor crucial systems like heating and air-conditioning and turn on and off various lights and locks.

“Anything you can do within the home you can do remotely these days,” said Pat Hurley, director of research at TeleChoice, a consulting firm, and co-author of “Smart Homes for Dummies.” “If you just want to know if everything’s O.K., if the basement’s not flooded or if someone’s at the door, you can do it.”

And doing that is easier than it has ever been. Gone are the days of calling in to your home-monitoring system and punching the phone keypad. Today’s remote-access systems are linked to broadband Internet service and can be accessed through your computer, mobile phone or P.D.A.

The way it works is that you buy a central control box that connects directly to the Internet, bypassing your computer (although you can use your computer to log into the system). The box communicates with any sensors you install via a wireless signal and, voilà, you’re automated. Want to monitor the temperature? No problem, buy a heat sensor add-on, set your system to notify you when the house drops below 55 degrees and wait for it to send you an e-mail, text or phone message.

Two well-regarded companies in the home-automation field are iControl and Control4. IControl uses a self-installed control box as the brain of its system. Add-ons allow for a range of home-automation uses, including light, temperature and motion sensors, as well as video-surveillance options.

“If you have a vacation home in Lake Tahoe and if a door or window opens in the house, you can get an e-mail with a picture attached or a text message sent to you immediately, before your home security company even calls you,” said Paul Dawes, chief executive of iControl. “So if it’s the property manager, you can see, or if it’s someone you don’t know, you can tell.”

IControl sells its products as part of systems offered by home security companies or directly at www.icontrol.com. To go it alone, all a homeowner has to do is buy one of two starter kits (both of which come with the control box and different add-ons) and sign up for a subscription to the iControl service, which is about a month. Depending on the kit, you can be up and running for a few hundred dollars.

Control4 is a higher-end option (start-up costs are around ,500) and must be installed by specialists. Available through authorized dealers (check the Control4 Web site, www.control4.com, for those in your area), the package is most often sold as a home-theater automation system. But once it’s set up, it can run just about anything in the house.

“I could log on and turn the temperature up, or get an e-mail if there’s water in the basement or if the cleaning service went into a room they’re not supposed to,” said Will West, chief executive of Control4. “I get e-mails when my kids use the home theater or when my 17-year-old son gets home at night.”

If you don’t want to invest in a whole system, or just want the surveillance option, you can buy what’s called a network camera. “They connect right to Internet not to the computer,” said Brian Cooley, an editor at large for CNet.com, a Web site that reviews tech products. “It is self-contained and connects through broadband. Webcams do the same things, but they have to be parasitic on a PC.” You can leave these cameras running at all times, without having to leave your computer on.

Of course, this puts the responsibility in your own hands, and that is one of the key factors to consider when choosing among all the remote home-automation options. “D.I.Y. stuff has been around for a while and is getting better,” Mr. Hurley said. “But it comes down to how much time you want to spend learning to do it and monitoring it.”