I have a JVC 809 A/V receiver that has a soft power button ... when the power is "off" the receiver is in standby mode. The same is true for all of my A/V equipment, now that I think about it.

If I connected a 2-way X-10 controller to this receiver, would it:

a) be able to detect the difference between the two modes

b) be able to switch from standby to on and back to standby

Thanks for the help. I haven't bought any X-10 stuff yet, but I'm gonna, especially if I can trigger this A/V equipment.

There are some expensive systems that can monitor which state your equipment is in, but I don't believe you'll find any generic X-10 stuff to do this. Another problem is that a lot of equipment will, after a power loss, stay in standby when power resumes - making X-10 control of them useless.

Hrm...so do most people who have X-10 either not control their A/V equipment or have A/V equipment that can be set to be always on and hence controllable by cutting the power to them?

Pete. There are ways of monitoring the state of A/V equipment. As Daniel mentioned, these types of products can be expensive and are normally a peripheral of a home automation controller and part of a home automation system. Probes are connected to the product than sense the current status of A/V equipment. But, there are less expensive ways to do this. One is an AC current sensor. It detects current flow in the TV's power cord. When the TV is drawing current the sensor will activate an X-10 Powerflash module that will send an X-10 ON signal. When the current draw stops, an X-10 OFF signal is sent. So the state of the TV can be determined by checking the status of the X-10 unit code as being on or off.

Robert
RCI Automation
[Link: ourworld.compuserve.com]