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Specifically designed, UL® tested, and UL® certified to be installed into a wall (unlike other systems)
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Built to last, with no moving parts
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Wired direct with romex and designed to comply with strict electrical and building codes (unlike other systems)
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Intel® Pentium processor
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CAT5E or WiFi b/g
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Microphone and speakers
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The N8
The new 8" panel is a fully functional inwall touchscreen PC with all necessary input/output ports to control any subsystem or automation hardware in your home or office. Our goal with the new design is to satisfy a large demand for a smaller inwall touchpanel as well as to create the most robust, powerful, and visually appealing touchscreen on the planet. We designed the N8 without a fan because we wanted to eliminate noise and also to eliminate possible points of failure which is also why we will offer the high performance industrial Compact Flash (iCF) hard drive as an alternative to a standard notebook hard drive. The N8 comes standard with a fanless 1.0 GHz Intel Celeron M processor and Intel 852GM+iCH4 graphics chipset. The N8 is available with Windows XP Professional and XP Embedded. The N8 is also available without an operating system for special applications.
Product Description (.pdf) Product Manual (.pdf)
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Why use the Nobu touchpanel ??
All other panels have one or more of the following characteristics:
* Other panels are DC powered.
This means that you most likely need to purchase the power supply separately (an extra $75-$100+). Retrofit becomes difficult because low voltage prewire is required. Even if the unit comes with a power supply you will most likely need to provide a separate, higher wattage power supply to compensate for power loss due to distance & resistance issues inherent in low voltage wiring scenarios (especially if you plan to attached additional powered devices to the panel; USB, serial, etc). Some manufacturers actually attach their ac/dc power supply to the back of the unit and cram it into the wall cavity. That's like parading an entire marching band around the home begging forbuilding code compliance trouble, product failure, fire, and lawsuit.
Why Nobu is better: It is directly wired with 110-240VAC. The power terminal is protected/enclosed with a proper & legal NM-B romex connector for NEC and NFPA code compliance. This not only makes installation safe and legal but it also makes retrofit projects simple. (The optional Wi-Fi adapter helps ease installation for retrofit projects as well).
* Other Panels may be FCC or UL certified but may not be specifically certified or tested to be installed into a residential wall environment.
Other panel providers like to claim that they are FCC/UL certified. They may be certified, but only for use on an engineer's benchtop. Some panels are approved for Industrial use only and not FCC Class B approved for use in a residential environment and thus, not electromagnetically compliant for use in a home/residence. This excerpt was taken directly from the user's manual of a competing panel: FCC NOTICE: This equipment has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class A digital device, pursuant to part 15 of the FCC Rules. These limits are designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful interference when the equipment is operated in a commercial environment. This equipment generates, uses, and can radiate radio frequency energy and, if not installed and used in accordance with the instruction manual, may cause harmful interference to radio communications. Operation of this equipment in a residential area is likely to cause harmful interference in which case the user will be required to correct the interference at his own expense. You are cautioned that any change or modifications to the equipment not expressly approve by the party responsible for compliance could void your authority to operate such equipment.
Why Nobu is better:Our N8 inwall touchpanel wasn't just tested on a workbench in an air conditioned lab, it was specifically UL and FCC-B (EMC) tested and approved to be installed safely and legally into a residential wall environment.
* Other Panels have moving parts (i.e. fan(s) or hard drive ).
Most touchpanels have a hard drive. Hard drives make a noticeable amount of noise and generate additional heat which creates another potential point of failure. Under normally cool and pleasant operating conditions, hard drives have a reliable lifespan of 3-5 years. When you put a hard drive inside of a warm, fanless PC the degradation of the magnetic platter speeds up exponentially. Fans are decidedly too noisy and present yet another possible point of failure. As fans operate and age they build up a coat of dust. Once the dust builds up the blades become unbalanced causing uneven wear, vibration, and annoying noise. Anyone with a computer at home or work should be familiar with this common problem. Some manufacturers claim that their touchpanels are "fanless" when in fact the processor may not have a fan but the case has 1 or more fans.
Why Nobu is better: The N8 comes standard with a high speed, industrial wide temperature, solid-state flash memory hard drive with advanced ECC and 'wear-level algorithm' read/write abilities. The ECC unit implements a Reed-Solomon algorithm that can correct two bits per 512 bytes in an ECC block. Code-byte generation during write operations, as well as error detection during read operation, is implemented on the fly without any speed penalties. The solid state drive uses a wear-leveling algorithm to ensure that consecutive writes of a specific sector are not written physically to the
same page in the flash. This spreads flash media usage evenly across all pages, thereby maximizing flash lifetime. This unit has NO fans or any other moving parts.
* Other panels have a weak operating temperature threshold.
Other panels have a maximum rated operating temperature of around 45C-50C(113F - 122F) which is about as warm as a cup of soup. Temperatures are positively going to reach higher than that inside of a wall cavity especially in hotter climates like AZ or SoCal.
Why Nobu is better: The operating temperature threshold of the N8WTS is 70C(158F) and comes with Watchdog and thermal monitoring features. The industrial-grade construction of the motherboard allows the system to endure the continuous operation in hostile environments where stability and reliability are basic requirements. System dependability of this unit is enhanced by its built-in watchdog timer, a special industrial feature not commonly seen on other motherboards. The watchdog timer makes the system auto-reset if it stops to work for a period of time.
* Other manufacturers cut corners on internal components.
Other manufacturers have a tendency to draw your attention to the $$ and not so much to the quality of their components. Most use the cheapest (usually lowest quality) components that they can dig up on the Internet. They like to use the cheapest and smallest amount of memory that they can get away with.
Why Nobu is better: The hard drive is a high speed, high temperature, solid state flash memory device with advanced 'wear-level algorithm' read/write abilities. It comes standard with an Intel processor and one gigabyte (1024MB) of DDR266 Kingston (lifetime warranty) memory. The N8 can also come with an optional Intel wireless 802.11b/g ethernet adapter which makes retrofit installations a snap.
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