The Ava Remote smart home controller | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge
Last week, I visited the world of the professionally installed smart home. This is the promised land. Everything just works, your voice assistant doesn’t try to sell you toilet paper, and you can control your whole home with just one app. Of course, you pay a hefty price and have to give up lots of control for the privilege.
I was at CEDIA Expo 2022, the annual trade show of the Custom Electronics Design and Installation Association (think CES, but less weird stuff and more stuff you — or someone with more money than you — can actually buy).
Here, I got to hold the almost perfect smart home controller: a sleek touchscreen, wrapped in a smooth…