Review: Domia Bye Bye Standby Online home automation

Bye Bye Standby Online (BBSB) allows you to control the power of your home appliances, such as lamps, TVs and even ceiling lights, over the internet.

The main component, a compact device called the controller, attaches to your router via an Ethernet cable and communicates wirelessly with Domia's range of adapters.

These items can be bought separately or as a kit, which includes the controller, two plug adapters and a wall switch adapter. You can't communicate with the controller direct; instead you must register the device on Domia's website, then access it from there. A £39.99 per annum subscription fee applies. This means you donít need to mess around with port forwarding, but the ongoing cost will deter some.

Once logged in, you need to tell the system what adapters you have. You can then set up advanced schedules or simply turn them on and off manually.

However, the web interface is far from polished. When first registering the controller, the site refused to log us on: a call to technical support remedied this, but it wasn't the end of the problems.

The printed instructions are very basic, while the help buttons on the site link to blank pages (Domia told us this will be remedied soon). Other small bugs hamper usability, such as incomplete dialogue boxes and the fact that if the controller at your home is offline, the site will allow you to switch appliances on and off without warning that your actions are having no effect.

That said, the service actually works very well and it doesn't take long to dream up new uses for it - security or otherwise. It's even possible to access it via a mobile phone.

BBSB has a lot of potential, but it's a bit rough around the edges and we didn't expect it to be subscription-based.