Category: Smart Home

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Home Smart Home

Keep plants from being thirsty, full with Blossom Wi-Fi smart watering system

Up to 50% of the water used to hydrate lawns and garden is wasted. As the water situation is getting worse, especially in California, homeowners need to ensure that they’re being responsible in the way they water their lawns.

Blossom is a smart watering device that saves water. This sensor connects to an app that lets the user view each zone of their garden and schedule when to water them. The app will show what is being watered and how much time it has left. In addition, it connects with local weather data to adjust watering based on temperature and rainfall. Blossom also boasts a far-reaching connection between sensors and app using both Powerline and Wi-Fi to do so. Watering can be controlled not just from a smartphone, but also from a tablet or laptop as well.

Smart watering systems are the way to go, saving plants from dying and money on water bills. In addition, they’re environmentally friendly, conserving water so that everyone wins. Unlike the similar Sprinkl, however, Blossom lacks the integration of water conservation policies in any town, a useful feature to add, but does feature app integration making it ultimately more convenient. One Blossom will cost backers $119 for estimated delivery in February 2015. Blossom is hoping to raise $30,000 on Kickstarter.

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Home Smart Home

Sprinkl smart watering system keeps plants hydrated, saves money and water

Over-watering, under-watering and weather conditions can mean certain death for gardens, plants or crops anywhere. Most have sprinklers set to automatically water their lawns every night, whether it’s raining or not. These systems fail to take rain or lack thereof into account when hydrating plants.

Sprinkl is a smart watering system that does more than just spew water everywhere. First of all, it monitors the soil, checking hydration levels at all times. After that, it syncs up to weather forecasts. Simply input location and it’ll see what’s coming in the way of moisture. In addition, it takes into account local water conservation laws. Sometimes, a town or city will put a ban on lawn watering to make sure there’s enough water for everyone. Sprinkl makes sure that laws are followed, keeps the lawn hydrated, but won’t over-water in times of heavy rainfall.

Using Wi-Fi the sensor in the ground keeps the touchpad inside up to date on everything that’s going on. The screen displays date, time, temperature, soil level, past rainfall, next rainfall, watering schedule and zones. If different areas need different levels of moisture, the touchscreen makes that possible.

As far as smart sprinklers go, Sprinkl is a great one. With its myriad of options and ease of use, it’s completely versatile for any garden. For $299 backers can get one with one sensor by May 2015. Higher reward tiers offer more sensors for larger lawns and gardens. Sprinkl is hoping to raise $150,000 on Kickstarter.

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Smart Home

3P Plug activates your turn-ons, turn-offs with your voice

Home automation is all the rage, but not enough systems make it simple enough to incorporate these smart features into all of your lights and appliances, instead only working with a select few. What’s the point of smart home if only half of it is intelligent?

The 3P is a Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0 enabled Smart Plug looking to outfit everything in your home not covered by other systems with smarts. It serves as the connection between the outlet and the light or appliance itself, and allows users total control over its operation with voice or remote smartphone command. The included temperature and humidity sensors also keep tabs on temperature to empower users to save energy using the companion iOS/Android app’s scheduling features. A donation of $35 gets backers a Smart Plug and the Smart Beacon with embedded sensors. A successful $20,000 campaign will see the product delivered by March 2015.

Although the 3P Smart Plug boasts voice control, it doesn’t have a wide array of commands available to it. As such, these limitations seem glaring when compared to other solutions like the SAM or AngelBlocks, which have proven to be more fully featured and provide more utility. The 3P shouldn’t be overlooked, though. It’s fairly difficult to make everything smarter, and the 3P handles the outliers well. 

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Smart Home

Droplit drops a remote control for your entire home

The rash of smart home automation solutions all think having a proprietary app is a fantastic idea, because why wouldn’t you want to have quick and easy access to total control of different parts of your home? As well-intentioned a thought that is, it quickly becomes apparent that having 12 different apps for disparate parts of your home actually isn’t that useful after all and makes decidedly analog action of flicking on your light switch that much more attractive again.

Droplit is a smart home solution that allows you to control all of the different connected objects in your home through a single remote control or iOS, Android, or Windows phone app. The app will allow for quick and easy access to all of your homes connected objects using Wi-Fi, Bluetooth LE, or an optional z-wave attachment. Both the remote and the app have the capability to set timers and capture “scenes,” or pre-set lighting and device states, that can be recalled with a single button press, making that one perfect set-up for your home entertainment system easily accessible anytime. The Droplit system is available with a backing of $129 and can be expected in June of 2015. The campaign is looking for $50,000 to hone their Bluetooth implementation and put the product into production.

Droplit expands on what Apple is doing by employing their own cloud service as an intermediary so that devices can be controlled from anywhere in the world almost instantaneously. Bluetooth devices within the home will also benefit, too, being that Droplit doubles as an access point which extends their range of communication. The company confusingly recommends multiple remotes to get the most out of their system, but that kind of seems counterintuitive to what they’re trying to do. In any case, cloud implementation is a clever move and could be what separates them from the pack.

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Sensors/IoT Smart Home

Aria detects radon and IAQ, reports it to your smartphone

Pollution is a big problem, but it’s not one that’s limited only to big cities or industrialized areas. The truth is that indoor air quality, or lack thereof, is the cause of thousands of deaths each year, whether it’s carbon monoxide or the harder to detect and deadlier radon.

Aria is a home air quality monitor that can detect radon and other pollutants and report on air quality in real time, giving homeowners plenty of time to react and protect themselves from harmful gases. Aside from the colorful light indicating air quality on the device’s exterior, Aria can also push notifications using a Wi-Fi network to owners’ phones, alerting them of an issue with the air at home even from a distance.

While Aria’s light functions with some basic indicators (green means good, red means bad), more detailed information is uploaded at all times to the app, letting users know when to ventilate or call for outside help if necessary. Aria breaks this information down hour by hour, giving a detailed report of when pollutants are entering the home. Aria developer RSens is asking for $95,000 to offset manufacturing costs. The device itself costs $99 for early supporters and is expected to launch September 2015.

It’s hard to be overly cautious when dealing with something that could be potentially life-threatening and hazardous to an entire family. That being said, asking a device to provide hourly breakdowns of air quality on demand seems a little hypochondriac. It’s nice that the device offers this level of performance, but many users might not need to be so plugged in to what the air is like at home at all times. Either way, there’s some peace of mind to be gained in knowing Aria is looking out.

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Smart Home

Point offers simple home security without putting sensors everywhere

The conception of home security in the connected age is one full of cameras and the complex systems that go along with them. Cloud storage and daily app interaction combine to make the use of these systems more tedious than it should be. The team over at Form Devices, Inc. believes that implementing security measures in your home should ease worries, not give you more to worry about. Their inaugural product, Point, is a representation of that thinking.

Point is a subtle, circular device that attaches to a wall in your home with design cues let it blend easily into most any aesthetic. Once installed, the device multi-tasks by listening for unusual sounds in your home and analyzing the air for disturbances. With the onboard Wi-Fi chip, Point can communicate a variety of information to your smart device, such as when a window breaks, guests arrive, when humidity levels are abnormal, or when there’s smoke present. In addition, Point uses a combination of lights and speakers to facilitate notifications to you or guests so that you can gently remind guests to keep it down when they party too hard. A Point can be had for $79 with an expected date of delivery in July 2015. Form Devices, Inc. is looking for $50,000 to complete manufacturing.

Unfortunately, Point’s most glaring lack is the inability to to detect carbon monoxide, something that should be standard at this point and is a severe oversight. In addition, it comes with a speaker but users can’t communicate through it which would be a nice touch. All in all, the Canary offers a much more robust feature set that includes the ability to sound a 90dB alarm to ward off intruders and respond to emergencies with a one-touch call to the appropriate authorities. Although Point emphasizes the removal of the camera in an effort to reclaim the feeling of one’s home, the capability for HD video most of the time is welcome. In any case, Point is a low-cost way to introduce some connected aspects to one’s home without going overboard.

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Smart Home

SandboxHome packs in multiple components for a smart security system

Finding a home security system that’s both effective and affordable tends to be a somewhat impossible task. Starter kits are always available, but lack necessary features or only offer enough equipment to target a specific area of the home.

SandboxHome is designed to take all of the advancements in smart home security, bundle them together, and provide enough equipment to cover all the important parts of the home with adequate security. The SandboxHome kit starts with five intrusion tags that can be placed on any door or window to send an alert when these apertures are opened or entered without permission. Next, two HD video cameras are included to allow photo and video recording of any intruders or live feeds of the home’s activity.

Add to this a smart doorbell that has a built in intercom and HD camera so any visitor can be greeted or screened appropriately. For those that prefer a more traditional security system, an optional service of 24/7 live monitoring by security operators can be added in to make sure someone is responding to any break-ins as quickly as possible. SandboxHome has set its goal at $50,000 to assemble the prototypes and build relationships with manufacturers and assemblers. Everything in the SandboxHome system can be purchased for $400, with delivery in March 2015.

Single devices have popped up recently to offer the smart doorbell/doorman system, or the live feeds from security cameras placed in the home, but SandboxHome is offering all of that functionality at a price that’s actually pretty reasonable. The app looks fully featured and easy to use, and for homeowners or renters looking to just make one purchase to encapsulate their entire security needs, this may be the product for them.

 

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Smart Home

Showering with Eva helps you save water

The topic of water in today’s world is an incredibly important one, yet doesn’t receive the kind of attention it deserves. Many parts of the world are experiencing the most debilitating water crises in recent history, slowly increasing the demand for water as time goes on. Perhaps most people don’t talk about it because they don’t feel like much can be done. For this reason, the creators giving you the chance to play your part with the Eva Smart Shower.

Eva connects to most standard shower heads and facilitates your showering experience, cutting down on water waste. An onboard temperature sensor cuts water flow when it’s reached your desired temperature, starting up again when you enter, and a motion sensor throttles water according to your distance from the shower head itself. A companion app interacts with the Eva, allowing you to set your desired temperature, manage shower length goals, and tracks overall water usage so that you can adjust your habits.

Becoming just a bit more eco-friendly requires information to make decisions and Eva provides. It’s a promising use of technology that should become widespread, even if its own manufacturing might negatively affect its positive effects. Eva is $149 and the Indiegogo campaign has a $50,000 goal.

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Smart Home

Lock-Bot stores, releases keys for renters, AirBnB guests

Sites like HomeAway and AirBnB have facilitated the growing popularity of property rental, making it easier for owners to put their spaces up for rent and for travelers to have lots of choice pretty much anywhere they go. As progressive as these sites and the values they promote are, some aspects of the process aren’t and owners are always on the lookout for solutions to the many unique problems this new economy creates.

When you’re not in, the biggest hassle is safely getting keys to renters when you’re already gone. Think of the Lock-Bot as your own personal desk attendant for your property so you won’t have to worry again. The Wi-Fi connected lock box provides a secure place to for an owner to leave RFID-attached keys for incoming renters with mobile web access, and sends text messages alerts to both parties with check-in and check-out information. You can feel confident knowing that different codes can be set for different users so that no two codes will be alike. The company advises to mount the Lock-Bot onto a wall and its hardened aluminum construction will make sure it stays there all without you having to pay subscription fees. The device is powered by either AC or battery power, so that means users are out of luck if there’s a Wi-Fi or power outage.

The company does mention that they’re working on a four character manual switch, though, but it seems like that should’ve been baked into the original plans. The Lock-Bot comes in at $79 with an estimated delivery date of May 2015. The campaign is aiming for a goal of $100,000.

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Home Smart Home

Kuna embeds a smart camera in a porch light to scare off intruders

Home security is a big concern for people worldwide. The old security systems of the 80’s and 90’s rely on off-site, outsourced professionals to contact the authorities and hope for a response in time. This technology needs an upgrade.

Kuna is a combination outdoor light and smart camera that allows owners to get notifications when someone approaches their door and, using the Kuna app, see them, talk with them, or sound an alarm. Disguised as a stylish exterior home light in one of three available styles, Kuna has all the function and convenience of an app-controlled outdoor light.

The fact that Kuna also includes a fully functional security camera with all the bells and whistles is a welcome addition. Operating on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0, Kuna is easy to install and easy to use. Kuna is raising $50,000 to complete testing and ship out units. A donation of $149 is all it takes to provide peace of mind with a Kuna.

This isn’t the first smart camera and intercom system that’s been released on the market, but it may be the most multi-functional and most discreet; great for making a home look welcoming poorer for deterring unwanted guests outright.