Tag: android

Categories
Smart Home

Angee’s all-seeing eye protects your home from nefarious ne’er-do-wells

Typical home security systems require a lot of input from users every time they leave and enter the home. And while they might alert authorities to sinister plots on your valuable goods, by the time they arrive it’ll have been too late anyway. A smarter type of security system is needed to serve as the best deterrent possible.

Angee has a good shot at making waves in a segment rife with connected security solutions that pretty much all do the same thing. The portable, lightweight device is outfitted with a 360° camera, allowing Angee to track all motion directly around it, record one hour of HD video, and stream video to an iOS or Android tablet from which it can be shared. Angie’s portability makes it so that users can move it to any room but to truly get the most out of her, security tags mounted at entry points throughout the home can expand Angee’s monitoring range. This offers users more peace of mind through more comprehensive security benefits, at-the-door identification, and pinpointed zone detection in the case of a curious toddler, for example.

Continue reading “Angee’s all-seeing eye protects your home from nefarious ne’er-do-wells”
Categories
Technology

Ubik Uno smartphone was made for you and me

These days, using a smartphone may seem easy to many of us, but making them is tough. There are a lot of tradeoffs that companies must make — the better the specs, the pricier the device.

Ubik Mobile hopes to become a more responsive player in the crowded Android market by tapping into the power of the people in a number of ways. First, by bypassing carriers and other retailers, it can cut out middlemen and the piece of the pie they command. Second, by launching the Ubik Uno,  its first phone on Kickstarter, it gets the benefit of getting case before fulfilling preorders. The Ubik includes many leading-edge components, including a  horizontally bezel-free display, an eight-core MediaTek processor and a 20 MP/4K camera with Sony sensor, at the price of a mid-tier device.

But the third way may be the most novel. The company plans to create a community that will vote on features for subsequent Ubik devices. Ubik seeks $200,000 by August 15th and the price of the smartphone, which is due to ship in September, is $345.

Continue reading “Ubik Uno smartphone was made for you and me”
Categories
Podcasts

Backerjack Podcast #21: Dish-sized Desktops and Roving Robots

In Episode 21 of the Backerjack Podcast, the triumphantly returning Steve and Ross check out some of the latest products seeking funds and preorders:

  • Remix Mini, a $30 PC that you can hold in your hands and runs a Windows-flavored version of Android.
  • Buddy, an expressive, face-sensing robot that can interact with multiple family members when you’re home and watch your home when you’re away.

Download the episode or listen below, subscribe via iTunes or RSS, and subscribe to the Backerjack Daily Digest to make sure you catch all the gadgets we’re covering. Also check out Steve’s great work on Apple World Today!

 

 

Categories
Technology

Android does its best Windows impression in the ultra-cheap Remix Mini desktop PC

editors-choiceOnce upon a time in a land before laptops, towering desktop PCs peppered the landscape, their hulking shells loaded with all manner of cards and drives dependent on support from the operating systems of their day.

The Remix Mini PC shows how the desktop has evolved in an era of mobile hardware and software. The elongated dish-like device, which makes the Mac mini look large in comparison, is bereft of buttons. (It turns on by touching its top surface.). Its rear is only slightly less minimalist — two USB ports, an HDMI connector for a monitor, a microSD slot and headphone port. Something of a surprise is a standard Ethernet connector, which may be welcome for corporate use or anyone who wants to escape the occasional unpredictability of Wi-Fi.

Continue reading “Android does its best Windows impression in the ultra-cheap Remix Mini desktop PC”
Categories
Cell Phone Accessories

Rogo dock lets your smartphone run a smart home

Having a personal assistant in the home either means shelling out lots of money for someone to follow you around all day or going all in on some of the more experimental attempts to integrate robotics in the home.  Choosing either option overlooks the most powerful computing device in most people’s lives: the smartphone.

Rogo is a dock that uses the connectivity of a smartphone to power a range of applications aimed at giving users a true personal assistant in the home. All of Rogo’s apps are powered by a cloud platform and a conversational AI that users can speak to naturally. RogoTele is a telepresence app to keep users in touch with family or friends back home that takes advantage of the swiveling dock to track movement, while RogoChat is for all other times where message and event notifications will do.

Continue reading “Rogo dock lets your smartphone run a smart home”
Categories
Smart Home

Drop connected buoy makes a splash by continuosly monitoring your pool

While a pool is a perfect antidote to a hot, sticky day, maintaining it over the long-term can quickly prove to be a hassle. Keeping its water balanced is a tricky game requiring the right amount of the right products at the right to ensure quality. However, balancing kits can be involved and unclear, leaving owners unsure of what to do.

The drop Wi-Fi connected pool monitor is a solar-power buoy that continuously monitors the temperature, pH, and chlorine levels of a pool. With this information, the iOS/Android drop app can create custom maintenance plans complete with recommendations on which products should be purchased, and how often they should be used. drop takes the guesswork of maintaining up to three pools for up to a week without sun with the option of maintaining more for $9 a month. In addition, an accelerometer inside detects suspicious movement too, sending a smartphone alert when it does. Backers can expect their own drop by June 2016 for $199. Drop Designs Inc. is hoping to raise $100,000 by July 9th, 2016.

With ideas like drop and the Quack Vac out in the wild, it’s never been easier to take care of a pool. drop offers users just enough valuable information to make it worthwhile, with a solar panel truly making the product you can set and forget.

Categories
Smartwatches/Bands

Cogito Fit takes on geeky smartwatch competitors with style, simplicity and savings

Think wearables and the smartwatch inevitably springs to mind. With us firmly in the age of the Apple Watch, entrenched stalwarts like the Moto 360 and the Pebble are fighting to stay within the public eye through innovative offerings and novel form factors. All this going on doesn’t mean new ideas can’t spring up, though.

The Cogito Fit attempts to tack on a bit more functionality to a basic smartwatch without resorting to daily charging . Billing itself as the first fashion-forward connected watch on the market, the device not only looks good but also addresses a few limitations of high-end devices. Cogito offers a face with LED icons for basic notifications, straps in a few colors, and a bezel that can be swapped depending on preference.

Feature wise, the Cogito Fit functions like most other smartwatches in its notification capabilities, and when its done alerting someone to what e-mails, SMS, calls, and social media updates they have, a light activity tracker also tracks steps.

Continue reading “Cogito Fit takes on geeky smartwatch competitors with style, simplicity and savings”

Categories
Maker/Development

Musio robot may be music to the ears of AI fans, kids

The most widely-used personal assistant application remains Apple’s Siri. But, as many iPhone and iPad users know, it is pretty difficult to engage in a true conversation with Siri because its software can only do what it’s been programmed to do by Apple.

Musio is a cross between a robotic toy along the lines of Sony’s long-discontined AIBO and a personal assistant. The Android-based device features artificial intelligence and was designed to engage and grow with its user, while its Arduino-compatible board enables the device to do whatever the user asks, its maker says. It is being fielded in three separate versions, each featuring a different brain.

Continue reading “Musio robot may be music to the ears of AI fans, kids”
Categories
Smart Home

Presence home security system keeps the sensors, skips the fees

Everyone wants to keep their home safe. Not everyone wants to pay the sometimes steep monitoring fees associated with doing so. The result? Houses everywhere essentially are left unprotected.

The Presence home security system gives both renters and homeowners peace of mind without taking a piece of their wallet with it.  It uses the cameras and Wi-Fi connectivity of the spare smartphones and tablets most people already have, and puts them to use alongside a variety of sensors, like motion and temperature, to keep any household safe from intruders, flooding, and a variety of other problems.

Continue reading “Presence home security system keeps the sensors, skips the fees”

Categories
Input

Glide your fingers over the Moky keyboard to use a virtual trackpad

The keyboard is a popular accessory for mobile devices because it’s often much easier to type with than the tiny one featured on a smartphone or tablet. But they take up a fair amount of space, and their footprints are made even larger by the trackpads that they sometimes bring along with them.

patent-claimedMoky is a twist on the typical mobile keyboard, featuring a large, invisible touchpad that’s controlled by the user’s gestures. An infrared laser sensor module provides a thin optical surface on the keyboard. The device communicates wirelessly with whatever mobile device is used with it via Bluetooth Low Energy 4.0 technology. The keyboard cover, meanwhile, doubles as a portable device stand. Moky costs $149 and will ship in October. Its maker is hoping to raise $30,000 by July 9.

Continue reading “Glide your fingers over the Moky keyboard to use a virtual trackpad”