Samsung Smart cam. Samsung SmartCam HD Plus Review

Samsung SmartCam HD Plus Review

Samsung Techwin just announced their latest home security camera, the Samsung SmartCam HD Plus (189.99), complete with SmartCloud, a Cloud storage service that lets you securely store video footage in the Cloud. A solid performer, the Samsung SmartCam HD Plus is much smaller than its predecessor, the SmartCam HD Pro, but offers just as many features in a discreet an elegant design.

Samsung SmartCam HD Plus Design

The SmartCam HD Plus measures a tiny 2.5″ x 1.4″, not including the stand, and sports a black finish. A large bracket holds the camera in place on its stand, which has a hinge that provides around 300-degrees of tilt. You can place the stand on a shelf or desktop, or mount it to a wall using the included hardware. Also included in the box are a USB power adapter, an 8-foot USB power cable, and a Quick Start guide for Android and iOS devices. Suffice it to say, the Samsung SmartCam HD Plus looks very sleek and modern.

Features

The HD Plus has a 1,920-by-1,080-pixel camera, with a 4x digital zoom, a 130-degree field of view and a 2.8mm focal length. It uses 14 infrared LEDs for night vision, and comes stocked with 802.11n Wi-Fi circuitry, a motion sensor, and an audio sensor. The camera also supports push-to-talk two-way audio communications.

Above the lens is an ambient light sensor that tells the camera when to enter night vision mode, and below the lens is a status indicator for Wi-Fi connectivity and power and a built-in microphone. A mini USB power port is positioned along the lower edge, and a microSD card slot is embedded in the right side of the camera housing. There’s also a speaker around back along with Reset and Wi-Fi Direct buttons for connecting to your smartphone.

Recording Options

The Samsung SmartCam Plus HD offers three recording options: manual recording, continuous recording, or recording when motion or sound is detected. All video and still images are stored locally on the included 16GB microSD card. The camera supports cards with up to 128GB of storage capacity. You can also store the footage on your phone, but your phone is limited to 30-second clips. You can also store your footage on SmartCloud, (more on that later). Finally, you can have the HD Plus send push and email notifications when one of the sensors are triggered, but you must use a Google account for these alerts.

Samsung’s Mobile App Companion

The mobile app is the same as the one used with the SmartCam HD Pro. It opens to a list of all your installed cameras. Simply tap a camera to view live video in portrait or landscape mode. There are several buttons along the bottom of the page, which enable manual recording with options to save the clip to your phone or to the SD card. Another button allows you to take still images, and a push-to-talk button allows you to initiate a two-way audio between the phone and the camera.

Additional buttons let you choose low, medium or high resolution, play a pre-recorded sound through the camera’s speaker (Police Siren, Alarm Siren, Dog Barking), select a specific motion detection zone, change image orientation and adjust the brightness level. The pre-recorded sounds is a pretty nifty feature. Besides the 3 sounds that come installed, you can also add up to ten custom sounds or messages.

Other features on the app include camera settings such as Wide Dynamic Range, night vision on/off, and speaker and microphone volume levels. There’s also an Event screen where you can enable alerts and adjust sensor sensitivity, an SD Card screen where you can enable continuous recording and format the SD card, a time zone screen and a network settings screen where you can change your Wi-Fi settings.

Installation

Installation can be done in a snap. Simply pair your Samsung SmartCam HD Plus to your Wi-Fi router, connect the camera, download the app, create an account, and tap “Register” to enroll the camera. Then you follow the app’s instructions, and your ready to go. The entire process takes about 20-minutes.

Performance

Once everything was up and running, the SmartCam HD Plus performed like a champ. The camera delivvers crisp 1080p video with good contrast and rich colors. We were surprised how well the night vision images looked, producing sharp, detailed images, and recorded video appeared every bit as sharp and colorful as the live feed. Finally, the 4x digital zoom showed good detail as well.

SmartCloud

The SmartCloud service serves as an alternative to the 128 GB of local video storage that comes with SmartCam HD Plus, but the new offering delivers a 75 percent increase in video accuracy compared to the HD Plus’ standard features. Now, if a home intruder damages or steals the HD Plus, the video will be automatically preserved and users will be able to review the footage leading up to the incident. Additionally, the SmartCloud leverages enhanced algorithms to better analyze lights and shadows to filter out irrelevant activity from footage that could trigger false alarms.

Bottom Line

The Samsung SmartCam HD Plus is a winner in our book. It allows you to monitor activity in your home using your smartphone, and delivers sharp 1080p video both day and night, thanks to its night vision feature. It also records video when the motion and sound sensors are triggered, and stores it on a local SD card or through SmartCloud. Finally, installation is a breeze, performance is better than most home security cameras on the market, and the customizable features allow you to outfit any home with all of your preferences.

For more information on the 189.99 Samsung SmartCam HD Plus, visit here.

Samsung SmartCam HD Pro review

Home-monitoring webcams have been around for years, but to set one up often required some networking know-how. Over time, these surveillance webcams became cheaper and easier to set up, but it wasn’t until the arrival of the Dropcam that consumers took note. Why? Simply because the Dropcam is an affordable solution that’s easy to use, comes with useful features, delivers good picture quality, and takes the complicated networking out of the picture.

Samsung (via its Techwin division) has been making home-monitoring cams for some time, and just launched its own Dropcam competitor, the SmartCam HD Pro (SNH-P6410BN). It has several of the same features and ease-of-use as the Dropcam Pro, but one-ups it in areas like storage and resolution. But as a home-monitoring product, can Samsung deliver a product that’s as consumer friendly? Yes, it can, and although it’s not a perfect product, it delivers as advertised.

Features and design

The SmartCam HD Pro (190) is saucer-shaped 2-megapixel camera with an embedded lens that records Full HD (1,920 x 1,080, at 30 frames per second) video, as well as lower resolutions like 1,280 x 720 and 640 x 360. At 2 megapixels, you’re not going to be shooting high-quality stills with it, but video is really what you’re after. At 10 ounces, it’s relatively lightweight to adhere to the base to a wall (although you should also screw it in if you’re wall-mounting it, as we found out during testing); you could also just rest the camera on a tabletop. The camera is bit larger than the comparable Dropcam, and not as inconspicuous as we would have liked, but we have also seen cameras that are much larger. If you are looking for a discreet surveillance cam as a form of theft deterrent, you may not want the SmartCam to be your first choice, but for monitoring your family or pets, it’s a solid choice. The SmartCam isn’t cordless, and there’s no battery option, so you’ll need to make sure there’s an outlet nearby if you plan to move it around; the cord is relatively long, and there’s no need to set up the camera after each time you plug-and-unplug.

camera lens, speaker (for bi-directional audio, or two-way talk), LED status light, and sensor to measure lighting conditions (the camera has a night-vision feature that works relatively well even in completely dark rooms). Beneath the unit is a Micro SD card slot that lets you record footage onto, while the back has a Wi-Fi Direct button (it creates a point-to-point connection between your smartphone and the camera, in order to set it up during first use), a reset button to bring the unit back to factory settings, Ethernet jack for a hard-wired connection (Wi-Fi is also available), audio-out jack, and microphone. Connecting the unit to external speakers might be cumbersome, but if you want to communicate to someone via the SmartCam, it’s a good idea as the onboard speakers aren’t very loud. As for the mic, Samsung strangely decided to put it on the back of the unit, which made it difficult to capture the voice of anyone talking back into the camera (more on this later).

The design raises some questions, but it’s a sturdy little camera.

However, you don’t really need to care what’s on or in the camera. While most people get apprehensive about things with “networking” in the name, this SmartCam is a easy plug-and-play affair. Once it’s powered up, you can set it up via your computer browser or iOS or Android device. Setting up with a computer is a bit more involved, as you’ll need to first physically connect the camera to your router in order for your computer to find it. If you have a smartphone and your home is set up for Wi-Fi, bypass the computer and go straight to your iPhone, iPad, or whatever Android-based device you have, and set up the unit there (via the Samsung SmartCam app). This process is far quicker and painless, and you’ll have your SmartCam set up in no time. (Samsung’s has a series of videos on YouTube that demonstrate how to set up the camera and mobile app.) on this in the “performance and use” section.

The SmartCam offers many similar functions to the Dropcam Pro, although it one-ups its competitor (at least on paper) with the aforementioned Full HD video recording, SD card slot, and Ethernet port (if you require a hard-wire connection for stability). Otherwise it has a 128-degree wide-angle view (versus the Dropcam Pro’s 130 degrees), night vision (there’s also a Wide Dynamic Range feature, or backlight correction, that evens out the brightness due to strong lighting entering the room), motion detection, real-time alerts, digital zoom, and companion mobile apps. What the SmartCam lacks, that the Dropcam Pro has, are location awareness and scheduling; the SmartCam remains on at all times. Dropcam offers a Cloud-based storage as an option. While Samsung doesn’t, you can have it snap a photo and send it to your Google Picasa account every time it detects motion. If you want to record video, pop a large-capacity SD card in there, and it can record footage continuously (erasing earlier recordings once it maxes out the card), or you can manually record a scene via the app. We think the SD card is a big selling point over the Dropcam, but if someone breaks into your home and steals the camera, then all your content will get stolen too.

Android app. The menus are relatively straightforward and, except for a few features, are easy to figure out. We used both the iOS and Android apps, and found them to be exactly the same. You will need to first create a Samsung SmartCam account, and then you can register the camera (or multiple cameras). Overall, we were able to get our test unit set up and running in no time. Whether it’s a Web browser, iPhone 5S, iPad, or Samsung Galaxy S5, we had no trouble logging into the camera and viewing footage. Now, let’s now take a look at how well it actually performed.

What’s in the box

The package comes with the camera, power adapter, network (Ethernet) cable, a quick-start guide and other documentation, double-sided tape, and screws and anchors. The full manual can be downloaded via the Samsung SmartCam website, but you don’t really need it unless you want to use some of the more advanced features.

The SmartCam comes with a standard one-year warranty, but it doesn’t protect against accidents.

Performance and use

While Samsung’s SmartCam HD Pro isn’t perfectly designed, it manages to deliver on most of its promises as a home-monitoring device. The form factor and limited mounting options raise some questions, but it’s a sturdy little camera that capably beams live footage from your home (or wherever you’ve got it hooked up) to the computer, smartphone, or tablet screen of your choice.

Overall performance is impressive, and image quality is very good with impressive low-light performance.

We tested the SmartCam in two different situations: one, as a surveillance camera to keep tabs on an apartment, and two, to observe a dog in another apartment while he’s home alone during the day. Other possible uses could be to observe your kids with their nanny or an elderly parent home alone, or record the happenings of a party you’re throwing.

As mentioned, setup is a relatively smooth process, whether you’re using a PC, smartphone, or tablet. In both environments, we used our smartphones to handle the setup process because it’s much faster and less complicated. We simply plugged the camera in, created an account in the app, and followed the onscreen instructions to pair the camera. Simple.

The camera’s overall performance is impressive, although we consistently saw choppy video whenever the stream was set to its highest video quality. This could be an issue with the bandwidth in your home or wherever you have it set up. In observing our dog, turning off bandwidth-hogging devices on the camera’s local network helps, but we weren’t ever able to get a reliable HD video stream to work during this part of the testing. Lower quality settings work great, with only occasional video hiccups. In the apartment-surveillance environment, video performance is also generally great, except the few times where we couldn’t log in at all; we suspect it was an issue with the network, not the camera, since we were able to log in later. So, before we blame the camera entirely, we must also consider network speed as well. If you have a reliable and strong Internet connection, the camera should perform well. With that said, the wide-angle image quality is very good with nice coloring, and we were quite impressed by the low-light (or lack of light) night vision performance. Motion is also nice and smooth. Is it really true HD? Is it as good as cameras that have stronger sensors with more megapixels? No, but for viewing in small sizes on your computer or smartphone, it’s perfectly fine.

Samsung SmartCam PT camera review

Back in February, I reviewed the Samsung SmartCam HD Plus and found it to be a good alternative to other popular home security cameras that are currently on the market and charge a monthly or yearly fee to use their Cloud service. Samsung doesn’t charge extra to use their camera. They recently sent me their SmartCam PT camera to test. Let’s take a closer look.

What is it?

The Samsung SmartCam PT camera is a Wi-Fi security camera with pan and tilt features that can be setup to alert you to motion and audio.

What’s in the box?

Samsung SmartCam PT Camera Power adapter USB cable Quick start guide

Design and features

The SmartCam PT Camera has a cone shape with a narrow top and a wide base that allows it to sit on any flat surface. It’s made of black plastic with a gray base that has a status LED below the Samsung logo. The status LED can be deactivated if desired.

The bottom of the SmartCam PT camera has rubber feet that keep it from sliding around. There’s also a threaded socket if you wish to attach the camera to a tripod. A reset switch and Wi-Fi connect button are also accessible from the bottom of the camera.

The PT camera is powered by an AC adapter that uses a micro USB cable. You can also see from the image above that the camera has a micro SD card slot in the base. This card is used to store motion detection clips and continuous recording AVI files that are saved in 5 minute increments.

The camera can sit on any flat surface, but if you would like to attach it to a wall, you can also do that with the included bracket.

Setup

Setting up the Samsung Smartcam PT camera is quick and easy.

The first step is to download the free iOS or Android version of the Samsung SmartCam app. You’ll be required to setup an account if you don’t already have one like I do. Then you just follow the step by step instructions to add the camera. You connect the camera to the USB adapter, wait for the LED on the front of the camera to flash red. Press Wi-Fi button the bottom of the camera until the LED turns yellow, press next, tap the camera in the on-screen list, choose the active Wi-Fi SSID, name the camera, set camera’s password and you’re done. Fast and simple, just the way I like it.

You connect the camera to the USB adapter, wait for the LED on the front of the camera to flash red. Press Wi-Fi button the bottom of the camera until the LED turns yellow, press next, tap the camera in the on-screen list, choose the active Wi-Fi SSID, name the camera, set camera’s password and you’re done. Fast and simple, just the way I like it.

The application has quite a few settings that can be customized including toggling motion and audio detection, changing video resolution and toggling continuous recording (requires a micro SD card which is not included with the camera).

You can also set specific motion detection areas so that only motion in those areas will trigger an alert.

The SmartCam application has not changed much at all since I reviewed the Samsung SmartCam HD Plus camera many months ago. The interface is still a little clunky to navigate especially when you’re trying to find video clips from motion alerts.

The camera can be set to show an alert on your phone when motion is detected, but the alert does not show a thumbnail image of the motion and if you click on it, it just goes to the main menu of the app instead of taking you directly to the motion alert video clip.

You can also set the camera to email you if motion or audio is detected, the emails DO include a thumbnail image of the motion, which is great, but you should be careful using this option because there is no limit to the number of emails that will be sent. That means if someone walks into the room, it might send 5 or 6 emails within a minute’s time. This can be a problem with certain email providers who may disable an account if multiple emails are sent in quick succession.

This camera and app has a really cool feature that I’ve not see on any other camera so far. It can automatically track a subject. If you tap the crosshairs button it will toggle tracking which will cause the camera to pan and tilt when it detects motion. I had a lot of fun testing this feature by walking into the room and then walking to the edges of the frame to see if it would follow me. It did. When I finally walked out of the frame, the camera would stay in the last location for a few seconds before moving back to the home position.

You can set 3 location presets and you can also manually move the camera using the arrows. The camera can pan 350° and tilt 155°.

If you turn your phone to landscape orientation, you can view in full-screen orientation. Even though you don’t see the arrow buttons to pan and tilt, you can still use those features by just swiping your finger left to right to pan and up and down to tilt. You will notice that the camera has a pretty narrow field of view. It’s only 96.1°.

Other features of the Samsung SmartCam PT camera include:

• Select from up to 10 pre-recorded messages that you record to play through the camera
• Play a police siren, alarm siren or dog barking audio clip through the camera
• View live feed and change settings through Samsung web viewer
• Quick privacy mode toggle in live view mode in app (lock in top right corner of screen)

To use the web viewer, you will need to install a web viewer plugin. The viewer worked fine with Firefox and Safari, but I could not get it to work with Chrome on my MacBook Pro. It kept asking me over and over again to install the plugin.

Final thoughts

I really like Samsung’s SmartCams. The fact that you don’t have to pay a monthly fee and you can still view through the web as well as an app is great. But the coolest feature of the SmartCam PT has to be the automatic subject tracking. I love that feature.

There are only a couple of things that keep this camera from being perfect. The app needs some improvement and the camera’s field of view is pretty narrow at 96.1°. But other than those two things, I consider the Samsung SmarCam PT to be a very good choice for an easy to use home security camera.

Source: The sample for this review was provided by Samsung. Please visit their site for more info and Amazon to order.

Product Information

• Easy to use
• No monthly fees
• Camera can automatically track a subject when it comes into view
• microSD card saves motion clips and can be set to record continuous video

• Alerts don’t show a thumbnail of the activity
• Can’t export video clips from mobile app
• Requires a browser plugin to use web viewer
• Only 96.1° viewing angle

Julie Strietelmeier

I created The Gadgeteer in 1997 as a fun way to share my passion for gadgets which began when I was a little kid. Some of my other interests include ukulele, photography, productivity hacks, and minimalism. Learn more about me and my favorite gear.

7 thoughts on “Samsung SmartCam PT camera review”

This is a great review and I love the fact it embraces open standards to allow you to use your own Cloud. Too often these types of devices try to tie you to their backend as a way to get fix perpetual revenue stream. Great for them terrible for the consumer. It is interesting to see the rise of Internet of Things where a lot of the smaller more innovative companies have great ideas but I question if they can be in for long haul or at least the usable life and relevancy of their products. And when they move on to greener pastures you are stuck with an expensive paperweight. Another big concern is security with these young devices as security is an after thought. Any device in your home that is accessible over the web has to be a security concern even if ironically it is is a security camera. I am not trying to go all conspiracy theory here, just the absence of good security and erodes our privacy it just a gaping problem for most new devices and the files they produce. It is an exciting time we live in where there is the Rapid integration of technologies many with fantastic value propositions that make our life richer we just we have to careful with unintended consequences.

Can you access this from outside your home network? (i.e. does it require you to open some IP port to gain access?)

I did not have to open any special ports or use port forwarding to access the cameras from outside my network.

You’ve noted you can’t export video clips from the app? How would you send a clip to say the police if you’ve been robbed?

Samsung Wisenet SmartCam A1 Indoor Home Security Camera Review

Home security cameras are an essential security device for today’s Smart home and GearBrain has tested many of these devices. But we’ve never put a security camera with 350-degree panning capability into trial — until now. Meet Samsung Wisenet SmartCam A1 Indoor Home Security Camera, a Wi-Fi enabled indoor security camera with Full HD monitoring, 2-way communication plus additional features which turn this device into a do-it-yourself (DIY) home security system. The company sent us a device to test and here is what we found.

Samsung Wisenet SmartCam A1 Security Camera

What is the SmartCam A1 Security Camera?

SmartCam A1 security camera is a good standalone camera, and a respectable device for consumers looking for a DIY home security camera or system. When unboxing the SmartCam Security Camera, you’ll find a station hub, indoor station camera, station hub power adapter, Ethernet cable, Quick Start Guide and a warranty card.

The A1 security camera sits on top of the station hub and offers 1080p Full HD monitoring. The camera, when taken off the station hub, has an individual field of view (FOV) of 130 degrees which is very good for a home security camera today. But when on the base, the camera provides 350 degrees (175 degrees in either direction) panning. This is the first Wi-Fi enabled home security camera GearBrain has tested — and we have tested many security cameras — that can pan 350 degrees in full 1080p HD inside your home. This is a nice feature to have in a security camera. We just wish it could do this when it’s not on top of the station hub.

The SmartCam A1 security camera is Wi-Fi enabled and is dual Band. If you have either a 2.4Ghz or 5Ghz modem, the camera will work. We tested both and the 5Ghz modem had less of an audio delay, but everything else was equal.

SmartCam Station Hub and HD security camera.

The SmartCam A1 Security Camera has much to offer the person looking for a DIY home security solution in one camera. We really like the A1 Security Camera’s audio and motion detection features, which sends you text notifications via the SmartCam app. You can program three different alarm sounds — at different sound and sensitively levels — in the app: a police siren, alarm and dogs barking. You can also schedule when you want to arm and disarm your camera — and when armed, the camera will record video if motion is detected.

When the A1 Security camera is armed, and you’re alerted to motion detected in the space, you can flip to live video in the SmartCam app to see what’s happening. A1 Security Camera starts to track the motion on its own too, a feature we like. You can also speak to anyone you see in the live feed — perhaps try to scare them to leave — but you can’t sound the alarm unless you click off the microphone icon and activate the alarm. That felt strange. We wish the live feed allowed alarm activation as you’re talking to someone — but you can only use one icon at a time in the app when viewing the live stream.

How To Setup SmartCam A1 Home Security System

After unboxing your Samung Wisenet SmartCam A1 Home Security System, you need to download the SmartCam app. The app is available for both iOS and Android devices.

When registering your product, make sure your SmartCam device is plugged in and the LED light is blinking.

Connect your SmartCam to your home Wi-Fi.

When connecting to your home Wi-Fi, note it may take a while to connect. it took us about 2 minutes before the devices connected.

First step in registering SmartCam camera, turn on the power.

Following the prompts in the mobile app, you will need to make sure you power on your SmartCam camera by hitting the button underneath your camera. Once powered on, you should see the LED light flickering.

Pair SmartCam camera with Station Hub.

Once your SmartCam camera LED light is flickering, you need to press the Pair button the side of the camera for at least 3 seconds. The camera light will flicker in green. Once this happens, you need to press the Pair button on the side of the Station Hub for three seconds. Your LED light will now turn blue.

SmartCam LED blinks green and stops, registration is complete.

You will also hear an alarm which means your registration is complete. You are now ready to use your SmartCam A1 Home Security System.

Many security cameras record video but charge to store this data in the Cloud. Because the SmartCam A1 security camera doesn’t store video feeds, there aren’t any fees. Instead the A1 Security Camera stores any recorded videos locally on an SD memory card. (You’ll need to buy that — it’s not included in the kit.) Make sure you get an SD Card with up to 128GB of data: the maximum amount the camera itself will store.

The SmartCam A1 Security Camera allows support Full HD monitoring of streaming videos, with 1080p and three HD settings: low, medium and high. On the low setting, we found the imagery very distorted when we zoomed in to the picture. The medium and high settings were very clear. The ability to zoom? That was a plus for the camera, which has a 4X zoom — particularly great for closing in tightly on a person’s face or an object in a room. Night vision is also a nice feature and you can easily see up to 24 feet in the dark as well as a well-lit room.

Samsung SmartCam app.

SmartCam A1 security camera also supports two-way communication. As we mentioned above, using the mobile app, you can press the microphone icon and talk to whoever is in the room through the camera’s built in microphone like a walkie-talkie. The sound is crisp but there is a three second delay. When you’re finished speaking, take your finger off the microphone icon to hear someone talking back to you.

Testing the microphone, we heard the delay but we found people near the camera could hear us clearly. You can also adjust the volume on both sides via the SmartCam app. One good thing to note: people in the room don’t know there is a delay, which is ideal if you’re actually dealing with an intruder and calling authorities at the same time.

All DIY home security type of systems or cameras send text notifications when motion is detected. But the SmartCam A1 home security camera sends alerts for both motion and audio, which worked during our tests. But recording only worked in these cases if we’d armed the camera. If the camera is disarmed, it won’t record motion. It’s also simple to turn these notifications on and off (if you find them annoying) and we also recommend adjusting both the audio and motion sensitivity, along with arming and disarming scheduling in the SmartCam app. You really want to make sure your alarm goes off when you actually need it.

SmartCam app offers two-way communication via built-in microphone.

Non-Features

When building a Smart home, you really want your devices to work with each other. That’s key. We were surprised to find that there weren’t any home automation integrations for the SmartCam A1 Home Security Camera. Yes, the device can be used as a standalone DIY home security system. And yes, you can add an unlimited number of A1 security cameras together to form your own DIY home security system. But consumers want — and need — the flexibility to add best of breed connected devices to their Smart home system. Samsung says integrations aren’t available right now with other Smart home systems and devices like Apple HomeKit, Samsung SmartThings or Harmony Hub. However, integrations may be coming soon.

In some cases, brands are getting around Smart home compatibility issues by using IFTTT applets to help integrate their devices with others. The SmartCam A1 camera does not have an IFTTT applet — nor do they have any on the drawing board either. The company has said this might be something in the future for them. But nothing is available today.

The SmartCam A1 Home Security Camera dimensions are 4.5 x 4.5 x 9.5 inches and requires high speed internet connection via a Wi-Fi router (8.02.11 b/g/n). The SmartCam mobile app is for iOS (8 or higher) and Android OS (5.0 or higher) devices. You can download the SmartCam app from either Google Play or Apple App Store. The camera retails for 178.99 on Amazon.

The Samsung Wisenet SmartCam A1 home security camera is a standalone DIY home security system. It offers incredible panning (350 degrees), good FOV, and has the essential elements for a home security network you want to monitor yourself: two-way communication, auto motion tracking, night vision and no fees.

We would have liked the system to work with other Smart home devices — perhaps an integration with either a Smart light manufacturer or a Smart lock. The company does manufacturer a Smart video doorbell which GearBrain is in the process of testing. But for those who already have Smart home devices — like Smart lights or locks — and want to add a DIY home security system or camera, this is not the camera for you.

However, If you’re looking for a good indoor DIY home security system, with an all-in-one camera, then you can consider the Samsung SmartCam A1 camera. It’s inexpensive, has solid features like two-way audio, and monitors a large area in your home. Just remember: with a DIY home security system you need to call the authorities when needed because the camera can’t do that for you. You need a professional monitoring service to complete the call.

Pros: No fees, 350 degrees panning, 1080 HD monitoring, motion/audio detection, 130 FOV, microSD slot with max 128GB, night vision, dual Band Wi-Fi connection, 2-way communication and 3-hour battery life for camera only.

Cons: No home automation integrations, no IFTTT applets, indoor use only, camera only pans when on station.