Some Updates. Internal Cameras, Intercom & HomePod Mini.

Intercom and the change it made for indoor cameras for me.

<Updated 9th December 2020>

Well weren't Apple sneaky with that release of 14.1? Intercom was a surprise to even those of us running 14.2 Beta. That initially completely flipped my views on running internal cameras.

Netatmo Indoor

In an earlier post I was complaining about the Netatmo Indoor not having 2-way communication, which I had on my D-Link Omna (Which has been discontinued). The good news about Netatmo Indoor is that it does have support for HomeKit Secure Video, which is something that I wanted. It was just that lack of 2-way communication that irked me. I was just about to buy the Aqara G2H which, I admit, is very much cheaper than the Netatmo.... but I do want some simplicity in my set up. I'd rather pay more and reduce the vendors I use. I also have had a great experience with Netatmo products: specifically their Doorbell and Outdoor cameras.

Another thing about the Netatmo was I had no idea of scale. It always seemed quite large to me, in the pictures I saw.  It actually isn't.

Intercom changed all that for me. As I now had Apple HomePods in a few rooms, including a stereo pair in the garage which is used with my outdoor cinema set up, I had no need for the 2-way capability of a camera. Or so I thought.

I bit the bullet and ordered 2. Fortunately, on Amazon, there were some cameras that had damaged packaging, and so I got a good discount there.

I've already installed them. One in the Dining Room as it looks directly at the front door, and one in the Garage looking at the roller door and side door. Both are already set up with HKSV and I have them recognising faces.

With  release of iOS 14.2, which includes Intercom for all devices, we are now set up and I have retired my D-link Omna camera from the Garage.

Intercom has definitely reduced noise in the house. It's great for a quick message to someone else in the house instead of shouting t the top of your voice! What it's not great for is having a conversation. e.g.

<Person 1>"Can you come and look at this?"

<Person 2>"Where are you?"

<Person 1>"I'm in the Living Room"

<Person 2>"Is it important as I'm busy?"

etc

So I actually missed that 2-way audio, especially in the Garage.

Eve Cam

Because of this blog, Eve Home contacted me to look at some of their products. One of them is the Eve Cam. I have been using it for a month now. I'm trying to keep this blog pure about the practicality of using products and not become a review site There are plenty of good ones that already do that.

As mentioned above, I already have a Netatmo Indoor watching my front door, and Dining Room Windows. This made watching the back door, which is in my kitchen, the perfect place to watch with the Eve Cam.

I must admit, first impression on taking the Cam out of the box was that I didn't like the design as much. The Netatmo is very elegant and the Eve Cam, whilst nice, is not so elegant. It looks a little like the Logitech Circle View on initial impression, but what became immediate obvious is that the Eve is very functional with it's ability to be placed just about anywhere as long as there is a power socket.

First of all, the base is magnetic. So you can place the Camera just as it is shown in the photo, or you can stick it to something magnetic. If you look at the base, you can see that the cam can articulate, which means you can now increase your options for mounting. Eve have been quite clever here too as they've included a metal disc that can be stuck to another surface, thus increasing your mounting points.

Having said that, I just stuck mine on top of the fridge as it is directly opposite the back door. As you can see, it is quite discreet.

This gets me into installation. I will say that setting up the Eve Cam is as simple as you can make it. The only products that compare are actual Apple products themselves.

It was, literally, switch it on. Add a new accessory, find the cam and then register it in HomeKit. It then performed an automatic update.

Note, that I did not need to use a manufacturers app at all, everything was done via the Apple Home app. Now, as it happens, I do have the Eve app, but I mostly have that to do better automations. 

Then it was into setting up HomeKit Secure Video (HKSV).

Into Settings and define Recording Options, Face Recognition, and Activity Zones. With this camera, and its placement, I can actually see the doors on the fridge.. and I don't really care about the ceiling. I can see the entire width of the kitchen too, including the windows as it has a 150° field of view, compared to 140° view on the Netatmo Indoor.

The Facial recognition works well. It has access to my photo library. You can see that it has already detected myself and my partner, but didn't know what to name one of my friends, as I hadn't identified them in the Photos app. That has since been corrected. You can choose to stop notifications for people you know, if you wish to do so, which reduces the notifications you get on your phone.

This is particularly useful for me at the moment, as my house is up for sale and, using my indoor cameras, I can watch people inspecting my house. I've even brought the old D-Link Omna back into service and it is watching my living room.

A couple of other things I have not mentioned about the Eve cam are:

• It is $50 cheaper than the Netatmo Camera, 
• it does not stream to the web unless you use the Home app, which is a big deal as the Netatmo web access does not have two factor authentication. So how good is your password?
• It has that two-way communication that I wanted. Having played with it for a while now, I think this is going to become my new Garage Camera and the Netatmo I have inside the garage will become my Kitchen Cam.

If I compare the 3 cameras I have:

 

Feature	Eve Cam	Netatmo Indoor	D-link Omna
camera	1080p	1080p	1080p
degree	150	130	180
HKSV	Yes	Yes	No
Audio	2-way	1-way	2-way
SD Card	No	Yes	Yes
Design Aesthetic	Good	Best	Good
Mounting	Flexible	Flat surface	Flat surface
installation ease	Best	Good	2nd Best
requires App	No	Yes	Yes
price (USD)	$149	$199	$69.99

Conclusion on the cams.

I like all 3 cams. The lack of HKSV on the D-Link Omna is a bust though. Of the two remaining, overall I like the Eve Cam best and, if I'd known about it earlier I probably would have bought 3 of those instead of the Netatmo Indoors that I did buy. Certainly, the Eve Cam is going into the garage because of the superior viewing angle, the 2-way communication and the better mounting capabilities compared to the Netatmo in there at the moment. It also does not increase my vendor app count. If only they did an outdoor and a doorbell!

There is only one concern I have, which is what happens if my internet connection goes?

Having said that, I am perfectly happy with my Netatmo Indoor cameras. Technically not quite as good but aesthetically more pleasing and, I think, blend in with interior decor a bit better.

HomePod mini and new HomePod functionality

The HomePod mini and new functionality to come for the HomePod are some great announcements for me too.

I've been waiting for sometime for a mini version of the HomePod. I didn't want to fork out a lot of money to have a quite large speaker in my Living Room that was not going to do much more than be a Siri interface for those times when I, or my partner, are in there and the tv is not on - which means I can't use the microphone on the tv remote - and I'm not wearing my watch or have my iPhone... which is quite often. 

I did not expect the HomePod mini to be as good a speaker as it appears to be, so that is a pleasant surprise. Sure, it is still more expensive than an Echo Dot, etc... but it is supposed to be a better speaker. So I'm OK with that. The fact that it is such a good speaker is actually making me think bout putting one in multiple rooms where do you don't need AMAZING sound, just great sound. First one, though, will be the Living Room.

So, what is it about the HomePod that I'm excited about? Well, quite frankly, it is the "Home Theatre" sound that is supposed to be coming. This will mean that when I buy an tv for my outside movie theatre, the HomePod Stereo Pair I already have out there will deliver an even better experience than I have already. I'm not expecting it to be as good as the 7.1 Surround I have in my living Room, but hopefully it will be pretty good.