“Nest Cam (battery operated)”, the product is called exactly that, is Google’s new surveillance camera for the home, which can be used indoors and outdoors. It was unveiled at the end of summer along with the Google Nest Doorbell smart doorbell (battery operated) and the Google Nest Cam wired camera (with cable).
The main features
Nest Cam (battery operated) is a very solid product, designed to be placed at home, attached to a wall or leaning on its support, or outside the home, to frame the balcony, the door or other places that we want to keep under control. The camera allows you to monitor from the outside what is happening inside the house and to receive notifications in real time in case of movements. Through the app you can choose whether to receive notifications of movements in general or only of people, animals, cars. The possibility of creating monitoring areas within the frame is useful: in this way, by fixing it for example on a balcony, we can exclude a part of the frame that faces the street, so as not to be warned every time it passes. a car. Video quality goes up to 1080p 30fps and there’s night vision functionality (which works very well even when it’s all dark). Nest Cam (battery operated) is water resistant (IP54 protocol) and operates in environments from -20 ° c to + 40 ° c.
The installation and integration with Google Home
To use Nest Cam, you need a Google account and the Google Home app (free for Android and iOS). The first installation is very simple: once the camera has been removed from the package, it must be recharged with the supplied cable while the coupling with the app takes place via a practical QR code. Nest Cam, as we said, can be installed inside or outside the home, the important thing is that it is within the coverage range of home Wi-Fi. They tell us from Google that it can be mounted on wood or plasterboard using the wall screws and the wall plate included in the package; for brick, stone or stucco, wall anchors will be used instead. Finally, for those who, like us, do not have the possibility of making holes in the wall or for those who prefer to place the camera on a horizontal surface such as a high shelf, a table, a bookcase, an accessory (to be purchased separately for 35 EUR). A full charge takes about five hours and allows you to use Nest Cam for several weeks. Within the Google Home app it is possible to optimize the battery life by choosing different options (there is also automatic energy saving if the battery has autonomy for less than seven days). Nest Cam was produced, they explain by Google, using 47 percent recycled materials in the plastic and mechanical parts.
Nest Aware features
Nest Cam allows you to store up to three hours of events to watch, and in the event of a power outage or Wi-Fi, it has spare local storage that can record up to one hour of events. For those who want more, it is possible to make a subscription to Nest Aware (5 euros per month) which allows you to extend the video history from 3 hours to 30 or 60 days; with Nest Aware Plus (10 euros per month), on the other hand, you can take advantage of a continuous video history 24/7 on Nest Cam (with cable).
Our proof, availability and pricing
In our test we can be very satisfied with the functionality and ease of installation. Too bad that the camera does not have the table stand in the package (useful for placing it on a bookcase, for example, or on a flat surface) and you have to resort to purchasing an optional accessory. Among the few downsides, in our test a few times we found the connection to the live stream a bit slow (despite having good network coverage on both the smartphone and the camera) – nothing that cannot be solved, we imagine, with an update software. Nest Cam (battery operated) is sold in single pack at the list price of 199.99 euros; in a pack of two at a cheaper price: € 359.99.
Pros and cons
PRO
- Functionality
- Ease of installation
AGAINST
- Table stand sold separately
- Connection from the app in some cases a bit slow to see the live stream
Source-tg24.sky.it