I recently had the good people from Vivint come and install a home automation system/security system in my home. Vivint provides a ton of options and provides professional installation with every purchase. Read on to see how the process and products have transformed my home.
Philips Hue smart lighting ecosystem has long been a leader in providing sophisticated smart lighting solutions, and now a new app update is going to make Philips Hue lights even more customizable and useful.
Newton Mail, formally called CloudMagic, has been one of many third-party emails that I’ve used after being generally displeased with the stock iOS mail app. Featuring everything from Sent Receipts to fellow third-party app integration’s, Newton Mail’s new “True Inbox” feature is a helpful new way to tackle your mailbox.
Philips has set the goal to improve the lives of 3 billion people per year by 2025, and part of the way that they hope to achieve this goal is by bridging the gap between consumer and professional health. To that end, at the IFA GPC, Philips’s Liat Ben-Zur talked about the importance of healthy sleep.
Buerer is a European company that’s been around for almost 100 years; their focus is health and well-being. At the IFA GPC, their Managing Director, Georg Walkenbach, mentioned that they currently have 12 apps and 60 connected devices. Georg mentioned several of their health-focused device and app combos, but the one I really took note of was their SleepQuiet app.
At CES, I served as a judge for Last Gadget Standing. One of the finalists was the Modius Headset. It particularly caught my interest because the presenters claimed that wearing this headset for 45 – 60 minutes a day over an 8-week period could significantly reduce your weight and body fat — without necessarily changing diet or exercise. Wait, what?!
My family can’t be the only one who’s accidentally left the garage door open overnight, right? Chamberlain wants to solve that problem by making your dumb old garage door smarter with the MyQ Smart Garage Hub, which allows you to open and close your garage door or check its status from your smartphone. Grab yours today for $99.99.
I never grew up playing video games; my parents were fine with us playing at arcades or at friends’ houses, but we were absolutely not allowed to own a Nintendo or Sega at home. So I enjoy sharing video games with my 4-year-old son, as it becomes a bonding experience when he “helps” me play Sonic or Mario Run on my iPhone.
Concur’s TripIt app just continues to get better and better, and continues to be my personal favorite for travel organization. Without its automatic emailing features and boarding arrangements, I’d truly be lost. So it’s no surprise that their latest feature makes traveling that much easier.
Sure, it’s January and you’re probably thinking “nobody keeps their resolutions after February 1st,” but let me just let you know.. that’s absolutely true in many cases. But most of that stems from workouts becoming repetitive, and gyms being overcrowded — discouraging folks with goals in their tunnel vision.
Smart toothbrushes have been around for a few years, and all, for the most part, have the same premise: Making sure you’re teeth are clean, while giving you a better glance at how well (or not) you are doing so. Then there’s the Kollibree Ara Toothbrush, which uses artificial intelligence endgames to encourage longer brushing.
Sometimes shopping at the last-minute can be a good thing. You get your pick of all of the price cuts, and in many cases you find gifts that you would’ve never thought of that will be useful for the new year. Here are a few items that I think that you should check out if you are still shopping for last-minute gifts.
I’ve been a Creative Cloud subscriber for a couple of years now. Adobe has always been adding apps on the mobile side but it’s always been a bit disjointed. That has now ended now with their new Lightroom CC, however, they’ve added to the confusion by continuing the previous desktop oriented Lightroom and calling it Lightroom CC Classic. I’m not sure if this will work for them.
If you believe that disconnecting from your device during meal-time improves family bonding, then you aren’t alone. 98% of the parents surveyed by Wakefield Research agreed that “disconnecting from devices during mealtime improves family bonding”, but 42% said they couldn’t remember the last time that their family had a device-free meal. That’s messed up.
Stranger Things is coming in just a few weeks! If you live under a rock, “Stranger Things” is a horror-ish drama from Netflix that is an homage to the 1980s. It has evil scientists, parallel dimensions, plucky pre-teen heroes, and Winona Ryder screaming at Christmas lights. Now it also has a companion game, and it is incredibly addictive!
One of the bothers that comes with getting older is that you’ll likely have to add at least a few medications to your daily routine. Whether you are keeping up with your own meds or those taken by an elderly relative, the PillDrill aims to make the process of remembering to take those medications as painless and streamlined as possible.
TripIt has been my go-to app for travel, hands down. I track all of my flights instantly thanks to the Pro features, but when I’m in the airport, I’ve always thought the app could be more useful. Luckily the company thought this as well, and they’ve released an update that its users will enjoy.
Messaging apps like Slack revolutionized long-distance and group communication by making text messaging possible over the Internet. Now we can text and video chat with people anywhere in the world without having to pay exorbitant fees to a phone company. Messaging technology has dramatically improved communications for businesses and entrepreneurs in nearly every industry except one: health care.
Some people go on vacation to unplug. For those who run a small business, however, there’s no disconnecting – and that means you need to take your business on the road with you if you plan to get away.
In the last few years, the smarthome accessory market has exploded. Now it’s possible for anyone to make their home more automated, efficient, and yes, smarter to add aftermarket accessories that remotely control or oversee their home’s temperature, energy efficiency, who’s in their home, who has access to their home, and more. Which brings us to the Friday Lock.
We’ve covered Elgato Eve products since they became available; these are add-on Smarthome accessories that allow you to automate and control your home remotely using the Eve app on your iPhone; they integrate seamlessly with Apple HomeKit. Their latest product is the Elgato Eve Degree, a tiny and elegant aluminum-cased indoor or outdoor temperature with humidity monitor.
