Neposmart Review: Connected Video for Today's Smart Home

By Stefania Viscusi May 29, 2015

I’m a fairly new homeowner and the abundance of responsibilities and maintenance these dwellings require has been a startling reality. Lucky for me, I am also living during a time of great technological innovation and possibilities. I don’t know if there is a greater evolution going on right now than the one made possible by the Internet of Things (IoT). The ability for machines to communicate with one another and automation to becoming the norm is making managing and maintaining a home much more attainable. And I’m not alone in my praise of smart solutions for the home. The latest research from Berg Insight says over the next five years we will be seeing huge growth in this space with revenues growing to $2.6 billion in 2020.

Interestingly, another study by ABI Research also looks ahead to 2020 at a specific segment of the Smart Home – security monitoring services. The research finds that these services will be making their way in into 15 million more homes by 2020.

Even though having my coffee machine know to brew my coffee when I wake up or having the thermometer make room temperature toasty for when I get home from work are all very cool things, perhaps one of the more important connected “things” I want in my smart home is a security device to monitor my valuables when I am away.

“After decades where penetration into U.S. households stalled, home security adoption is set for significant growth,” Jonathan Collins, Principal Analyst at ABI said.

With more players offering their own solutions, the market for smart security in our homes is heating up. Traditionally, paying for professional monitoring was the only choice, but now you can shop the aisles of a hardware store and find some intelligent devices that connect via the Internet and a mobile app.

One Internet of Things company that’s offering a low-cost way to upgrade to a smart home is Neposmart. They offer a next gen IoT security camera that not only gives homeowners or businesses a way to view live HD video but it can also create an intelligent garage by connecting right to the existing garage door and allowing users to open and close it from anywhere using an app, tablet or PC .

I had a chance to test out the device recently and immediately became addicted to ‘checking up on things’ when I wasn’t home. It’s really as simple as going into the dedicated app and being assured nothing crazy was going on while you were away.

While I don’t have any children yet, I can see how this smart home monitoring thing could also do wonders in ensuring kids were well behaved for baby sitters and teens were home from school and doing homework as expected. For people with pets, it’s also a great way to make sure shoes aren’t getting chewed and your four legged friends are also OK alone.

In my home and quiet neighborhood where I don’t have kids or pets to care for yet, I was able to use the camera to make sure the garage’s contents were safe and even monitor it while technicians worked to fix a heater tank in the basement without having to hang around in person and make small talk.

All of this is really handy, gives great peace of mind, and really makes you not want to go back to a life where being away from home meant you had no visibility into what was happening, unless you paid a pricey alarm system company to alert you – and then only after someone had already intruded.

I also liked how easy it was to get started with monitoring. Once the Neposmart was plugged in and the App was downloaded and Wi-Fi synced, I was ready to go. Another handy feature is the ability to save videos and snapshots from the camera. This could be useful for proof in a legal matter, or even just to capture moments.

The camera also has the ability to transform a garage into a smart door that can be controlled from the app. If someone locks them self out of the house or a service call is being done, it means not having to run home and open the door but still providing access only to someone you can see with your own eyes entering your home.

Installation of this element naturally was a bit more cumbersome and included wiring and mounting of the electrical components. The instruction guide is pretty detailed for anyone with the ambition to self-install, but I have not had the chance to test that option out yet. I’m hoping I can have someone more skilled in installing get it working so then I can also stop worrying and wondering if I shut the garage door or not - which typically happens daily.

What’s really great about the device is that it’s a one time cost, and a device that I am able to control without the need for outside people or subscription fees. That alone makes this a great option for anyone who has been looking to either finally get security in their home or wants to move on to something smarter than the traditional services they currently have.