Gadgetory

hey see that I'm right Kristen right now we're taking a look at smart things smart things as a kid that you can get online though I'll help you automate your home with the help of these nifty sensors now you'll plug in the smartthings hub to start with this is ninety nine dollars and all you've got to do is plug it into your router and plug it into a power source and then download these smart things app for your iOS or Android device it'll find your hub it'll connect your system and get you started and you'll be ready to go with just the smart things have installed in your home you'll be able to track when your phone comes and goes and then automatically trigger events based on that so if you leave your home and you want a z-wave control thermostat to turn down the heat you can do that you can set that all up and that's really cool you can get additional sensors as well there are a lot of things that are smart in the smartthings catalog one of the smart things be like a lot are the contact sensors that they use we've seen these in a lot of systems you stick them to your doorframe in the door and when the magnet separates it lets you know that the door is opened or the windows open door the cabinet whatever you want the nice thing here is that these also have built in temperature sensors so you can use them to track how hot or cold it is in a given room that's a really nice feature in a very smart little multifunctional device there's also the motion detector you see this in a lot of systems too but this one also has a range extender built-in so if you incorporate it into your system you'll have a stronger signal and that's good because the smart things up isn't quite as strong as i'd like there's also a moisture sensor there our fries detectors and all sorts of gizmos you can get for the system that our official smart things gadgets also you can automate other devices that are z-wave or zigbee enabled using smart things now no matter how many devices you add to your system you'll control all of it from the smartthings app for iOS and Android devices it's a very good-looking well-designed app that looks great but it's a little cluttered and a little confusing about how to create relationships and set things up & turn things off I wish that the app was a bit more streamlined and a bit more user-friendly because right now certain aspects of it are a little confusing like I said the smartthings hub on its own is available for ninety nine dollars and I think that's a great place to start just because it can already detect your phone out of the box however if you want to get some additional sensors a contact sensor motion detector or whatever you want I check out these smart things kits that are available they've got a couple bundles for 199 and 299 that seem pretty interesting for cnet I'm reckless