HomeTech.fm - Episode 388 - A Bunch of Canadian Thieves

Episode Date: May 20, 2022

This week on HomeTech: Onkyo files for bankruptcy, Vivint woes, Sonos might get a baby sub, Ecobee launches a new thermostat, TPLink launches a smart home line, and of course a fun pick of the week!

This is the Home Tech Podcast for Friday, May 20th, from Sarasota, Florida. I'm Seth Johnson. From Powell, Ohio, I'm CJ Huddleston. And from Pickering, Ontario, I'm Gavin Campbell. Welcome to the Home Tech Podcast, a podcast about all aspects of home technology and home automation. This week, we've got a bunch of new products we're going to talk about from a couple of cool brands, little brands. We know like Sonos, Ecobee, TP-Link.

Throw that one in the mix. But yeah, a couple of, there's actually a Graveyard one from a very famous company that we'll have to talk about right at the top of the Home Tech Headlines. But first up, Gavin, you've got an update for us on some some software it looks like looks like we're tj and i are going to be busy after the show it's a big day uh unraid 6.10.0 was released officially finally today and i'm excited you know like this i i'm a big unraid person i got you guys on to unraid i've got a lot of people on to unraid and it's so powerful i highly recommend it if you You know, like this, I'm a big Unraid person. I got you guys onto Unraid.

I've got a lot of people onto Unraid and it's so powerful. I highly recommend it if you ever want to get it, a home NAS, a home server, jump on Unraid. But they just released their latest version. Some of the key things, if you're an Unraid user, they integrated a MyService plugin for your flash backup and key management. Lots of security updates and changes. So make sure you read the notes on that. The virtualization updates allow Windows 11. So that's good. Integrated WireGuard is now integrated. That's really nice. A lot of Docker updates. So I know I'm a big Docker user, so I have to really pay attention to that. A lot of other little enhancements and fixes and

updates. So it's a big day at Unraid. You know, this is a major update for them. And I know I'm probably going to update my setup this weekend. It's actually, you know, it's actually painless upgrade. When you guys do your first, I don't think you guys have ever done an upgrade. No, I was actually looking for the upgrade button so I could just press it on the show and just watch the whole thing burn down as like just catch on fire over here. You know what? It's really painless to upgrade. It's pretty much just press that button. on the show and just watch the whole thing burn down as like just catch on fire over here you know what it's it's really painless to upgrade it it's pretty much just press that button and if you have

to downgrade after for whatever reason there's a way to downgrade easily straight from the ui so yeah i'll probably do it on the weekend because i gotta shut down like my whole house and reboot it just to get the upgrade yeah yeah i i should probably do it on Friday, Friday night. Seems like the best time to do anything. When people are sleeping. Yeah, yeah. Right, right. Do it overnight or something. Oh, that's cool.

That's cool. I saw there was Docker news in there, and I'm like, yep, Gavin's all over this. He's going to. A big Docker user. It looks like there's legitimately some pretty cool updates. They've got it built in. What is it? WireGuard, the VPN thing. That's kind of taken the VPN world by fire.

If there was anything that could take the VPN world by fire. But it seems to be a little bit easier to set up than something like OpenVPN. Yeah. But it seems to be more supported, too. I feel like WireGuard's on everything now, or OpenVPN isn't as much anymore. Well, OpenVPN is built on... I mean, it's just ancient, right?

It's been around forever. And WireGuard's new. It's using all the new tech and all the stuff that just like ancient, right? It's been around forever. And WireGuard's new. It's using all the new tech and all the stuff that cool kids like, right? And what they're doing with that, like the code base is so much smaller. Like it's manageable. Like if they were to find a bug in WireGuard,

they find it pretty quickly. They're still finding bugs in OpenVPN because it uses like stacks and stacks and stacks of old technology. So it's nice. They're still finding bugs in OpenVPN because it uses stacks and stacks and stacks of old technology. So it's nice that they're updating that. And the only thing it doesn't have that OpenVPN kind of had is a user management thing. You have to manage like a, it's not hard,

but you have to have a key, like a public key and a private key to match up with the server. And as long as you got that, you're in. But that can be difficult because there's a lot of keys. At the end of the day, you end up with a lot of keys, especially if more than one user, you start to end up with more keys to keep up with both for the server and it's just a mess. So I noticed there are a couple of companies that are figuring all that out and putting

all that together where you're just kind of like using your Google, your Gmail account to log into their service. And they manage the keys and basically, you know, flip the switch to get you into whatever your network is supposed to be on. So it's coming. It's it's it's not all there yet. But I think it's like you said, DJ, it's pretty ubiquitous now. Like it's just popping up everywhere because it's such a such a lower overhead piece than openvpn was um so i think people are just going to migrate for that uh over time yeah hopefully hopefully they just start building it into ubiquity equipment as well that would be really nice um not really a good vpn option right now oh i use it but i only do basic vpn through

my unify Dream Machine. And it's just to get me into the network to do my stuff. Like I don't do hardcore many users or anything like that. Right. Yeah, I can't remember with WireGuard if you have to open ports. I think you might have to put a firewall rule in. I don't remember. But kind of the same thing with the basic VPN, like LTPP or something like that.

I don't remember. All this IT stuff off the top of my head, but I've done them a couple of times and then not the most fun thing to do. I'd rather just like click a thing and I'm in. I don't want to go through this. Yeah, I mean, I already had a password way back there, guys. Just export a, well, and that's why I always liked OpenVPN, just because it was so easy to use, you know?

Once you got it set up and everything, you just exported the key and you used it or the certificate, and that was it. So that was always the advantage of that. But yeah, WireGuard makes it just as easy. There's a very popular one called Tail Scale Out now that makes it really easy for remote connecting to your devices. They're using WireGuard.

I think in the back end they are, but they manage it all. And you just install an app and log in, and you're connected. Yep, zero config. Yeah, Tailscale's using WireGuard, I'm pretty sure, because it's really the. I showed this to someone who I was trying to say, hey, this is coming. You should look at this. And I was like, look at this website.

And then if you're in the IT world, you scroll down to the second section there. They've got the little hero image at the top. But if you scroll down to the second section, it says no config file, no firewall ports. And you say without, and it shows you this big, complicated graph thing. And then you click on it, which says with Tailscale.

And it's like, here's you. And you get access to all the things you're supposed to have access to. Yes, that's the ideal world. That's what you're supposed to be. That's the way it should work. But if you're in IT, and you've got a route VPN connection through three different routers, oh Things are, things get really messy.

Enough IT talk. Cause I don't, I don't like IT. Gross. Yeah. The underwrite server is almost more than I'm willing to deal with on, on a daily basis. So it's like, it should be a notice and says, um, I'm not dead. If it doesn't send me the notice, I know it died. So there we go. All right, guys. What do you say we jump into those home tech headlines?

Let's do it. All right. Sombra Music, Japanese audio equipment maker, Ankyo Home Entertainment. Friday filed for bankruptcy in the Osaka District Court with total liabilities around 3.1 billion yen, which is $24 million, or probably 3.1 billion Canadian pesos.

I'm not sure how the conversions work there, Gavin, but it's definitely going to be more. The Osaka-based company was delisted back in August as it was unable to keep pace with the changes of how people listen to music as users shift from audio equipment like compact stereo systems and receivers to devices like smartphones

for streaming services. Two Onkyo subsidiaries that handled the original equipment manufacturing such as assembling speakers and other brands and sales representation of audio equipment filed for voluntary bankruptcy back in March. So yeah, Canadian pesos there. Since then, Onkyo has essentially stopped doing business, except for the management

of an already sold off subsidiary as well. So it was basically just a name that was out there. I think we covered way back that the company sold its core audio visual business to Sharp and Vox International. And its headphones and earphones and headphones business went off to another like investment fund company. That happened back in September. So Sharp and Vox are going to continue making Onkyo branded AV gear. And I guess maybe there'll be Onkyo branded earphones and headphones is what this kind of means to me.

But, um, 76 years, uh, Onkyo, the, the, the company that, that didn't really sound like it had anything left to sell was $24 million in debt, um, has gone under 76 years. It's pretty sad. Have you guys owned any Anki equipment ever? I have not. I've come across quite a bit, you know, in the professional AV installation, but I only know them from AV receivers. And they weren't that popular. You know, you saw them a fair amount, but they were nowhere near as popular as like a den on or or yamaha or something like that um i was just kind of shocked that they were still a company to be honest just because i i don't see

them that often so yeah i i can see at circuit city that was my favorite brand to sell because i sold a ton of the harman kardans and like every one of them died or came back and if you're in commission and product came back then you had to pay your commission back, which is not fun. So I immediately switched to Yonkio. And back in the day, I say back in the day, back in like the 90s, late 90s, what was it, the late last decade or last century or whatever, they were a pretty good brand.

And they had quality behind them. It was nice stereo equipment. Man, you had to pay back your commission even if they returned it because it was defective? they were a pretty good brand and they had quality behind them. It was nice stereo equipment. So man, you had to pay back your commission even if they return it because it was defective. Oh yeah. Oh, that sounds awful.

It was awful. Yeah. Circuit city, man. I think, I think my mom, my mom had a onkill receiver, but this would have been back in the seventies or sixties.

Yeah. I think it was one of those big heavy ones, right. That sat on a shelf back in the 70s or 60s yeah i think it was one of those big heavy ones right that sat on a shelf back in the days you know they used to have their own house parties with the huge speakers you know things got a lot smaller now a lot more efficient now it's not the same but i'm pretty sure she had one back then and i didn't even know what an ankyo was so i just knew how to turn it on yeah it always sounded like an awful name for like a pig or something it's just like awkward to say onkyo i think it means uh harmony or something in in japanese but uh i can't remember exactly what it what it i think it may be a clap like a combination of two different words uh that they put together um but it I was always, and I don't know if this is true,

but I was always told they had like one of the first, um, dual cassette deck, you know, back in like 1980 or 1981, you know, dual cassette deck where you could actually record. And that's kind of where they like took off, um, at least here in the States. So I don't know. I I've seen those on online. I'm not going to get one for the graveyard. I really don't need to add a giant component system to the tiny little IoT devices I've been collecting there in the background. But

yeah, sad to see them go. 76 years is a long time to be in business. And at one time was a pretty good product. Wow. I definitely have a soft spot for them in my heart, even though like, I know that in, in, in the past number of years, I've purchased them and they've, they've died. You know, like the receiver is just up and quit. And I was like, oh, this just isn't the same. It's not the same thing. Greg, Greg, run your thing. I have one. It sucks. And I'll send you my Ankyo. According to the Ankyo website, Ankyo means sound acoustics in Japanese. There we go.

So it did mean something. Not off brand, at least. Learn something new. There you go. All right. Let's move on here. In the state of Arizona, Vivint Smart Home has finally settled with them. A case that the Attorney General called false representations to introduce customers, to induce customers to sign a contract.

Provo-based Vivint has agreed to pay Arizona $325,000 in penalties and legal fees. It's also agreed to pay another $75,000 in restitution to its customers. In 2021, the FTC announced a $20 million settlement with Vivint, according to those allegations. In that case, Vivint's staff were using what one FTC commissioner referred to as identity theft to use credit card histories of people who did not consent to sign up for an account to be co-signers. Lee Ward of Kingman, Arizona says he's a Vivint customer who complained to the Arizona Attorney General. He said basically Vivint came to his house and said they do everything for about $45 a month around that ballpark.

He said, OK. They jumped in, and all of a sudden he had an $80 per month contract. So the service was good. It was just overpriced, and the deception of the sales thing was what ticked him off. Anyway, any Vivint customer there in Arizona who thinks they were entitled to restitution has until June 30th to file a complaint. You're going to miss out on that whopping $75,000. I'm sure that's not hurting Vivid at all. It's like a drop in the bucket.

Yeah, lawyers get paid. So that's good. Man. Well, I like how they say what they call as identity theft. It's like, is it identity theft or not? Like, we refer to it as that but it might not be i don't know like stealing someone's credit card credit information so you can like co-sign and get you know something financed um that's that sounds like identity identity theft

like you probably shouldn't be doing that it doesn't seem like it's a great business practice yeah and this basically backs up everything bad i've heard about Vivint. I've heard about this several times now. I've heard about, you know, basically just deceptive business practices in general, or just super overpriced service. So, I mean, it's crazy to me that you could go into, you know, an agreement for $45 a month and they send you a new one for $80 a month. I just don't understand that at all. How is this company still around? That is crazy.

Absolutely crazy. Oh, man. Well, I don't know. Gavin, you don't seem like a vivid customer up there in Canada. No, I can't relate to this story because in Canada we don't have identity theft or anything like that. We're totally safe up here. No, we don't even know what that means up here.

When we sign a contract, they never increase it on us. Not at all. I have contracts from the 60s still that I'm paying 30 cents for. Of course, that's all a lie like you know what it's come to the point now where when i sign a contract i'm only expecting it to be at that price for six months you know um whether i sign up for netflix i expect in six months there'll be a some kind of uh price range or a raise and there's nothing we can do about it it seems it's like you know my cell phone bill every six to twelve months they raise it by five more dollars right um what am i gonna do what can

we really do i i can't cancel my cell phone and it's so much of a hassle just to go to another provider i find so we just end up paying it a lot of the time. You and everybody else. Yeah, that's how they get you. Once you think you're out, they pull you back in. Yeah. All right, all right. Well, let's move on here to some more deceptive. No, wait, this isn't deceptive. This is just free TV.

Yeah, this is pretty obvious what it is. So it's pretty on the nose what they named it. Amazon FreeV, which is an ad-supported streaming service that's formerly known as IMDb TV, now has its own dedicated app on the Apple TV. FreeV, which was previously available on the Apple TV within the Prime Video app, so just kind of in that cludge, has now got its own app and it's available for download in the app store. Freebie offers Amazon Studios shows as well as other free movies and TV shows. They recently signed a deal with Disney so they can rotate in and out movies like Deadpool, Logan, and The Post, among other selections from Disney. It has over 75 channels for streaming. I thought this was kind of interesting. It includes an exclusive channel that only plays Kim's Convenience. There we go.

That's brilliant. That's a feel-good channel, if you ask me. You won't be able to pick the episode that it's playing, but it's free, so it's really hard to complain about that. It's like an iPod shuffle, but video. Exactly, exactly. The freebie app is not only on the Apple TV, it's like an ipod shuffle but video yeah exactly exactly uh the preview app is uh not only on the apple tv it's also on ios android roku and some lg samsung smart tvs xbox and the playstation so uh gavin are you are you gonna just load up the uh kim's convenience uh

you know it's fine canadian programming you going to load that up on and just watch it. It's a pretty good show. Actually, I watched it. It's great. I enjoy it. But every time I hear these these type of stories, I think we're going back towards cable. You know, now we're getting commercials back. They're calling it as you know, I'm calling them commercials.

And the part that really makes me worried is we're going to start off with one six second ad you know to watch your show but in six months it's going to be two 30 second ads plus like are you still watching click or something like that you know that you'll have to get by it's just gonna get worse and worse and worse and they're just gonna jam ads down it's you know i'm not interested in this if i'm paying for, I don't want to see ads. Right. Netflix. Yeah. Yeah. I could, I could totally see the appeal of this though. I mean, a lot of people don't want to pay for a streaming service. So as long as you're getting some good quality content on there, it's a no brainer for a lot of people. Um, but I'm in the same boat. I don't want to watch anything with ads at this point. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I, I would much rather

just skip the ads i don't and they're not like the ones they have on those streaming services aren't really relevant so to me at least like usually what you get on those are like the same commercial just over and over again like it could be it could rotate three times during the show and you watch the next show it's the same commercial on the same rotation and it's like okay i don't really i don't really need this or want this but they're getting their ad plays i guess that's how that works so basically you know if they made their ads better it wouldn't be as annoying like if everything was like a super bowl ad because super bowl is the only time where we

actually sit there looking for the ads right and? If you think about it, if they invested that, then they'd really... We'd be okay watching ads. I've got a million dollar idea for them. Super Bowl ad channel. Oh, genius. It's just the companies, the best companies in the world making the best advertisements and then displaying them all the time.

No, not even that. Just replay from like... Just start from the beginning of time and just replay the commercials that were broadcasted in the super bowl on this channel 24 7 all right that'll be one streaming classic and then we'll have another one with just new ones because we're gonna have multiple streaming services for the same thing i mean only during prime time would you have to play the new ones yeah exactly i mean and you could have another app completely set aside that can just do the current on-demand commercials, really. I think that would be great. Budweiser, little frogs, bud.

What's up? What's up? We should start next show like that. It's too good oh man bringing back some memories that was that was uh that was a common uh call call to action in college yeah oh absolutely for many many years all right all right well let's let's move on uh say goodbye to ads. Move on to new gear. New gear. We got new gear, guys. Yeah.

All right, let's start out with a cool one. Yet another Sonos leak from The Verge, where they have been able to confirm that Sonos will produce a smaller, more affordable subwoofer called the Sub Mini. Sonos Sub Mini. I guess I'm just going to call it Sub Mini. Or just the Mini. Why not? Rumors about such a device popped up a few months ago after sono's accidentally spilled some of the

early details in its mobile app at the time screenshots revealed the product's name the sub mini and the verge was able to further collaborate or corroborate the branding on that so uh they were also whoever this uh writer is at the verge. It's also seen pictures or something of these things being manufactured. I'm not sure, but they, they, they've seen enough to have like a full 3d render on the website, uh, of this product. So no specs are available yet. So I have to wait and see for Sonos to basically drop that information on the product. It's a small sub, a little cylindrical, has kind of that weird hole in the middle of it that Sonos likes to do.

Looks good, but I think the only question that we really care about on this show is what's this thing going to cost, guys? We need to start betting on this. I think that's what we're going to do. What is this thing going to cost in both U.S. and Canadian dollars? What are we going to do? I'm going to write them down. what is this thing gonna cost in both us and canadian dollars what are we gonna do i'm gonna write them down i don't i don't see how you could go above 449 for the subwoofer american dollars of

course the current sub is a thousand dollars right 749 hold on hold on hold on in canada it's way it seems like we're paying a lot more yeah your prices are prices are crazy. I have to look it up. But yeah, in American dollar roos, it is $7.49. So $7.49 for the sub. Yeah. All right. So $7.49. So I'm guessing $4.49.

I'm going to go with $5.99. Ooh, see, I think that's too high. Yeah, but we're talking about Sonos here. And Gavin and I were talking about this show. And anytime you think that Sonos is going to do something at a particular price point, it's probably going to be a hundred dollars more. So I'll say five 99. Yeah.

But that, I don't know. Cause that puts there. Cause I'm all, I'm all aboard them. The sub mini, I live in like a top four of a apartment and a sub mini would be perfect for me because I just don't need a ton of base.

I just need something. And this would be great. I don't know if I would be doing more than four 49 for it though. Cause you't need a ton of bass i just need something and this would be great i don't know if i would be doing more than 449 for it though because you can buy a u sub gen 2 probably for like five or six hundred dollars and that's like the sub mini is something exactly like i want just i didn't want the big sub i wanted the sub mini just like how the ray came out i was like that was just perfect just to you know but no matter how much i think it is it's always going to be more and they always seem to price it i think it is it's always going to be more

and they always seem to price it at that level where it's like well i can get the sub mini for this much or for another two three hundred bucks i can get the sub you know like they seem to do that really well um i'm gonna go with the six hundred dollar i guess um that's probably a 750 canadian guess you know i'm gonna go with that he's snaking me by one dollar all right so i've got tj in at 459 449 come on for 49 okay for 49 keep it on their other stuff i'm saying 599 i guess and then, Gavin, you're going to say in U.S. Freedom Dollars, you're saying it's going to be $600? Yeah, I'm going to go with the $1 above you. So if it comes out at $629, you win all three Showcase Showdowns.

Does this include tax? Is this plus tax, including tax? We don't do that VAT stuff here. Yeah, we don't do tax here. That's after the fact. Okay. If you don't have enough money for the tax, you don't get it. All right, I've got it written down in our show notes there.

So we'll have to come back to this whenever Sonos does spill the beans on it. But I agree with you guys. I'm excited about this one. I like the Subwoofer. I really like the subwoofer. I really like the subwoofer. It's one of the products that really rounds out some good product that Sonos does release, but it's almost like you have to have that sub for them to perform optimally. Like it seems like it, like Sonos sounds great by itself. Don't get me wrong. When you add that sub in, it's just a different,

a different world altogether with their product line. i i really do like what that sub does for the product so i will be happy to see them if they come out with a lower cost one it's not going to be 249 i guess we've all agreed on that like yeah it would be nice if it'd be nice if they could do 249 just like they did with the the ray right or 279 what if they what if they match the ray what if it's yeah i definitely don't see that happening no if they did that's an insta buy for me right because the sub is like a luxury device so they're they're able to charge more for it you know you don't need the sub but it sounds better with the sub so i'll have surround subs at that price yeah you buy more than one yeah maybe by the time this comes out, we can use our Sonos Ray as surrounds.

Yeah, you could just use it. Well, I mean, just think about it. You could get a Sonos Ray. You could have that for your front. You could have the subs. Can you use the Roams as surrounds? No. No.

Okay, so you've got to use starting at the 1s, right? Yeah, or the XPS speakers. I don't even think you can use the moves. So this is $200 for those. And then you're looking at another $300 for that. Yeah. So it'd be nice if they could price in somewhere a thousand dollars for, for its round system. But it looks like you, you're, you're probably going to go over that with, with what we're predicting yeah absolutely yeah because you're already at what's seven hundred dollars just for the seven yeah sound bar and two surrounds yep well i'm saying if they could come in at like

275 to 300 or somewhere in there you'd be in the ballpark but oh oh well it's not my money i mean it will be but it's not my could be I mean, it will be, but it's not my money. Could be. I don't know. If it comes out and it's like $629, which is Gavin's guess there, I'm definitely going down to Ikea and ripping something apart because that project is going to happen for sure. All right, all right. I got another pretty cool product here from Ecobee following even more leaks.

Smart home accessory maker Ecobee officially announced today a new smart thermostat premium. They're really having problems with their product names over at Ecobee. It has new key features, including a premium design and higher-end materials, larger display, a refreshed user interface,

improved sensor technology, including an air quality monitoring, and more environmentally friendly packaging. Ekeby said the new thermostat is built with the company's most advanced sensor technology for improved temperature readings, occupancy detection, and motion detection. And while the new built-in air quality sensor monitors indoor air quality, including estimated levels of carbon dioxide, so CO2 and volatile organic compounds, VOCs or toots, as we like to say, it's pretty much what it is, as well as relative humidity.

Let's see. The thermostat displays the air quality status directly on the screen. Let's see. The premium of, let's see. The smart thermostat premium is available to order starting today on Ecobee's website for $249. And there's a lower end thermostat enhanced model without the features like the air quality monitoring and the voice control stuff that's built into that one that's launching for $189. And the Ecobee 3 is going to remain down at $149. So they've got, I mean, all said and done, like Ecobee, it really does have a good round like portfolio of product that they have consistently

been able to deliver on year after year. Like how much can you do with a thermostat? And they've got all sorts of stuff built into this thing. Like we, you know, alarm alarm system. You can,

you can kind of trick it to listen for glass break and that kind of stuff. And like Amazon, Siri, everything's built into it. So it pretty good products. TJ, what do you think? Yeah, I mean, it looks like a very nice device. It looks very similar, but Gavin was saying the interface looks updated.

I'm interested about the air quality sensors. I think that's a welcome addition. And the tie-in with security systems I find fascinating. I don't know if security systems just got super easy to do now because everybody has a security system, and they're being built into everything. This one's built right into the thermostat, which is a cool idea, and it's only $10 a month.

Yeah, I think the monitoring has gotten super simple. It's crazy how cheap it is. That's cheaper than I can get it for, really. Yeah. Well, I mean, the APIs, like what is is that new moon moon or noon or something like that noon i think no noon light no noon yeah that's right yeah there's all these companies and i think they're just one of a couple that have basically built you know software connections into 911 call centers and that's what has basically made everything kind

of drop in price because you're kind of removing a little bit of the the human element out of it when you do that so instead of having a phone bank of a bunch of people laying around it just directly calls 911 and when you tell it to you which is nice gavin you were saying you like the new interface on this thing and that you were seeing other people did as well yeah i'm a big echobee fan i've had I have one of their older models and it's still kicking along. Like I really have to look to see if it's worth the upgrade to this one.

It's 330 Canadian. So it's a bit of change. I really like how, you know, Echobee integrates with everything easily. They have an open API, you know, that's great to see. I do like the integration with the alexa and um you know the siri because that adds extra features to it you know and you can stream spotify and bluetooth from it you know i don't know how many people stream music from their you know thermostat but

it just sounds awful if you ask me it's like it's it's why not no you're paying 250 for it might as well have bluetooth exactly exactly they do mention that they have hands-free calling and intercom built in i wonder if that's through the amazon lady um because that that's interesting to me because that's always um disabled in third-party products so if that's not disabled in this 30 third-party product they have an agreement with Amazon for that. That I would find interesting. And what happened this week on Tuesday, there was a pricing error at Home Depot in Canada for this.

So everybody was getting the premium at the enhanced price. Right? So I tried to jump on it, but as soon i i i got there too late they finally fixed it but no people were posting pictures of you know they got the premium one at the low price everything canadian thieves i mean it's a good canadian company up there they're just trying to make a living and buy generators and stuff for their families and you guys are ripping them off i know when we find something good we share it with all the other canadians you know and then we all you know the the most exciting the best ones are ones that get in early because then they cancel it and stuff like that and we all miss out you know

the thing about canadians when they find a good deal like that though they'll brag about it so you really feel left out uh it's funny that's funny yeah well it it seems like i mean even even at 250 it seems like a pretty good price for a smart thermostat given all the stuff that it does and i i like the uv because it's it is like pretty ubiquitous like i can use it for home kit or i can tie it in with the control 4 system i could tie it to amazon if I wanted to, or Google. They just kind of like, they work with whoever. And that's the way a good smart home product should be. I don't know how long-term that holds up, because it's probably really hard to do and keep up with all those integrations year after year. But they seem to be still able to do it and move their product forward every year.

So that's kind of nice. Well, for the most part, they just publish an API and everybody else integrates with them. So it's not really that difficult for them. But, you know, with the air quality sensor, I really like that built in. I just hope that they will release a mini sensor that also has it built in so we can see the air quality, you know, around the house and not just where the thermostat sits, right?

That would be cool. It's not too close to the bathroom or that VOO or whatever is just going to go. Red alert, red alert. Pulling in your bathroom to mess with everything. He's that little fainting canary. He's just going to flop over and die on the wall there. The sensor will get triggered.

It'll be a tie-in. I wonder how many people are going to blame the dog when the sensor gets triggered. What's crazy, too, is I think that that canary thing was more expensive than this Ecobee thermostat. The Kickstarter was only like $130, but I think the MSRP wasp was like 280 or something like that 279 yeah so you can buy an ecobee instead of that no it's infinitely more you you useful

the the ecobee not the canary but i was gonna say the canary is definitely a lot cooler looking but definitely not worth it yeah yeah well we'll have to keep an eye on this one i i i haven't seen the new user interface but i'm glad that they've updated it that the the old one was kind of i don't know i have one of the first generation ones that i use and it it it's okay like but it's not very intuitive to change the temperature and they've actually changed it over time i noticed it walked up to the other day and I moved the slider on the side. And instead of like having like this really small target area that I can move it in, I said, we'll just move a couple of degrees.

And it's all I wanted to do. But in the past, it's been like just a pain to use that interface. So I've avoided it and I just use the app or something. I don't know. It seems like they're, they're, they're always working on something over there, which which is nice they're always in it's always good to have a product that's continually approved um over over time you see that's the thing i barely use the interface because we just tell our voice assistant what to set the temperature to right like i've i the only time i ever noticed the thermostat is when i walk by and it actually lights up the screen because

it detects motion right but other than that if I want to know what the temperature is in various rooms we ask the voice assistant or we adjust it so that's why I like this one yeah mine's and mine even has that the flare system laid over laid over the top of it so it even further complicates things uh when I'm like I have completely different set points set up for it. And the Ecobee is either on or off depending on what the flare system was telling it to do, which causes some minor confusion here in the house. Let's just say between people who like to go over and make sure that I don't have to turn down too cold in the house. It's Florida though, man. It's hot. It's always hot. All right, guys, let's move on here.

We've got some new, the last new year that we've got is from a big company called TP link, which is better known for wifi routers and smart home gear, but it's aiming to change the reputation. The company's launched, uh, the TAPO, TAPO, T-A-P-O. I don't know how they're going to spell, say that, but let's just call it TAPO. A smart home line that revolves around budget 2K resolution security cameras. Indoors, you can pick from a stationary TAPO C110 for $30 or the pan and tilt, uh, TAPO C210 for $35. Oh, I would just get that one. $35. Okay. Anyway. Go outdoors and you can choose between the basic night vision

and IP666 weather resistant Taipo C310 for $50 or upgrade to the C320WS which is $60. It has a starlight sensor in it, spotlights, and two-way audio. All the cameras can record on microSD storage.

That's nice. Up to 256 gigabytes. Or you can use the Tape O'Care subscription. It comes with 30 days of video history and perks like baby crying detection, which I don't think would work really well outside. But I guess if a baby was crying outside, you probably want to know. They aren't just stopping there. So the company is also releasing LED RGB lights. So they have a light strip. The Taposmart L900-10, really working me over on these model numbers. They've

gotten progressively longer too. Anyway, it's for gamers and anyone that's hoping to liven up their rooms it's a 45 pack offers a 32.8 foot strip with support for 16 million colors dimming and music sync built in is this is this the new wise no definitely nowhere near as good and i'll have everyone know i just actually just bought the strip lights. So I'll have them tomorrow. I'll see. I have to see how they work from TV link or from wise. Yeah. From TP link.

Oh, interesting. Okay. Those ones are available for next day delivery. I was looking at the, the, uh, the two K camera,

uh, with the giant flappy wings on it. It looks like a bird. I love it. Um, but I really don't have any other reason for an outside camera right now so cannot justify it yeah it does look like it's gonna fly away like i would be afraid of a bird attacking or something right it's like thinks that thinks it's gonna attack it instead yeah what if it it has an uh air quality sensor built into it and it

it flips over when it detects. I'll blame the dog. Yeah, you blame the dog. But the LED light strip is not off to a good start. In the description, it says it has automatic control that you can do with a TAPO sensor. But it says TAPO sensor sold separately. The connectivity to TAPO sensor will be released later in 2021. Wait, what? So how do you control it?

Well, I think it's just like a motion sensor or something. Oh, okay. So you can tie it into a motion sensor. But it's not good if this just came out and the product is going to come out last year. Where's it at? Yeah, that's kind of how everything is these days yeah that's true interesting like these cameras don't look terrible and for the price i thought the 35 dollars for the indoor like pan tilt zoom camera i think it's even like higher than what wise is

pan tilt indoor cameras i think they're like 40 so a whole five more dollars and you could you could get the Ys there. So I don't know. It will be interesting. I think one of the things that has gotten Ys a little bit further down the road, not besides their like cheap prices,

is that they do have like, people have gone and like hacked them. And I don't know if they've like reluctantly let them hack them or just kind of like let people do what they want to do with them. But it seems I was looking the other day and there's a bunch of, uh, there was a bunch of like, uh, hacked things for wise cameras that I was looking at.

And I was going, you know, any other company would be like shutting this down. I don't, I don't know. Wise seems to be like, yeah, just buy our hardware and you can use the logins for this stuff and run backdoor services on our products and we don't care well i feel like that's probably true though because like for the longest time they had rtsp support on the cameras not directly like somebody came up with some hacked firmware for it and then wise was just like all right you guys can do this and wise makes money a lot off their services and stuff and they're they're the fact that they have a whole ecosystem now that works together with each other um they they

make money off of that so hacking the cameras aren't as like uh attractive anymore it's more like getting everything to work together and nobody can out wise wise at this point they've got everything covered you know at this point i mean i was trying to think of other things they could come out with maybe a wise coffee maker at this point i would probably purchase one of those you know they're they're getting into that market but they got everything covered right now somebody needs to send them that switchbot video we had like a month or two ago they'll come out with an automatic toilet flusher. Ooh, yeah, yeah. That would be a great addition.

Oh, there we go. We could have the wise, yeah. You could do that with the air quality sensor from Ecobee. So that way when somebody poos, it automatically flushes. Having poos. The 10 in the L900-10, that's 10 meters. So LEDs and everything are all done in in in meters and centimeters and when you got to cut them it's in usually in like 100 centimeter sections but like we have to

convert them over here to our freedom units and it's like always these weird 32.8 or 16.4 or whatever it's like drives me nuts i wish uh if you need help converting you know we're so used to it just as asked me it's crazy to me like, like patch cables are done in meters, bolt cables done in feet. LED light strips are done in meters. It's like such a mismatch. They're done in feet though. They're done.

They're done in feet. Like here in the States, they're done in feet. I mean, like they're clearly, they're clearly made. 10 meters is 3.80839 feet or whatever. So like, um, they're clearly manufactured in centimeters and meters, but unfortunately we have to convert them to 16.4 or, I mean, I don't know why they, I don't know why led lights and strips have settled in on feet. Like why not meters? Like just like HDMI cables, like you need a nine or a three meter hdmi cable why why why did they settle in on feet it just this one this one in this particular product

just drives me crazy so now you know how i feel when i watch cnn and see the temperature reports i sit there doing math through the whole program it's a it's a tough life up there with your with your no fraud and math you have to do that's why we have a great school system for conversions and free health care for when things go wrong yeah you you can't you can't pull the wool over this man's eyes he's always doing math on CNN. So there's no fooling a Canadian.

Yeah. It's just... All right. Well, I don't know. I do like the price points of the cameras. I hope they're pretty good. They look decent. The little wings are cute.

I don't know if I would... I would personally put them anywhere, but... Greg's a TPp link so you know i've always used tp link for like their networking switches and that kind of thing i've never used them for anything more advanced than that though but they make they make heck of a heck of a cheap switch so yeah yeah and and sometimes in stock like it's it's pretty much all you can get these days sometimes so yeah uh becoming more of a brand name just by the default, I guess, at this point in time. All right, guys. Well, that pretty much wraps everything up that we've

had for Home Tech Headlines. All the links and topics we've discussed tonight can be found on our show notes at hometech.fm slash 388. All right, guys. Pick of the week this week this is a fun one added into the stream this i ran across this and this is probably the coolest use of is this augmented reality i guess this is not really odd well we can't we can't see what that guy's doing so i wouldn't say it is but supposedly the guy and it with the hard hat on and stuff is using vr oh, okay. But we don't see what he's seeing. So I couldn't. All right. So let's like describe this for,

for people who are not watching the live stream, which is only one person at this point, but every Jason, Jason Griffin was here and he had to bail. I was gonna, I'm gonna go probably take care of the family this time of night. Uh, but anyway,

uh, thanks Jason for stopping by. Uh, so this is like one of those large rooms that has the projection systems in it that are basically mapped to the floor and everything's all lined up. So there's, it's probably, this is like a warehouse size room and it looks like the entire floor is a projection screen in here and there are people walking around and what they have projected on the floor is actually the floor plan of this house. And so you're able to in like actual feet and inches because it's

American, right? You're able to walk into this house and see exactly how big your kitchen sink will be or your living room is going to be. You can walk right up to the countertop space and visualize it that way rather than kind of like seeing it on a plan in front of you. I honestly, I would love to have something like, or to have had something even remotely like this, uh, when I was selling stuff, cause we could just go around and just drop our speakers in each room and say, this is where this is going to be. We'll put the TV right here on the wall. This is amazing. This is really, this is a really great idea and use of this technology. Yeah. That's kind of what I i was thinking too is that like you could even partner up with

like an interior designer or something if you had this technology and like fit out the whole house with whatever furniture or carpet or rugs or whatever you wanted and you could see how it all actually fits in there yep the only the only way i would see this is better is if they could do like virtual walls somehow so you can actually walk through it. But obviously I think we're a little far off that. Yeah. I mean, I guess anything is possible with, with enough money and time, but like, I've actually seen, um, I think, I think somebody was showing that off at who, in one of our home tech docs, not recently, they were, there was like a kitchen that they could just project the finishes on. And, and you, when you walk into the showroom, you basically pick out your finishes and they just project it on this kind of a generic kitchen. So you can get

the look and feel of it. And you see all the finishes and what the finished product would actually look like in front of you. I'm not sure who was talking about that, but they did show us a video or some pictures. And I thought that was a pretty good idea. I really like this use of projection technology. If anybody's familiar with it, like that Van Gogh thing that's been going through, it's been on tour for a while. This is kind of the same idea where it's just like a bunch of high-end projectors strewn up on a ceiling on some scaffolding. And they just shine down on walls and floors and that kind of thing. And just, it, it, it, it's not as like disorienting to look at than you think.

Like it's actually looking at this video, I'm like, oh man, this could make you sick after a while. But when being in, in like in there, when stuff is actually moving in that kind of thing, um, it wasn't, it wasn't disorienting like you it was really cool to just be immersed in that experience and and in this case like you can build your entire house and and and set set like oh this this wall i don't like i would like to have more room here but one of these like the scenes here they've got like a chair sitting in the living room or something it's like what if you put a chair there and you sat there and you looked around and said no i'd really like this room to be bigger

move this wall back some and they could just go right over the cad and just kind of like move stuff around for you right then and there that's pretty cool it looks like the guy one of the guys is like he's got the goggles on he's immersed in it it looks like he's having a great time and it looks like he's like moving stuff around and doing things um that we can't see but this whole ar has come so far that every time the camera pans over and i see the chair come into view i also think that's fake too for some reason it just doesn't look you know it just doesn't look right like right there but um it's this is such a cool concept yeah it really it really is um tj you were saying you could team up with a like a

interior designer or something but like you could you could team up with a like a interior designer or something but like you could you could team up with a couple of trades in the area and just build like this into a giant warehouse throw the plans up there and and use it as like a shared space if the technology and software and everything was easy to use you know or any your average joe sales guy could walk in and and you know uh go go through the plans and do their walkthrough real fast. Um, I think this would be beneficial to more than just the AV trades. And clearly this is a builder. It looks like Willem, William something homes or something like that. Can't quite read it. It's a little small on my screen. William David co company. Yeah. I think that's

one of the bigger home builders here in the States. They don't have them here, but I've heard the name before. But yeah, I like this. I hope we start seeing more stuff like this existing out in the real world for real people because this is technology. It makes things helpful. And if you get in there and you're like, man, I really like how these projectors look. Maybe I could get a home theater or something. Maybe sell some home theaters with it it looks fun i want to go play in this room and uh walk around in a very large house that doesn't exist on the

floor it looks really it looks like a lot of fun i just think you will never look cool when you're in vr world to someone outside of vr world you know like there's never gonna be a point where it's like that guy looks so cool you know like there's never gonna be a point where it's like that guy looks so cool you know i think it'll just go the way of cell phones like whenever you saw someone you know 10 15 years ago walking around with a cell phone in public you're like man that person's totally disconnected from reality and they don't know what's going on and now it's like that person's not on a cell phone what are they doing they're disconnected from our virtual reality yeah serial killer yeah now if you see somebody at a coffee shop that's not like, they're just sitting there enjoying their coffee.

You're like, that's a psychopath right there. Yeah. What does that person do? A stalker. Everybody's watching him. He's using up space that we need. Why is he on Wi-Fi? This is ridiculous.

All right. Well, if you have any ideas for show feedback, questions, comments, or picks of the weeks, give us a shout. Our email address is feedback at hometech.fm. You can visit hometech.fm slash feedback and fill out the online form there. All right. That wraps up another week. I've got a TV show I started watching.

One of those guilty pleasure TV shows, I guess. So have you ever heard of this thing called Halo? I guess it was a video game that was kind of popular. Xbox. I didn't realize they made that into a TV show. Yeah, it's on the Paramount+. I think it's a Showtime TV show. Because it does kind of have some buttocks in it, I guess.

It's not really – I was like, oh, it's going to get risque here. And then like, no, it was just very basic TV. I guess they could put this on any channel. I think there's language in it. But other than that, it's exactly what you think it is. Space, aliens, shoot them up. Overcomplicated story. Jarheads.

Not very complicated story. Well, it's one of those stories that you have to, you know, if you're not paying attention to it, then you're lost again. You got to rewind it and figure out like what's going on. But then you just ignore it and you're caught back up into some other story. So it's all right well the main character to me sounds like vera de milo which is uh jim carrey's character on the living color i don't know if you remember that one do you guys remember yeah i don't so yeah well we'll just go ahead and skip into this here and i can actually share this back because add it back to the stream there uh let's

so yeah vera de milo was, uh, one of like Jim Carey's like amazing characters. And like, if you ever watch him, uh, he, he, this character appears quite often in some of his comedy, uh, later on in his career, but, uh, very early on when he was hanging out with, uh, you know, comedians or j-lo was in in living color everybody seemed to be in living color it was crazy um yeah a good show uh and yeah if you listen to halo and you and you think vera then you'll you'll you you can't unhear it but uh yeah i'll take that away from the show thanks for ruining it for me seth thanks for i don't i don't know it's he's I don't know he's like he's like a soldier or something and he's

genetically engineered and he's just kind of like a jarhead you know just kind of like doing his thing as a soldier and that's all he thinks about and shenanigans happen he gets a conscience and he goes against it. He gets a conscience, yeah.

They deprograms and that kind of thing. And there's a sex scene. There is. There is. Master Chief. That's not in the video games. It's canon now. I'm sorry.

You can't. No take backs. Jeez. He kept his helmet on. He did. The closest thing to that in the video games was teabagging. Well, that's what he did the whole time it was it was a really awkward sex scene so i'm glad they brought it back at least yeah yeah pretty good show um like like like gavin saying you don't have to think much you

can leave it on the background and and watch it um but yeah uh i kind of took a break from my my my star war start star trek binging there for discovery and switched over that because i heard a few people talking about it and i was like i'll check it out and yeah not bad not a bad show can't can't complain for you know paramount paramount plus i guess they gotta have something on there to watch. And Star Trek Brave New Worlds is amazing if you really want to see that. That one I highly recommend. TJ's just shaking his head down there, but he's too busy.

He's like, is it cake? Or did I have my hunter license or whatever? Hey, don't hate on the funny Star-Lord now. Too good, too good. If it makes you feel any better, we went back to house this weekend, so we're going even older. That's old school, yeah. Hugh Laurie.

That's right. Yeah. We're sitting around trying to figure out what we're going to watch next, and we were pulling some things up that were kind of on the Netflix queue. We watched about 20 or 30 minutes of it, and it's like, yeah, I we're going to watch next. And we were pulling some things up, uh, that were kind of on the Netflix queue watched about 20 or 30 minutes of it. And it's like, yeah, I don't want to watch this. It's just like skip next one. There's a just unforgettable or just forgettable shows, I guess. And, um, I would say like three fourths of my TV watching now is just looking for something to watch. So it's a first world problem to have, right? All right. All right, guys all right guys well uh we do want to give

a big thank you to everyone who supports the show but especially those who are able to financially support the show through our patron page if you don't know about our patron page head on over to hometech.fm support to learn how you can support hometech for as little as a dollar a month any pledge over five bucks a month gets you a big shout out on the show but every pledge gets you an invite to our private slack chat the hub where you and other supporters of the show can gather just about every day and talk about what are we talking there's been a lot of stuff flying in there lately um greg put in this crazy thing i i don't know what this multi-input recorder switcher thing for 2100 dollars and yeah the yolo box yeah there's been a lot of good conversations that have gone on over the last couple weeks.

The idiot sandwich meme or gif is always a great one. Beautiful, beautiful, yeah. So, yeah, just a lot of good conversations. I saw even before that that there was, like, some questions. See, the Slack, you know, it's kind of like one of those like Wild West things. Like there's, it's self-moderating, right? So like, I don't really do anything on there

because we're all, everybody on there is, you know, it's ladies and gentlemen only. Like it's an elite club. We don't let the riffraff in. We'll kick them out if they come in. But, you know, everybody in here is just, you know, really wants to help this community. So we get all these really good questions. But one of the things that's happened is that threads have started to appear in Slack.

And this is a new feature in Slack where you can reply and like you don't see all the replies until you like go into it. And yeah, i miss so much with threads i i have not ever been able to figure out how those work in slack so um all the good stuff's in in in threads now i guess is what i'm trying to get at and say i don't understand your your dislike of threads i mean they just i guess they make sense to me but maybe not i don't know you know i just i i just mainly don't like how they're implemented in Slack. Like, they just seem to be. They're just side conversations the way I look at them, you know?

And I think you can see threads that are updated at the top or something like that. You can, but there's not. Yeah, top left. But that only counts for the ones that you've commented on. Exactly, exactly. So that's where that kind of stinks. But, yeah, you can just go to threads in the top left, and it'll pull up all the ones that you've commented on. Exactly. Exactly. So that's where that kind of stinks, but yeah, you can just go to threads in the top left and it'll pull up all the ones

that you've been part of. Anyway, Slack, thank you so much for your free product. We're complaining about a free product here. But yeah, I'm not, not a fan of the thread things.

I wish, I wish it was like unfolded a little bit or something inside where I can actually see what people are talking about without diving into it. Like expanded view or something. Yep, just something a little extra, a little extra. Anyway, if you want to help out the show but can't financially support, totally understand, just appreciate a five-star review on iTunes

or a positive rating in podcast app of your choice to help people find the show. That wraps up another week in home tech from everyone here. Have a great weekend and we will see you next week. Take care. Bye.