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PM: The possibility of damaging something is the only reason I haven’t ordered anything yet 😀 I didn’t think they’d be able to launch anything near the city though, I was expecting to either go deep into the Beacons, or head to somewhere like Pendine Sands.

Dave: Thanks for the link 🙂 I’d found them, but didn’t realise that they were fairly local. The design of their site genuinely hurts my eyes, so I haven’t been able to get through much of it. I’ll have to wait for their next meet though, I’m away for this one. If they’re any good, I might offer to update their site to get into their good books 😛

Ed and Richard: Those are the types of kits I was hoping you could still buy – something half decent that is probably a bit scary too 😀

Mark: Thanks for the link 🙂 I didn’t realise how cheap it was to buy kits. I’ve been looking at the cheap DIY stuff,expecting the kits to cost a small fortune.

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Dave Rice wrote:

I have been using TP-LINK TL-WA801ND 300 Mbps Wireless N Access Points in AP, Bridge and Client modes for the last 2 / 3 years and find them rock solid. As you are dealing with Ethernet and set up is via a browser they are o/s neutral. They have 5dbi antenna so signal is only an issue of you live in an “awkward” house.

Would I be right in thinking that these would have a better signal than something with a built in antenna? I’m still getting dead spots at home, and for that price I might just give it a try. Would there be much actual difference in signal strength with the 450 Mbps version with three antenna? It’s currently £30

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The Duke wrote:

Though this will only work if your outdoor light are wired in like a house lamp would be. Chances are they will be.

Thanks Steve, but mine are wired in like the indoor lights. I might have a look at them for the garage lights though. The ceiling and insulation need doing, so the wires for the strip lights are exposed at the moment. I might see if something like this works with them and set them up to come on before Ellen takes the car out in the morning and switch on and off when she’s at a set distance away etc., and put a voice control on the separate set of lights at the back of the garage. You can guarantee that I only need those when I’m under a bike and something’s been moved in the way of the switch (the genius who had the house before us only put a switch at the back of the garage, and not at the front with the others…).

The Xmas tree is a good idea too, as well as the downstairs light. Because the living room is upstairs, we’ve got to go downstairs just to turn the tree off, or the light at the bottom of the stairs.

I might go through the whole house and see what can be automated now that I know how to do it. Better wait until after Xmas though 😀

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I’m tempted to splash out on a few smart bulbs for the waterproof fittings along the front of the house. My house is effectively upside down, so it takes a minute to answer the front door, especially when I’ve got my hands full with Alice. Being able to say something like ‘Ok Google  turn on the outside lights’ would be handy and would let a delivery driver know that I’m on the way.

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I bought one of these as a burglar deterrent for the xmas period:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07CB7R8FX

It’s not bad. It’s not bright enough for a living room light, but for a lamp or bedroom light, it’s great. The colours don’t match up with the app, so red sometimes comes out orange, or purple if you’re the other end of the band, but it’s nothing major.

It’s great for keeping my daughter entertained though. I tell the lamp to listen to Alice, and she tells it to change colour, or turn on and off with me controlling it from the app. She was shouting at it today though as it wasn’t listening to her. All we could hear was ‘Lamp! Listen to Alice!’ ?

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Glad to see that you’re back Bob, and faster than ever 😀

Pharmacy were always the bane of my life when trying to get home, but in UHW they were servicing a huge hospital of inpatients and outpatients, and the representatives on the renal wards are lovely, so I couldn’t get too upset with them.

I want to know your secret now that you’re home though – who did you have to sleep with / threaten to get your internet sorted? ??

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Ed P wrote:

When I did an audit of my PCs I found that by upgrading BOTH the GPU and CPU I could get a 5 year pay-out in just Leccy savings

What did you use to get the power figures Ed? I could do with checking mine and possibly changing to more power efficient parts.

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Does the Pocophone have a custom launcher? It’s EMUI that causes the problems with the Honor 9 and Android Auto.

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Thanks Richard, I remember the stories you mean now. I thought that the bigger names had resolved the issues, and the older devices essentially just needed the login details changed. It’s been a few years since that story broke, so I may not be remembering it correctly though.

Dave Rice wrote:

I’m not sure any of them do upload to “Amazon”.

Of course, yeah. I keep forgetting that people can run their own servers through Amazon now.

Dave Rice wrote:

So for most people you’d only need the first two for a one off cost of £200 which will last many years and be supported in that time, not abandoned by the OEM once it’s a few months old. But I’ve been trying to convince so many of you here…

For what it’s worth, I’m a convert, but with an empty wallet ?

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Thanks for letting us know Lee

Tell Bob we’re thinking of him here too. It sucks now, but he’s in the best place, and when he gets out, he can have a meal from the garden centre he recommended. It sounded lovely and made me a bit jealous :p

 

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Dave Rice wrote:

If I come across the “I only want to pay £x and that’s it” I will walk away…

Oh, if only I could! ??

I’ve broken your reply up to answer it 🙂

 

Dave Rice wrote:

Tippon, you can take no notice of what they claim, it’s meaningless. Think about photography and the difference between what a £50 Argos job and an SLR can do at the same resolution. Look for You Tube clips and reviews.

Then there’s cloud storage and the apps. Read carefully and look for what they don’t say. You may be able to view clips, can you download them? If so to what? How long will the service be in existence?

Don’t record at 25fps, 8 fps is more than enough and cuts storage and bandwidth by two thirds. H265 compression is much better than H264 but at this price level I doubt you’ll find it. Avoid MPEG.

“Smart” tracking – when it’s looking one way it’s not looking in the other. Go for a 90 degree camera and put it in the corner of the room. PTZ – pan / tilt / zoom will not be of any use for the same reason.

These are the things I didn’t think of. I haven’t got a lot of experience with security cameras, so thanks again for helping me 🙂 I should have remembered your first point though, I’ve got a cheap GoPro clone, and the ‘4K’ quality isn’t very good.

I think I’ll stick to cameras that can upload to Amazon, or one of the other big names. At least then he’s got some sort of backup if the camera gets nicked too, as well as being able to stream a live view if it’s included. I’d forgotten all about your post on cutting down the frame rate. The cameras and apps I’ve found don’t mention it, only whether you can change the quality.

Thanks for the heads up on smart tracking and PTZ. Again, not something I would have thought of. He’s got quite a small living room, so a static or moving camera should be able to capture pretty much all of it. I’m quite tempted to get at least a PTZ camera just for the gimmick so that they think it’s better at this point. Like RGB fans in a windowless case ?

 

Dave Rice wrote:

2 way audio is often a waste of space due to latency plus you MUST NOT record audio or YOU could be in a whole heap of trouble.

Notification of motion detection sounds great but you’ll likely get a lot of false alarms.

Cheap IR can cut off at short distances and cause under / over exposure.

And as Richard says, security.

Thankfully they’re not interested in two way audio. I think even they’ve realised that it’s more of a gimmick. I can see him using it to give whoever’s checking on his house a scare, but that’s about it. Ironically, given how tight the budget is here, he’s recommended that I buy a Nest video doorbell so that I can see who’s at the door and let them know if I’ll be delayed because of my daughter…

As far as motion detection goes, we should be ok, as because of the small room, the camera won’t cover a window, and there are no pets etc. As long as he remembers to turn it on when he leaves home, it should only pick up whoever’s taking care of the house. IR will hopefully be ok for the same reason – there’s not a huge difference from corner to corner.

As an aside, I’m going to suggest a few dummy cameras for outside his house, covering the front door and side access. I’ve found a few that look realistic, so will hopefully deter any chancers.

@sawboman I was under the impression that the risk from the better known Chinese companies was inflated by the Trump administration, or at least the US security services, in response to the current trade war. I may well be wrong though, I didn’t pay a huge amount of attention to it at the time.

@edps You’ve just reminded me of a potentially huge problem – The newest Homehub causes big problems for lots of devices that can only use the 2.4GHz wifi. I’ve been having trouble with a smart bulb, and most of the online help says that it’s trouble. I need to check what router he has.

Thanks again for your help with this guys. It’s not a subject that I know much about, and with her family moving the goalposts as I’m starting to get to grips with things, my brain’s rebelling ?

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Dave Rice wrote:

The free secure connection is limited to 300mb / day. Premium Protection – Annual Subscription £20 (monthly £4) for 5 PCs unlimited and various locations http://tinyurl.com/y76etxpa

Thanks for the heads up Dave.

It’s a bit naughty of them, there’s no mention of that on Amazon. I would have bought it on the assumption that it’s a ‘proper’ VPN.

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Kaspersky is on Amazon’s Black Friday sale, and the 10 device version is £17 and includes a VPN.

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Have a look on piracy forums. If they don’t work, they get busted, so they take their VPN seriously 😀

Private Internet Access and NordVPN seem to be mentioned regularly. If you want to stay private, I think they both accept gift vouchers as payment too, like Google Play cards and iTunes vouchers.

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Dave Rice wrote:

For internal use I use the Hikvision DS-2CD2442FWD-IW with an SD card. As you can see they are £135 on Amazon but I can get one trade for you, about £95 (less if you can pick it up from Cardiff) plus £20 for an SD card and 12v PSU from Amazon.

Thanks Dave, that’s a great offer 🙂 I’ve asked them today though, and they won’t go that high on the price 🙁

 

Dave Rice wrote:

£50 gets you the sort of device you’ve linked to. There’s a You Tube review here and I think it’ll do the job for you, but I’d put an SD card in for recording. However I have no idea of the functionality of the app and I can’t see it for sale in the UK!

Crap! I found it on Amazon originally, and it wasn’t much more than I would expect from buying it from America and getting it posted. The sellers have either taken it off sale or put the price right up now 🙁

One of the comments on the Youtube video said that it’s a rebranded Xiaomi Mijia camera. They’re in stock for a decent price, but won’t get here for up to two months >.<

I’ve found a few cameras through Amazon that fit their budget, but some have caveats. I’m going to post a list here for my own reference, but if you wouldn’t mind having a look to see if I’ve missed anything obvious, I’d be very grateful 🙂

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wireless-Security-Monitor-Surveillance-Detection/dp/B07FDBBT4R – 1080p. One month free through Amazon Cloud Storage then needs a subscription (I’ve got 5GB, but don’t know if that’s because of Prime. It’s £16.99 for 100~GB for a year otherwise). Can be used wired and wireless. Compatible with Alexa? Has smart tracking and face detection. Also has sound detection. Can be viewed by multiple users. Uses HDR to eliminate dark spots and highlights. Takes up to a 64GB card, not 128. Seems to be the best of the bunch.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/YI-Wireless-Security-Surveillance-Activity/dp/B07CPRCPY8 – 720p and no PTZ. Needs an SD card or subscription (from $66 a year for 7 days loop recording on either motion detected vids for up to 5 cameras, or continuous upload for one camera). Two cameras rather than one, and can be removed from the white housing to be placed into a dome etc.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0743BVL2C – 1080p. Needs an SD card or subscription (from $66 a year for 7 days loop recording on either motion detected vids for up to 5 cameras, or continuous upload for one camera). Slightly over budget. Has PTZ and can be modified for a wider vertical range.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/DIGOO-Wireless-Security-Surveillance-Detection-White/dp/B07HN1FG7T – 720p. Probably needs to be ceiling mounted. Doesn’t seem able to look down. Cheapest of the group. 7 days free upload to Amazon cloud, but no info in the description.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07GZGYSN4 – 1080p. May need to be ceiling mounted. Not much info on storage. Can be used wired as well as wireless.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/VERSION%E3%80%91APEMAN-Security-Surveillance-Wireless-Detection-1080p/dp/B07GNZ2N1Y – 1080p. Cloud storage is one month free then subscription. Can only be used through the Eyecloud app. Can be used wired and wireless.

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No worries. I’m just glad I got the right OS this time 😀

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If you’ve got the tab view, right click a blank space underneath the Mozilla Thunderbird header, and to the right of the tabs, and you should see the option to add the menu bar, mail toolbar (looks like the one you want), and folder pane toolbar.

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Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion is currently free through Humble Bundle if you subscribe to their newsletter. Free for existing subscribers too.

https://www.humblebundle.com/store/sins-of-a-solar-empire-rebellion

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Dave Rice wrote:

Just ask them to take you off their list.

Where’s the fun in that? 😉

D-Dan wrote:

GDPR requires people to give permission. Existing permissions when GDPR was introduced endured. It’s likely that you already gave permission and forgot.

Nope. They were an Ebay shop, and I’ve had no reason to ever get in touch. I keep my shopping emails locally, so I’ve still got everything from back then, and there’s no contact other than through Ebay.

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To be honest I hadn’t really thought about it. I’ve never needed one before  but because the baby’s been ill, I’ve been awake at all hours. Something gentle to help me drop off would have been handy.

I might try out a language course or a podcast now that I know about it though

[Author]

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