The world
just got smarter
72 | MACFORMAT | APRIL 2020
here’s little better
predictor for what
the tech future
holds than CES,
the annual Las Vegas trade show
that traditionally kicks off the
year. Major companies turn up
to show off new releases, fancy
prototypes, and fresh technologies;
there’s a slight underlying thread
of one-upsmanship between
business competitors, which
extends all the way from the size
of their booths to the brightness
of their screens. 2020’s show was
absolutely no different – and much
of the war was fought on the smart
home battlefield.
Let’s take the camera sector as
an example. We saw a high profilesmart camera from Arlo, which
unveiled its Pro 3 Floodlight ($249,
around £190), a wireless cam with
a wired option, toting a bright and
customisable floodlight around
its 2K HDR sensor – check out our
review on p84. We saw another
from fast rising company Abode,
which revealed its Indoor/Outdoor
Smart Camera ($199, around
£150), a tiny device which ties into
the company’s Cue automation
system and (we understand) has
been submitted for HomeKit
certification, which means it may
one day add to the unjustly slim
pickings in that department.
Eve, probably HomeKit’s
biggest supporter, went one step
better revealing the indoor-only
Eve Cam (£TBC), due to
start shipping in April.
The cloud-free cam is the
first camera designed
exclusively for Apple’s
HomeKit Secure Video
protocol, and it’ll assuage
the fears of those who
don’t like their footage
running through some
anonymous server
who-knows-where online.
Security firm ADT also
unveiled a trio of cameras
which will (eventually) getHomeKit support. We’re half
convinced that the HomeKit
camera market might actually
come to something...Take to the skies
D-Link showed off its neat and
fairly traditional full HD DCS-
8000LHV (£TBC), a tiny cylinder
of a camera that (beyond its 138º
lens) sets new standards for
discretion; Sunflower Labs’ Bee
proved far less traditional, a
bananas roving security drone
that emerges from its charging
hive and hones in on movement
without human intervention. With
a base price of nearly $10,000
(around £7,700), the Bee is unlikely
to be patrolling your personal
grounds any time soon, but it’s a
demonstration of what’s possible- and far cheaper security drone
systems should emerge in its wake.
That’s part of the charm of CES - you see the tiny improvements,
and you see the way-out-there
leaps in technology. You also get
the plain weird: Charmin’s RollBot
(yes, that’s Charmin the toilet
paper manufacturer) is a self-
balancing rollable that will scoot
over with a fresh roll should you
ever run out. Charmin also unveiled
the SmellSense, a device designed
T
APPLE HOME CES 2020
Arlo’s Floodlight camera can be entirely battery powered- plug it in, though, and you get double the brightness.
CES 2020
Image credits (left to right, top to bottom): Arlo, FasTeesHFrom security cameras to robots to automatic toilet roll
deliveries, here’s a glimpse into next year’s smart tech