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Tech

08th Aug 2021

Tech Corner: Google ups its game with smarter and cheaper Nest cameras and doorbell

Alan Loughnane

Tech Corner Google Nest

Welcome to the party, pals.

You’re reading the latest edition of Tech Corner and we’re taking a look at some smart home security this week.

Google has announced a new line of home security cameras and a video doorbell under its Nest brand, and from the specs, they promise to be smarter and cheaper than anything the company has produced previously.

The new product line-up includes the Nest Doorbell, Nest Cam, Nest Cam with Floodlight and the new Nest Cam Indoor.

All of the four are optimised HDR and Google says this helps to provide better quality video both during the day and at night. Google also claim the cameras have high pixels and frame rates for more detailed recordings.

They’re also smarter and able to discern between people, animals, packages and vehicles and provide specific alerts for each of them.

So why is this a big deal?

Well, strangely enough, all of the products cost less than the inferior products they’re replacing. So bad luck if you forked out for the old ones over the past few months.

But the with the ability to differentiate between people and other things means that Google can send more relevant notifications and not be sending you a warning every time a leaf or a plastic bag drifts by your house.

It achieves this through the Tensor Processing Unit which is more reliable and is being introduced in the smartphone game in the recently announced Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro.

Google Nest Cam (battery) is Google’s first outdoor/indoor battery-powered camera (210); Google Nest Doorbell (battery) is its first battery-powered doorbell (210), although it should be noted that both of these have an option to be wired as well.

Then there’s Google Nest Cam with floodlight, Google’s first connected floodlight camera (€315) and finally the second-generation Google Nest Cam (wired), which the company calls its most affordable wired indoor camera (€105).

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