Following the Nest Cam outed by Best Buy earlier this morning, Nest did in fact take the stage today to announce its new lineup of products. Besides the Nest Cam, Tony Fadell and company showed off the 2nd generation Nest Protect smoke detector, a new mobile app for iOS and Android that brings all of the company’s new products together, and more. Unfortunately, the company’s flagship Nest Thermostat didn’t get any hardware upgrades today, but here’s what’s new… Expand Expanding Close
The official Nest Mobile app for iPhone and iPad appears to have been removed from the App Store for the time being following complaints from users that the latest version of the app crashes at launch. The Nest Mobile app is used to remotely interface with the Nest Learning Thermostat and Nest Protect smoke and carbon monoxide detector from the iPhone and iPad.
Nest has acknowledged the issue via Twitter with a message regarding the software bug: “We’re currently investigating an issue causing the Nest iOS app version 4.4.0 to quit unexpectedly. We’ll provide a status update shortly.” Nest founder and CEO (and former Apple exec) Tony Fadell also acknowledged the issue on Twitter offering an apology to a user.
In the blog post announcing the return of the Protect, the company boasted some of its safety statistics and recounted the story of one Nest Protect user who was alerted to the presence of carbon monoxide in his home by the device, which saved his life. Nest’s Doug Sweeny writes:
The Nest Protect, which retails for $129 in both a wired and battery powered variant, intelligently interacts with an iPhone app called Nest Home with warnings about low batteries (if applicable) and when alarms are active or about to be active. It also features a handy dismissal gesture for silencing a screaming alarm.
Some users, however, are reporting a number of unprompted false alarms unrelated to cooking or other reasonable instances. One user even reported the alarm stubbornly going off for 30 minutes in the middle of the night with no sign of smoke and ignoring prompts to dismiss the alarm after an apparent glitch in the device… Expand Expanding Close
We originally reported last month that Nest Labs, the company founded by famed iPod creator Tony Fadell, was readying its next product for launch soon: the smart fire detector. Nest Labs officially announced today that the ‘Nest Protect’ will be joining the lineup with the smart thermostat.
The Nest Protect detects smoke and carbon monoxide and addressses some of the flaws of modern smoke detectors and of course connects it to your iPhone in the process:
Nest believes that safety shouldn’t be annoying, so they started from scratch and built a new smoke + CO detector, the way it should be done, with advanced features under a sleek interface:
· Heads-Up: Instead of just beeping at you, Nest Protect gives you helpful vocal warnings before conditions get dangerous. And if you have more than one Nest Protect in the home, you can connect them so you’ll know where the danger is, no matter which room you’re in.
· Nest Wave: No more climbing on chairs to reach your detector. You can silence Nest Protect by simply waving at it.
· Mobile app: Get low-battery alerts and Emergency Alarm notifications on your smartphone or tablet.
· Pathlight: Nest Protect glows white as you pass under it at night, lighting your way in the dark.
The smoke + carbon monoxide detector itself has a design similar to our Apple products as it resembles Apple’s previous generation Airport Extreme base station. I really like the idea of silencing an alarm with just a wave. Wrestling with a tiny disengage button in a commotion is the last thing anyone wants. Check out availability information and the official promotional video below: Expand Expanding Close
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