Review
Keep eye on kids with video camera
By Deborah Porterfield / Gannett News Service
Ninja
Pan 'n Tilt Wireless Camera Kit
Price: $260.
Rating: 3 (out of five)
Pro: Play "I Spy"
from your TV or PC.
Con: No overview manual to tie
all the pieces together.
Bottom line: Forget the
company's ads showing images of sexy women by the
poolside. This is the camera you need to keep an eye on
the kids when you're in one room and they're in another.
Information: www.x10.com
|
Even if you have no desire to use the Ninja
Pan 'n Tilt Wireless Camera Kit to spy on hotties by the pool --
something the company's online ads frequently show -- there are
plenty of other ways to use this product.
The $260 package from X10 Wireless Technology
includes an XCam2 wireless video camera with a mounting bracket
and robotic base, PanTilt Pro software, two AC adapters, a
remote control, a video receiver, a video-to-Universal Serial
Bus (USB) adapter and a PC transceiver.
With all these goodies, you have several
options for sneak peeks: You can set the video camera up on the
porch, hook the wireless receiver to the TV and clean the family
room while occasionally glancing at the television screen to
check on your kids playing in the yard. Need a closer look? Use
the included remote control to turn the camera to the left,
right or up and down. You even can program it to sweep across
designated areas.
Not near the TV? That's OK. You can connect a
USB Video Capture Adapter and wireless transceiver to a PC and
keep an eye on what the camera sees while online. You also can
view these images remotely from other computers connected to the
Internet.
This so-called kit has one drawback. The
package itself seems a bit disorganized. Instead of having one
overall manual that connects all the dots, this one comes with
several instruction sheets for the kit's various parts. Plus,
the kit doesn't include a CD with the necessary software. To get
it, you must go online and download it. And while downloading
the software isn't difficult, for a $260 kit, a disc doesn't
seem like too much to ask for.
In spite of such quibbles, setting up the
camera, software and receivers proved no tougher than hooking up
a game console to a TV or a camera to PC. The one difference is
that you need to aim the squarish antennas on the camera and
receiver so they more or less face each other. Depending on the
light and the strength of the wireless signals, the images
either will be fairly sharp or almost impossible to see, with
the TV images generally showing up better than the streaming
images on the computer. Even so, unless you're trying to check
out someone who looks like a model, you don't need a perfect
picture to see a child fall off a scooter or a guest walking
toward the door.
|
