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Group test: Home security cameras<br />
FLIR FX<br />
£149 inc VAT • flir.co.uk/flirfx<br />
Flir is best-known for building thermal cameras that help users<br />
detect household problems such as pest infestations and leaky<br />
pipes. Flir FX is the company’s first home security camera, and at<br />
£149 it’s priced to compete with the Nest Cam – successor to the<br />
popular Dropcam Pro – and other DIY models such as the Netatmo<br />
Welcome and Logitech Circle.<br />
But Flir FX has ambitions beyond home security. If you’re willing<br />
to spend extra for the appropriate accessories, the modular camera<br />
can also can be retrofitted as an outdoor surveillance camera, a<br />
GoPro-like action camera, or a dashboard cam. We only tested it in<br />
its indoor surveillance capacity, and it impressed with its array of<br />
features. But it has some hurdles to overcome before it’s ready to<br />
contend in an already crowded DIY security category.<br />
What you get<br />
The camera comes on a detachable stand, and its power cable can<br />
be connected to this base or directly to the camera. Two internal<br />
batteries – one in the camera and one in the stand – combine for up<br />
to four hours of power, allowing you to untether it for more mobility<br />
or to capture security footage in the event of a power interruption.<br />
Flir optional outdoor enclosure FLIR<br />
You can also order an outdoor housing for a £70 premium over<br />
the standard indoor model. As is becoming more common in this<br />
increasingly competitive category, Flir FX can record video in 1080p<br />
resolution – though it streams in 720p – and it offers a generous<br />
160-degree viewing angle. It’s equipped with an integrated mic and<br />
speaker for two-way audio, and it has infrared ‘night vision’ up to<br />
about 30 feet for operation in low-light indoor conditions.<br />
Flir FX can detect sound, not just motion, and you can set it up<br />
so that either event type will trigger a video recording. To reduce<br />
false alerts, the Flir FX app employs Flir’s SmartZone technology,<br />
which lets you designate monitoring areas on a grid that overlays<br />
the video. Movement in one of these zones will trigger a recording<br />
and push and alert to your mobile device; any motion outside the<br />
specified area will be ignored.<br />
The system’s other compelling feature is Rapid Recaps, which<br />
can condense hours of footage into an activity highlight reel. Rather<br />
than a time-lapse digest that presents a linear chronology of events,<br />
Rapid Recaps compiles all motion activities within a time frame you<br />
specify and compiles them into a single video. The result is you view<br />
all those individual events at once, with timestamps on each moving<br />
object to tell you when it occurred.<br />
Flir Rapid RecapFLIR<br />
Flir’s RapidRecap feature can show you the events it recorded<br />
over a period time, with timestamp overlays on each event. All<br />
recorded footage can be saved locally to an SD card or stored<br />
in the cloud via one of Flir’s subscription offers – and you must<br />
have a subscription plan to create RapidRecaps. Flir FX includes<br />
complimentary access to Free Cloud Basic, which gives you 48<br />
hours of video storage and three RapidRecaps per month. FLIR<br />
Cloud Plus and FLIR Cloud Premium extend storage to seven days<br />
and 30 days for $10 (£6.50) per month and $20 (£13) per month<br />
respectively. Both of these plans come with unlimited RapidRecaps.<br />
If you want to use Flir FX to capture your extreme sports<br />
adventures – terrestrial or underwater – be prepared to shell<br />
out an additional £70 for Flir’s sport camera case. To use it as<br />
an in-car camera, you’ll need the £49 dashboard mount. The<br />
outdoor housing, as we’ve said, costs £70.<br />
Setup and usage<br />
Setting up the Flir FX hardly went smoothly in our tests. The first<br />
camera Flir provided us with wouldn’t power on, and, after it<br />
determined that it may have shipped us a pre-production unit, it sent<br />
us another. This one powered on initially, but we couldn’t complete<br />
the setup process, which involves scanning a QR code on the bottom<br />
of the camera and connecting it to your Wi-Fi network. Despite about<br />
a half-dozen attempts following the in-app prompts, we couldn’t<br />
get the app to recognise the camera. Shortly after, that the camera<br />
stopped powering on and we were unable to revive it despite help<br />
84 www.pcadvisor.co.uk/reviews February 2016 TEST CENTRE
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