7 ms·
Meet the Nest Protect smoke and CO alarm
- apierre 13y agoDoes it get Paul Graham's seal of approval?
- annnnd 13y agoI love the way they make usual objects look good and function properly. Reminds me of Apple and its revolutions (iPhone, iPad, iPod) - but then again, I heard the founders come from Apple?
- jwarren 13y agoYup, Tony Fadell was a VP there, he worked on the iPod and iPhone: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Fadell http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Fadell Matt Rogers was a lead software engineer there in the iPod division: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-rogers/3/8a2/866 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-rogers/3/8a2/866
- coldcode 13y agoThe CEO was the genius behind the iPod and iPhone.
- 6cxs2hd6 13y ago> Reminds me of Apple and its revolutions Reminds me of Bose convincing people to pay $300 for a clock radio. Lest that seem mean-spirited, I was one of the people who bought a Bose Wave radio, and yeah the bass response was excellent for its size, and it looked nice. My point is, you can pick just about any product category and respin it as X for Affluent People. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- jwarren 13y agoI think this is pretty smart. The fire alarm in my small rented flat is pretty close to the kitchen, so I regularly have to try and fan smoke away from my panicking alarm. Looks like a well designed concept, well executed.
- pauletienney 13y agoSo much opportunities out there.
- coldcode 13y agoMan this would be a great place to work.
- raldi 13y agoIf you have any doubt that is a desperately-needed product right now, go read the Amazon reviews for literally any other smoke detector on the market. Frustratingly, this news arrives just weeks too late for us.
- jeanjq 13y agoWhat is wrong with the $7.50 Kidde? http://www.amazon.com/Kidde-Sentry-Battery-Operated-Ionization-Compact/dp/B00002N865 http://www.amazon.com/Kidde-Sentry-Battery-Operated-Ionizati... Reviews seem good.
- uptown 13y agoThe Nest is a photoelectric smoke sensor. The Kidde is an ionization sensor. "Kidde strongly recommends that both ionization and photoelectric smoke alarms be installed to help insure maximum detection of the various types of fires that can occur within the home." More info: http://consumerist.com/2010/08/25/fire-chief-most-smoke-alarms-are-useless-endanger-users/ http://consumerist.com/2010/08/25/fire-chief-most-smoke-alar...
- jeanjq 13y agoInteresting. It's sad, then, that Nest does not emphasise that fact.
- raldi 13y agoWe have this exact brand in our apartment. They (like almost all ionization-based smoke detectors) go off at the drop of a hat. And they're ear-splittingly loud. The kill switch is hard to press, and needs to be pressed every few minutes if you're, say, burning incense. And one day, when the battery gets low, they'll start chirping in the middle of the night, leading to a game of "Which one is it?!" as they somehow manage to make noise frequently enough to prevent sleep but infrequently enough to thwart identification of the dying one. (Smoke detectors' low battery alerts always go off at night because battery output sags when the temperature goes down.)
- jeanjq 13y agoI wonder what battery life is like on this? A typical smoke alarm battery can last years but this appears to have a lot of functions and WiFi and a light. BTW Why do smoke alarm batteries die at night? Because temperature drops and a weak battery's voltage output drops with temperature.
- robmcm 13y agoSo in theory during a fire they should heat up and start working again! Phew...
- hemancuso 13y agohttp://support.nest.com/article/What-is-the-difference-between-Nest-Protect-Wired-120V-and-Nest-Protect-Battery http://support.nest.com/article/What-is-the-difference-betwe... Looks like a couple of years with 6 AA batteries.
- cjrp 13y ago"Multiple years" on 6xAA (or there's a wired version with 3xAA as back up) according to http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/8/4790896/nest-protect-smoke-detector http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/8/4790896/nest-protect-smoke...
- macleanjr 13y agoIn the Wired article[1], there is a graphic that states battery life is seven years, and the batteries can be replaced for $10-$15 off the shelf. [1] http://www.wired.com/business/2013/10/nest-smoke-detector/all/ http://www.wired.com/business/2013/10/nest-smoke-detector/al...
- uptown 13y agoAccording to the site - for the battery-powered version: "6 AA Energizer Ultimate Lithium batteries Long-life batteries designed for multi-year operation" and for the wired version: "3 AA Energizer Ultimate Lithium backup batteries Long-life backup batteries designed for multi-year operation" I suppose it depends how much you use its features like lighting-up your hallway, but that's more-than reasonable in my opinion.
- hemancuso 13y agoI love the Pathlight feature - an integrated motion controlled nightlight is a great idea. A nice example of an incremental feature that helps tell a story about the product and justify the relatively hefty price tag. Something you can talk about when you need to justify a $130 smoke/co alarm to your wife.
- ashergm 13y agoSeems like having a built in motion-detector could be a good entry into home security as well.
- robmcm 13y agoI just found out that in the UK you can get the fire department to come and install free alarms http://www.london-fire.gov.uk/smokealarms.asp http://www.london-fire.gov.uk/smokealarms.asp Lets home they have the budget to stretch to these :p
- arethuza 13y agoI suspect that only applies to people who are at risk, from the same website: "We only target our visits at people and places where we know there is a higher risk of fire. This includes high risk individuals such as older people, especially those living alone, those with mobility, vision and hearing impairment, mental health services users and those liable to intoxication through alcohol/drug use. A combination of these factors will significantly increase the risk from fire."
- robmcm 13y agoI expect they have a quota, a friend at work got them installed and they don't meet that criteria. He said they got 10 year ones, that cost about £15 a pop.
- akilism 13y ago"It’s time to love your smoke and carbon monoxide alarm." lol what?
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- raverbashing 13y ago"But this electrical "noise" can make the Nest fail" Ouch! Looks like they didn't have the experts on that area working on it Switching an inductive load on and off is a pain, and Nest probably didn't want to use "old fashioned" relays (and I agree), but in the end it ends up prone to things like that.
- joezydeco 13y agoAs I understand it, it's not "noise" but small current leakage through the SSRs or triacs or whatever the Nest is using. More modern HVAC systems see this small leakage and assume a very old and crusty mercury thermostat contactor is trying to work. The HVAC's control goes ahead with the heating or A/C compressor circuit.
- raverbashing 13y agoHummm this is possible. Nest maybe should have a "high impedance" mode controller mode.
- raldi 13y agoMy prediction for Nest's next product: a home security system. If your home is already equipped with Nest thermostats and smoke alarms, all their motion sensors are commandeered by the central unit. No new wiring necessary. Edit: Come to think of it, there's probably no need for a central unit, either.
- jessegavin 13y agoI'd buy it.
- themstheones 13y agoIt would be great if your security system could detect an intruder, then make the house uncomfortably warm, thereby encouraging the intruder to leave.
- derekp7 13y agoSounds good, but most of the time a burglary is over with in a few minutes. Not quite enough time to get the house warm. Now a high pitched whine with strobing lights and cutting out regular lights might work, although it could be a safety thing that would get you sued. How about playing a recording of some old farmer's voice saying get out of here, with the sound of a shotgun getting cocked, etc. Or, for an outside perimeter alarm, turn on the lawn sprinklers.
- mynameisvlad 13y agoWouldn't be that hard, come to think of it. Perhaps add a few new detectors. Could use the fire alarms as intruder alarms, and then you'd just need to connect to authorities/central service and you're golden.
- syncerr 13y agoIt seems odd that they aren't leveraging an additional temperature reading. Some detectors have a heat alarm (not this one). So perhaps a firmware update will bring this. We'll have to wait for the ifixit teardown. Also, does anyone know how successful WiFi jammers are at negating current systems like this?
- Udo 13y agoThe "wave to cancel the alarm" function bothers me. What if there's a fire and there's movement in the room, for example because the cat jumps in front of the sensor or something falls over?
- dingaling 13y ago> I lay in bed, sleepless as usual, watching the smoke alarm blink. It blinked and blinked and I realized I had no idea what that meant. Whereas this new device glows green, or sometimes yellow. Or other colours. What does that mean? I'll have to check the manual anyway, or wait for the 'human voice' to explain. The beauty of smoke detectors is that they are a minimal set of electronics required to perform the task. This minimises chances of failure, since the circuitry is sufficiently simple that it can be understood. Perhaps it can even be formally proven? Not sure if that has been done for any end-user device. Once you start building an ARM computer, OS, wifi, SMS etc into such a device the complexity and failure conditions balloon. Edit: this device _might_ have an isolated, decoupled sensor unit but it still has to interact with the more complex upper-level functions in order to signal an alarm.
- speg 13y agoThat's why there are two systems, one for all the fancy stuff and the other handles the regular smoke detector stuff.
- Qworg 13y ago"Perhaps it can even be formally proven?" That is the whole purpose of standards organizations and testing organizations. UL has been in this business for a long time: http://www.ul.com http://www.ul.com
- PeterisP 13y ago"wait for the 'human voice' to explain" is an orders of magnitude better solution than the current one, which basically amounts to 'let's hope that I guessed correctly what it means'.
- brianbreslin 13y agoI think the most interesting feature is the one at the end. How it talks to your thermostat and can shut off your heater/furnace if it detects CO, which is often the source.
- ape4 13y agoMy alarms are connected to the house power -- no batteries. That seems like the best way. Perhaps battery for power failures.
- cpenner461 13y agoI bought a Nest thermostat last year and in general have been pretty happy with it. We have 2 HVAC units in our house (upstairs/downstairs), but I've only only bought one for the downstairs primarily b/c of the up front cost. This problem seems to be exacerbated with a smoke alarm where most (or at least a lot of?) people will require multiple smoke alarms. My two-story house should have 3 or 4 detectors to cover all the living/sleeping areas, but even just one detector is enough of an investment to think twice before plunking down $130 per unit vs several of the $7.50 Kidde linked by jeanjq (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6514777 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6514777). With the thermostat there's at least potential cost savings over time, but that doesn't exist with a smoke detector. Granted, the benefit of potentially saving your life in the event of a fire is priceless, but I think that convincing folks of the value here is going to be harder than with the thermostat. Also, sensors in any smoke detector "expire" after some length of time (8-10 yrs - http://www.usfa.fema.gov/citizens/home_fire_prev/alarms/ http://www.usfa.fema.gov/citizens/home_fire_prev/alarms/), so this is a semi-recurring cost. Also discussed in that article is the type of detection technology. This is using a photo-electric sensor vs a more traditional ionization sensor. Both have their benefits/tradeoffs, the ideal scenario seems to be to include both (slow smoldering fires vs hot and fast). (I've been researching these a bit lately for our house, would happily defer to an actual expert in the field though). I love (and am tempted by) the technology and polish/ease of use that they've done here, but the cost seems to be more significant when compared to the current alternatives.
- mbell 13y agoGreat design. One word of caution before anyone runs out and replaces all your smoke detectors: Ask your local fire inspector about it. Fire safety rules are very convoluted and very region/state/city specific and I've run up against seemingly irrational rules in various locales in multiple past lives. It's better to find out the rules up front than to run into issues with an inspection or even worse, get into a fight with an insurance company about it if the worst does happen. I also highly doubt these detectors would fly at all in an commercial settings, i.e. don't go replacing the detectors in your office without a long chat with your fire inspector.
- relaxatorium 13y ago$130 is a tough sell when comparison shopping for alarms, but it's probably a much more interesting value proposition when your damn smoke alarm goes off when you're sleeping/cooking/taking a hot shower, you try to deal with it, and then you look to see if there are any alarms that exist which are not completely inscrutable. The value proposition vs. the thermostadt seems less "smart vs. dumb" or "ugly vs. pretty" than "comprehensible vs. incomprehensible", or "infuriating vs. not infuriating".
- hershel 13y agoThere's this alarm[1],which costs half the price , offers talking warning, photoelectric detection and in home wireless alarms through the house(if there's a fire in the basement , you can know at the bedroom. It would be pretty cheap for the company to offer small gateway that connects the alarm to the net. The major difference between this and the nest is design, but does it justify doubling the price, especially when you need one for each room ? [1]http://www.amazon.com/First-Alert-SCO501CN-3ST-SCO500-Combination/dp/B000EVO7C2/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1381242086&sr=8-2&keywords=smoke+detector+wireless+talking http://www.amazon.com/First-Alert-SCO501CN-3ST-SCO500-Combin...
- ecopoesis 13y agoLooks nice but $130 is expensive. I have 9 detectors in the house to comply with code. This is going to get expensive.
- codex 13y agoIs this product z-wave compatible?